Any interactive sketchup to communicate with users?

antantantant · 18 Jun 2008, 15:55

Hi all,

I'm working on this project in which I want people to evaluate on different vehicle styles and new styles can be generated according to their response. I've written up some ruby codes that I can generate vehicles parametrically and convert them into set of jpgs.

The question is that How can I make my website interactive with users, or is it possible with SU, Ruby and Javascript? I have no experience in this but clearly I need to have sketchup running in the background, right?

Anyone has any idea about this, please help. Thank you all!

p.s. I also find Papervision3D to be promising, any comments?

-Max

tbd · 18 Jun 2008, 16:09

you can do it using webdialogs. but you need to post some pics showing your idea if you want us to give valuable feedback.

antantantant · 18 Jun 2008, 17:21

Thanks there!
What I need to do is to show random designs to people and use GA to converge their choice. This requires my sketchup to iteratively produce new designs and publish them online to massive users. Is webdialog capable of doing this? Anyway, let me do a research on this.

Open to any advice and comment!

tbd · 18 Jun 2008, 18:12

webdialogs are client based, you need a server solution. best is to export your models (this way you can cache it) and show them (maybe even using web exporter)

antantantant · 18 Jun 2008, 18:25

Appreciate it! But what do you mean by "Client based" "Server solution" (Sorry for this dumb question) and "web exporter"?

I've tried .wrl and hyperscom to export my model, but the former one needs plug-in (not good for survey) and the latter does not support ruby call (I cannot export hyperscom model automatically, can I?)

tbd · 18 Jun 2008, 18:37

web exporter

client based - it works only on the user machine
server solution - you need a computer (www address) where the user connects to see your designs

antantantant · 18 Jun 2008, 18:56

Thanks again! I'm using web exporter right now. (That's what I mean "convert them into set of jpgs")

But the problem is that these jpgs I uploaded need to be updated according to user behavior. However, unlike java3d or flash, the mechanism of updating these jpgs is not on the web page but on my local sketchup (Am I right?) This is what I'm concerned about? Any solution?

tbd · 18 Jun 2008, 19:16

you don't have an infinite number of designs, so export the more common ones and you will have a fast preview.

you just need analyse the workflow and see what you can optimize - 10% of the cases satisfy 90% of the users

antantantant · 18 Jun 2008, 19:43

Hmm... reasonable. But we are really looking for innovative (weird, maybe) ones rather than common ones. (It is Reeeeesearch) So any solution here?