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    [Plugin] Import STL files

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    • Didier BurD Offline
      Didier Bur
      last edited by

      Hi
      I'll see what I can do. Code exists also in su2pov for instance so it is just a question of time (which is hard to find these days for me...)
      Regards,

      DB

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      • C Offline
        casey344
        last edited by

        First, thank you for posting the utility - getting this to work will save us so much time.

        My STL file is not importing properly. I get the prompt to specify scale then a jumbled version of what I am importing. See image below.

        I am using Sketchup 7.0. Any ideas what I am doing wrong?

        Thank you.


        Screen Snaper Image.jpg

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        • Didier BurD Offline
          Didier Bur
          last edited by

          Hi,

          @unknownuser said:

          I am using Sketchup 7.0. Any ideas what I am doing wrong?

          Not at all. It can be aproblem with SU7, or a problem with the STL file. Post it here so I can check it.
          Regards,

          DB

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          • C Offline
            casey344
            last edited by

            Thanks for offering to help.

            You should be able to pick it up here ...

            Link to file:
            https://download.yousendit.com/bVlCSXR3Mm1wTVYzZUE9PQ

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            • Didier BurD Offline
              Didier Bur
              last edited by

              AAARGGHHHH 71 Mb !
              Downloading it now, but I guess the file is too big for SU...

              DB

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              • C Offline
                casey344
                last edited by

                Sorry, not my doing. 😕

                Manufacturer sent it that way.

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                • J Offline
                  jwelin
                  last edited by

                  Thanks for the work on this plugin. I have a three questions:

                  Is there a limit to the level of nested groups/components it exports?

                  The exported STL seems to be incompatible with some applications. Rhino sees the geometry, for instance, while Magics does not. Also an SU2stl generated stl, opened in Rhino and resaved as an STL is much smaller in file size. Would you like to see examples?

                  Is there a way to call this plugin from another? I have a need to batch export.

                  John Welin
                  architectural model maker
                  Chicago, USA

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                  • Didier BurD Offline
                    Didier Bur
                    last edited by

                    Hi,

                    @unknownuser said:

                    The exported STL seems to be incompatible with some applications

                    There are several STL formats which slightly differ in their syntax. The one I have choosen to export is the most standard one, as defined here for instance:
                    http://www.gom.com/CONTAINER/files/sp_stl_en.pdf
                    or here:
                    http://mech.fsv.cvut.cz/~dr/papers/Lisbon04/node2.html
                    Maybe some applications do not support every kind of STL ?

                    @unknownuser said:

                    an SU2stl generated stl, opened in Rhino and resaved as an STL is much smaller in file size

                    I don't have Rhino, but I suppose that it saves an STL in the binary format, while my script saves it in ASCII (text), which is 8 times bigger (average). You can see the same differences between an ascii dxf and a binary dxf (dxb) for instance.

                    @unknownuser said:

                    Is there a limit to the level of nested groups

                    No. Not tested here but as a recursive method is involved, there should be no limits.
                    Components are NOT supported, groups are.

                    @unknownuser said:

                    Is there a way to call this plugin from another?

                    Unfortunately no.

                    Regards,

                    DB

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                    • thomthomT Offline
                      thomthom
                      last edited by

                      @didier bur said:

                      @unknownuser said:

                      Is there a limit to the level of nested groups

                      No. Not tested here but as a recursive method is involved, there should be no limits.
                      Components are NOT supported, groups are.

                      I found that recursive methods might cause SU to bugsplat. http://www.sketchucation.com/forums/scf/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=15585&p=120726 I had a method that looped over entities to find connected entities which used a recursive method. Had to change it to an iterative method.

                      Thomas Thomassen — SketchUp Monkey & Coding addict
                      List of my plugins and link to the CookieWare fund

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                      • Didier BurD Offline
                        Didier Bur
                        last edited by

                        @unknownuser said:

                        I found that recursive methods might cause SU to bugsplat.

                        Bad news 😞

                        DB

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                        • thomthomT Offline
                          thomthom
                          last edited by

                          Mind you, it happens when you do many recursions. When crawling geometry you quickly end up with hundreds iterations. So if the script never goes that deep you're ok. But it's something to be aware of.

                          Thomas Thomassen — SketchUp Monkey & Coding addict
                          List of my plugins and link to the CookieWare fund

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                          • N Offline
                            NewOne
                            last edited by

                            When exporting STL from SolidWorks, here is an option to put all geometry in same file or to create separate file for each part. Mr. Didier Bur, could this script to be modified in a manner that allows multiple file selection and each geometry to be made group (or component if there are more identical parts) ? Or to specify a folder where stl part files are located?

                            Thank you.

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                            • Didier BurD Offline
                              Didier Bur
                              last edited by

                              Dropped into the to-do list 😉

                              DB

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                              • GaieusG Offline
                                Gaieus
                                last edited by

                                bump
                                (sorry Dider - no practical reason just testing some moderation stuff)

                                Gai...

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                                • S Offline
                                  stefkeB
                                  last edited by

                                  Minor improvement:

                                  On line 54 you call the "openpanel" method when exporting. This should be "savepanel", so the user gets the correct dialog displayed. Still works on Windows but not on OSX, where you need to point to an already existing file.

                                  Also, the default "." file location could be replaced with ENV['USER'] or ENV['HOME'] or preferably the current file folder, as to make it more convenient. With 'USER' it works much better for me on OSX.

                                  (I refer to the unscrambled file, obviously, not the compacted one -- maybe the reason why people think it is a binary file)

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                                  • Didier BurD Offline
                                    Didier Bur
                                    last edited by

                                    Hi,
                                    @stefkeB: I'm using openpanel when importing, and savepanel when exporting. So I don't understand what you're talking about, propably you have an old version, because the latest one is v1.3. (Nov 2009) and is scrambled in a RBS file (so unreadable).

                                    DB

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                                    • thomthomT Offline
                                      thomthom
                                      last edited by

                                      I've been looking around at the various ruby based importers for SketchUp and I see that no one uses the Importer class. If this class is used the importer can be found in the native import list which would be very nice.
                                      http://code.google.com/apis/sketchup/docs/ourdoc/importer.html

                                      Thomas Thomassen — SketchUp Monkey & Coding addict
                                      List of my plugins and link to the CookieWare fund

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                                      • charly2008C Offline
                                        charly2008
                                        last edited by

                                        Hi Didier,

                                        I have tried the tool in Sketchup 8. The Unit support appears and I can choose my unit but then nothing happens. I've attached the stl files which I downloaded from Internet.

                                        Charly


                                        knot.zip


                                        brain-gear.zip

                                        He who makes no mistakes, makes nothing

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                                        • Didier BurD Offline
                                          Didier Bur
                                          last edited by

                                          Hi Charly,
                                          Your files are binary STL files. The script cannot read such files, but only ASCII STL format.
                                          You can convert binary STL's to ASCII with Meshlab (free) for instance.
                                          Regards,

                                          DB

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                                          • charly2008C Offline
                                            charly2008
                                            last edited by

                                            Hi Didier,

                                            Thank you for the explanation. I learned something more to it.

                                            Charly

                                            He who makes no mistakes, makes nothing

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