Hi TBD I have just worte a mail for Smustard - is it possible to upgrade - or am I supposed to pay $5 for the upgrade ? Btw - nice to be in so close contact to the plugin developers. This is sure something that makes Sketchup a very special program Thanks Jorgensen

@jim said: Is it worth working on a PluginMenuManager, similar to ExtensionManager for the Plugin menu? Will the next version of SketchUp have better menu support? We hope so. There were several attempts to organize the Plugins menu - you know the Organizer.rb by - I think it was - RickW? I also tried it (extensionmanager.rb), but we all have the problem, that accessing submenus in a later process isn't possible at the moment. You won't believe, some nights ago a thought about a way to write on own manager for the plugins. But my idea has one disadvantage: You have to modify all plugin scripts (being not extensions) in one line. azuby

Thanx a bunch TIG

I've integrated both methods to the d/Code plugin: encrypt files with Scrambler.exe encode code with the other method Maybe anyone needs it and doesn't like to use the command line. (The scrambler isn't provided with the plugin, you have to get it on your own.) azuby

Thanks. I have found it, there is an application at the root of SketchUp SDK which is called Scrambler.exe. You just need to run it from command prompt and pass the name of your Ruby file. It will generate a new file with the same name and RBS extension. I think this is the best way to protect your routines by now. Best regards, Fernando.

Consider this a bump. I am looking for the exact same thing (I think). What I am doing is nesting some face-me components inside another component that I am making a bunch of copies of. I am then rotating each one of those slightly differently which also rotates the axis of the nested components. I then effectively move the components out by exploding the nesting component and I would like to get all the face-me components to match the global axis. But in my instance, they have now been scaled and I would like to retain that scale. Any readers to this thread have any ideas?

While you're starting to Smoove some geometry, press Shift. Smoove will now work normal to the faces. If you're working on a low-poly model where every edge counts, use Scale. You get full 3D control of every edge that way. And there are several move scripts that will nudge around selected bits of geometry. 2 use the keyboard arrow keys. One uses a wizard.

@jim said: You could also use a "master" scene that would reset the model when selected. And there is the File > Revert menu option, which will revert the model back to the state when first opened. Checked my "file revert". My revert is grey out, and I haven't found any way to ungrey the revert. So what do I need to do to use revert? Ken Oops, never mind. Was looking at a file that I had not done anything to, so when I added a new section, saw that revert was not greyed. So, thanks for at least making me aware of the revert option, because I sometimes can realy mess up my work. Ken again

Thanks guys. That's just the info I needed. The Ruby support on these forums is outstanding! Keep up the good work everybody!

Thx Didier!

i delete the skins layer thats generated and add my own coverings - drywall, plywood, insulation, etc... since its easier to control, split on layers, and apply materials individually so the cut sheet script will apportion things correctly (lumber vs sheet goods). otherwise - push-pull to adjust the size of each. it would be great to have a unified version for both metric and imperial as well as real covering layers for typical constructs or options to adjust - like exterior wall vs interior wall, size of drywall, insulation or not, exterior ply or not, etc...

I think the plan is to move all native SU rubies to the Tools folder and leave the Plugins folder free for 3rd party stuff. There are so many rubies now that the temptation is to simply copy the entire Plugins folder when you upgrade, rather than reinstall them all one at a time. When I tried this on the V6 Beta test, including sketchup.rb, langhandler.rb etc. it proved fairly disastrous.

Thanks for showing me the way !

TIG, I've made a discovery. Evidently I have a different version of Grow on my machine at work thatn at home. The one at home gives me an arrow to set the center of the grow operation and three different dialog boxes with the second covering scaling including the option to have exponential or linear scaling. The version at work, which I downloaded from Didier's library today doesn't give me those options or the arrow. Hmmm...... Maybe I have an old version at work? But. I have a puzzle about the version I have at home. I'm trying to create a series of circles that get smaller as they go up. In the version at work, I entered a scale of 0.9 (for both X and Y scaling) and the circles got smaller as they went up. The version I have on my home machine makes progressively larger circles with that same 0.9 for X and Y. I tried a -0.9 but that doesn't help either.

Hi TIG, we have a new code for energy calculation of non-residential buildings in germany (DIN 18599), which is a national implementation of the EU regulation on "energy efficency in buildings". In small houses you only had to get the four facades, a few windows, a roof and a floor to describe the building. The new code lists 33 different profiles (single office, group office, classroom, retail, auditorium, hotel room, restaurant, kitchen, archive, workshop,...) with many underlying parameters such as duration of daily use, duration of heating, cooling and air conditioning, temperature, strength of lighting, internal energy sources (persons, PCs, lighting,...). The problem now is that one building might have between 4 and 10 different zones/usage profiles, so one facade must get splitted and the surface area including windows has to be calculated for each zone. I have done this manually from plans and have written a very complex Excel-sheet to evaluate the zones and get the effective area of walls, ceilings, windows, etc. for each zone. Every surface must be sorted by orientation and type of construction. This data has to be transferred to my energy simulation software. What I need is a 3D-Editor to build a simplified 3d model (--> Sketchup) and a possibility to group spaces as rooms, assign information to them (profile/zone, ground area, temp, ...) and extract the information into a database. This database must provide 3 to 4 lists (list of zones, list of rooms, list of elements, maybe list of element layers, each including special infos) that can be exported to external software. To make it a little bit more complicated: Usually you only have exterior elements which can cause energy losses. But if you have interior elements with different temperatures on each side, you have to consider those, too. So I need a script, that can not only calculate the area, but also differentiate between areas to outside air, to outside soil, to inside rooms with lower temp, ... On my wish list would be also a routine that marks geometry problems and a interface to export directly via txt-file into my energy simulation prog. Okay, that's it in short. Do you think, this is possible? I don't know anything about Ruby Scripts, but I guess that kind of database would be a bit too complicated... Looking forward to your answer! Leo

JC> Go to this link and pickup this FREE program..It has a Fantastic "bend" function.. http://www.cbmodelpro.com/forum.html ...(You may have to type it in as I can't seem to get links to work..) Richard

There was an area script written some time ago, but I can't remember the name or the author (TBD maybe?). It updated when you made changes, but was far from perfect. I cannot find in on my system anymore. It was not fully developed but showed great promise. Maybe someone else can remember it.

Klaudius's k-tools.rb has long offered an 'L' command that's effectively a 'fillet'. You enter a radius and pick the edges (o radius extends/trims them at the same angle without a radius. However since this tool erases edges and replaces them with new shorter edges plus an arc you loose any faces... so I'd suggest that if the edges have a shared face then you draw the new arc and erase the then spare bits of edge that get left over - away from the arc circumference - so that the pre-existing face remains with its new perimeter... No need to reinvent the wheel just rework Klaudius's ideas ?

Yes, the size problem is strange. I know that when you put more spaces in the prompt value it works prompts=["help file............"] but why this ? No logical explanation...