# User Interface

Dash is an ecosystem that sits on top of Unreal Engine 5. Its user interface aims to be as minimal as possible, showing you only what you need, without hiding anything from you either.\
When you start Dash, you'll notice there are two main panels: The Dash bar, which is a vertical widget that sits at the top center of your viewport, and the Tools Panel, which is pinned to the right of your viewport, and is where you control your Dash tools.

When you install Dash, its icon <img src="https://1971338676-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FYp9tAkqjcwFDufAaviIa%2Fuploads%2FTfhRYgcdcMxh4CpeVtoc%2FIcon128.png?alt=media&#x26;token=8b9b2601-48c4-48fb-94d0-d8654944eb9b" alt="" data-size="line"> will be visible in the Unreal Engine toolbar:

<figure><img src="https://1971338676-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FYp9tAkqjcwFDufAaviIa%2Fuploads%2FijzRfe7znXbonqgYzSkp%2Fimage.png?alt=media&#x26;token=750e6bbd-fe15-4625-9185-bbd4144cec5b" alt=""><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

From there, click on it, and the Dash bar will show up.

{% hint style="warning" %}
If clicking on it doesn't show up the Dash bar, check this [**FAQ guide**](https://docs.polygonflow.io/getting-started#clicking-the-dash-icon-does-not-work) on how to solve the problem. If that doesn't work, please reach out to us on our Discord or <support@polygonflow.io>
{% endhint %}

## Dash Bar

This widget is your main gateway to Dash, and is jampacked with features:

* <mark style="color:blue;">**Content**</mark>: Dash features an amazing content browser, with Megascans & Polyhaven support, custom assets support, an IES library, and the ability to access all your assets from other UE projects! In this category, you will also find the reference image board tool, similar to Miro and PureRef.&#x20;
* <mark style="color:blue;">**Place**</mark>: This shows you a dropdown full of tools that help you with content placement. Features range from pivot setting to physics-based asset placement, and much more.
* <mark style="color:blue;">**Scatter**</mark>: This is where all the cool scatter tools of Dash reside: You can scatter on a surface, along a spline, scatter decals, scatter in a volume, etc…
* <mark style="color:blue;">**Create**</mark>: This is an extensive list of tools that help you create objects, from geometry & curve primitives, to cameras, vines, fog cards, etc…
* <mark style="color:blue;">**Edit**</mark>: This is the main properties panel through which all your Dash tools will be edited.

<figure><img src="https://1971338676-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FYp9tAkqjcwFDufAaviIa%2Fuploads%2FPcChg0TS02L1wqAxVUOu%2FUnrealEditor_nzJFNiCy3P.png?alt=media&#x26;token=9b91812e-0732-4951-b6aa-809b982dc408" alt=""><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

You can make the dash bar smaller by going to the menu icon on the left, then selecting **Toggle Scale** to swap between full, minimal, and icon only. The shortcut for this is **CTRL+E**.

<figure><img src="https://1971338676-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FYp9tAkqjcwFDufAaviIa%2Fuploads%2FztwY9XbuxPEJ7YtufFxT%2Fdash_bar_minimal.png?alt=media&#x26;token=3ddf8a55-fec5-4175-a5ff-e20b3a5a07bb" alt="" width="375"><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

The “<mark style="color:blue;">**Find tools**</mark>” text area is where you can search for tools. For example, we have a really useful tool called “draw curves” which allows you to interactively draw native UE splines. You can open it from the Create menu, or by just typing “draw curves” in the search field, then hitting Enter when you see it suggested. A lot of these tools are often in one of the menus; i.e. Draw Curves is in **Create -> Curve Tools**.\
But the search bar has a lot more tools broadly, from simple things like toggling nanite/collision on your selected objects, to more specific tools like the Channel Packer.

And finally, you have the Dash logo, which you can drag around to unsnap the Dash bar from its default position and move it around your screen, or double-click to expand/collapse the list of all tools available in Dash.

<figure><img src="https://1971338676-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FYp9tAkqjcwFDufAaviIa%2Fuploads%2FqZVc2gYY5geTMUmP59nz%2Fdash_logo_double_click.gif?alt=media&#x26;token=56f6c05b-77a5-476b-ad8f-44d4459de0b2" alt=""><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

The Dash bar is responsive, meaning scaling the UE viewport will adapt its position and scale too.\
You can disable this behavior by clicking on the dots menu, then **Toggle Responsive UI**.

{% embed url="<https://streamable.com/opzg1l>" %}

### Dash AI Assistant

To help you get the most out of Dash, the product ships with an AI assistant you can speak to.\
It is trained on this documentation, and will do its best to answer your questions, such as:

> * *How do I mask objects by proximity?*
> * *Where can I find my license key?*
> * *Where do I find physics tools?*
> * *I'm unable to scatter more assets after 1.0 when using surface scatter.*
> * *etc...*

<figure><img src="https://1971338676-files.gitbook.io/~/files/v0/b/gitbook-x-prod.appspot.com/o/spaces%2FYp9tAkqjcwFDufAaviIa%2Fuploads%2F9VOJgOimDbk1uERn6I9Q%2Fimage.png?alt=media&#x26;token=c6406694-3603-4534-bd9b-80ddc8d1c0d8" alt=""><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

Like most modern AIs, this assistant is not perfect, and occasionally make mistakes. Based on our testing, it seems to be helpful at dealing with most issues users encounter, and we've made sure to include links to our discord, documentation, and support email in the assistant window, just so you know where to reach out in case it's not helpful.\
We've also exposed a *History* button that helps you see all the questions you've asked during your UE session; meaning from the moment you started it, 'till the moment you closed it.

<details>

<summary>Does Polygonflow save my questions &#x26; AI answers on their servers?</summary>

Yes we do.\
We use that data to better improve Dash, and only that. For example, we might see that a lot of users ask how to scatter moss, and we'll take it as a signal that we need to ship a moss preset for the tool Surface Scatter.\
We might also notice that the answers from the AI assistant have a pattern of being unhelpful in a certain way, and that would be a good signal for us to adjust and deploy it again.

</details>

{% embed url="<https://streamable.com/8qrl08>" %}

The assistant is limited to 25 questions per session, after which we usually recommend you to just read out to us and we'll troubleshoot the issue with you. You could of course just restart UE5 to ask more questions, but at that point, one of our developers would likely be a better assistant :smile:


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