looks as if hou.ui.displayMessage is a modal popup, in that
it blocks waiting for user input so it can return a value.

Is there a way to kill this dialog without taking down the entire
houdini process? Is there a way to popup these messages so
that they dont block houdini? Particularly when they are just info
popups it seems excessive that the control of the main houdini
thread is suspended until the user accepts the dialog.

We have seen situation where a user will fail to accept a popup,
leave for a period of time so that their screen saver comes up,
and when returning the popup fails to refresh so there is no ok,
button to hit. This means the main houdini process cant be restored
and we have no choice but to kill it. Of course, i wouldn't expect
autosave to kick in while the dialog is waiting to be clicked either.

Doesn't look like it I'm afraid.

Ok, thanks.

Is it possible to write something to the status bar of houdini using HOM?
This might be a good alternative to a popup for user feedback.

Try hou.ui.setStatusMessage().

is this an H11 thing? We're on 10.0.345


>>> hou.ui.setStatusMessage('asdf')
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “<console>”, line 1, in <module>
AttributeError: ‘ui’ object has no attribute ‘setStatusMessage’

Yes, it is only available in Houdini 11.