A way that kinda works to add a shelfsets automatically to houdini

Coding mad hacks
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1

This will use the callback hou.ui.waitUntil to check if the desktop has changed to add the shelf set to the user’s shelfbar. having it exit was hard but hou._isExiting is a thing!

from functools import cache
from typing import Callable

import hou
import os
import time
import logging

log = logging.getLogger('my.houdini.uiready')

@cache
def initial_desktop_name():
    return hou.ui.curDesktop().name()

def throttle(callbacks : list[Callable], delay=0.5):
    """pulled from hou.ui docs. only run callback every 0.5 seconds"""
    last_check = [0.0]
    def wrapper():
        now = time.time()
        if hou._isExiting():
            return True
        if now < last_check[0] + delay:
            return False
        last_check[0] = now
        return any(callback() for callback in callbacks)
    return wrapper

def has_desktop_changed():
    """Check if stored value has changed."""
    return hou.ui.curDesktop().name() != initial_desktop_name()

def update_events():
    """Will cycle changes any time user changes their desktop opened."""
    while wait((has_desktop_changed,)):
        if has_desktop_changed():
            initial_desktop_name.cache_clear()
            add_shelf()


def add_shelf():
    shelf_name = "my_shelf_name"
    cmd = f'shelfdock add {shelf_name}'
    hou.hscript(cmd)

def wait(func):
    hou.ui.waitUntil(throttle(func, delay=0.5))
    return not hou._isExiting()

def main():
    try:
        add_shelf()
        update_events()
    except Exception as e:
        log.exception(e)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()
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