SU Ruby + XML

thomthom · 1 Jul 2009, 17:23

I'm looking for a solution to parse XML files. I read that normal Ruby, since 1.8.0 comes with REXML. But that's not available in the SU Ruby.
I managed to find Ruby 1.8.0 Build 10 - hoping to be able to pick out only the REXML files, but it's an installation file. I'm not sure what ahppens if install a different ruby package. Will it affect SU?

Is there some other XML solutions you lot have used?

NewOne · 1 Jul 2009, 17:48

@thomthom said:

I'm looking for a solution to parse XML files. I read that normal Ruby, since 1.8.0 comes with REXML. But that's not available in the SU Ruby.
I managed to find Ruby 1.8.0 Build 10 - hoping to be able to pick out only the REXML files, but it's an installation file. I'm not sure what ahppens if install a different ruby package. Will it affect SU?

Is there some other XML solutions you lot have used?

Try to find which files are added after you install REXML, then copy that files in SU, paying attention how you include in ruby files (adequate paths)! See how I did with Ruby MySql http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=19719#p163327

Jim · 1 Jul 2009, 18:24

I packaged rexml up in a custom svg plugin for someone here...

let me find it.

Not sure if it is helpful, but here it is. http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=13475

thomthom · 1 Jul 2009, 18:26

I noticed there was reports on Sandbox tools not working with the SVG plugin. Is that due any of the files in that package?

Jim · 1 Jul 2009, 18:32

Ah yes, there is a file from the Ruby Language named set.rb that conflicts with SketchUp. Forgot about that..

thomthom · 1 Jul 2009, 18:38

Something that conflicts with the SU Set class?

Is it needed by REXML?

tbd · 2 Jul 2009, 08:06

I would not go with REXML as is the slowest parser - see http://www.rubyinside.com/ruby-xml-performance-benchmarks-1641.html

"Note that the parsing time is in seconds and the Y-axis is logarithmic. Yes, Hpricot took over a minute, and REXML took over two minutes, while Nokogiri and libxml-ruby came in at a few seconds each"

thomthom · 2 Jul 2009, 08:12

Ah. That's interesting. I hoped to find something like that, but didn't when I was searching around.
So either Nokogiri or Hpricot. Anyone had any experience with them? Will they work with SU's stripped down Ruby 1.8.0?

sacch · 20 Jul 2009, 15:00

I am also looking for a solution to parse XML using SU ruby. I am writing a gas kinetics open source code which requires visualization of molecular structure and some energy related surfaces. It will be great if someone here can share more information on their experiences such as if anyone has tried but failed, or if there is any possible solution.

thomthom · 17 Oct 2009, 23:46

Anyone got any idea if I can use nokogiri with SU? http://nokogiri.rubyforge.org/nokogiri/
Says either 1.8 or 1.9 - but the install is a linux sudo command - can't find any way to download the package manually...

tbd · 18 Oct 2009, 13:07

http://rubyforge.org/frs/?group_id=7062&release_id=37319

download the .gem
rename to .gz or open it with Total Commander
have a look inside

or

gem install nokogiri if you have Ruby installed with Gems support

or

git clone git://github.com/tenderlove/nokogiri.git

thomthom · 18 Oct 2009, 13:33

@unknownuser said:

gem install nokogiri if you have Ruby installed with Gems support

I had Ruby installed so I entered the command into a console.


C;\Users\Thomas>gem install nokogiri
Successfully installed nokogiri-1.3.3-x86-mswin32
1 gem installed
Installing ri documentation for nokogiri-1.3.3-x86-mswin32...
Updating ri class cache with 2176 classes...
Installing RDoc documentation for nokogiri-1.3.3-x86-mswin32...

C;\Users\Thomas>

Seems to have worked. But how do I get the files required added and working with SU ruby?

tbd · 18 Oct 2009, 16:46

search in the gems directory for nokogiri (the lib and ext directory). you can make a test outside Sketchup and use ProcMon to look what files it loads and copy those in SU Plugins subdir

toxicvoxel · 18 Oct 2009, 16:59

Having explored a few options in the past I settled on writing a .DLL in .NET that uses the powerful XML query functionality of LINQ to to do the data crunching. By doing this you could call a simple function through COM to retrieve/update specific node and attribute values from SU Ruby. If you do not have knowledge of any of the main .NET languages you could possibly explore using IronRuby for this purpose.

thomthom · 18 Oct 2009, 17:07

@unknownuser said:

search in the gems directory for nokogiri (the lib and ext directory). you can make a test outside Sketchup and use ProcMon to look what files it loads and copy those in SU Plugins subdir

I copied nokogiri.rb and nokogiri folder from the lib folder to the SU Plugin folder.

When I start SU I get an error message:


Error Loading File nokogiri.rb
126; The specified module could not be found.   - C;/Program Files (x86)/Google/Google SketchUp 7/Plugins/nokogiri/1.8/nokogiri.so

Which is strange - because the file is there; And a Console test:


File.exist?('C;/Program Files (x86)/Google/Google SketchUp 7/Plugins/nokogiri/1.8/nokogiri.so')
true

So why it claims it's not there - I have no idea.

thomthom · 18 Oct 2009, 17:11

@toxicvoxel said:

Having explored a few options in the past I settled on writing a .DLL in .NET that uses the powerful XML query functionality of LINQ to to do the data crunching. By doing this you could call a simple function through COM to retrieve/update specific node and attribute values from SU Ruby. If you do not have knowledge of any of the main .NET languages you could possibly explore using IronRuby for this purpose.

I've briefly sniffed at C# previously - but I have no idea on how to do what you suggest.

I find it very odd that there isn't a built in XML support in Ruby considering how common XML is.

...maybe I can send the raw XML content to a Webdialog and have a JS parse it - feeding it back to Ruby. Not ideal - but I can't get any other solutions to work.

Jim · 18 Oct 2009, 18:24

It's probably just a matter of getting the paths and require's right. Sometimes when require'ing a .so you might need to respect it's capitalization.

requires dezip.so'

require 'Dezip'

Append your $LOAD_PATH to include the library folder:

On windows (in SetchUp):

$LOAD_PATH.concat eval(c:/ruby/bin/ruby.exe -e "p $:" )

This appends the installed Ruby $LOAD_PATH to SketchUp. (Not well tested by me)

thomthom · 18 Oct 2009, 18:30

I'd like to make the lib work by not having full Ruby installed. Want to ship it as a normal SU plugin.

toxicvoxel · 18 Oct 2009, 18:43

In basic terms this article may be helpful to explain the principle:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/265879/can-ruby-import-a-net-dll

If you use IronRuby you may be able to write the XML parser .NET class by leveraging your curent ruby skills.
(You will need to do some homework to confirm that you could make the IronRuby .NET class com-visible though.)
Alternatively if you know java you could use J#.NET.

tbd · 18 Oct 2009, 19:04

I will try to look tomorrow when I get on my Windows machine and make a SU friendly package of a XML parser.

It all depends on what XML files you need to parse - if they are static, then you can write a specific XML parser yourself and save the troubles. I wouldn't use XML for anything, hate that format