Moving Smoothly

[MartinRinehart]

I want to move things smoothly. I'm experimenting with thread functions, so far without success. In the sample code, I added a sleep( 1 ) to a move/copy routine, hoping to see copies added at 1 second intervals. What I see is a long wait and then everything appears at once.

def move_copy( component, distance, number_of_copies )

=begin
Creates an outer array, moving a component "distance" as many times as specified.

"distance" is a vector, an array of [r, g, b].

"number_of_copies" is like the "Nx" in the VCB after a Move/Copy.
For 15 steps, you make 14 copies.
=end

	ents = Sketchup.active_model.entities

	defi = component.definition # the original component's definition
	trans = component.transformation # the original's transformation
	pt = trans.origin # the original's location, a Point3d

	for i in ( 1..number_of_copies )
		pt += distance
            # add vector to Point3d getting new Point3d
		trans = Geom;;Transformation.new( pt )
            # create new Transformation at the new Point3d
		ents.add_instance( defi, trans )
            # add another instance at the new Point3d
        sleep( 1 )
	end

end # of move_copy()

Ideas?

[Jim]

Use the Animation class. Or a timer.

[Jim]

Or a frame change observer to animate entities a'tween scenes.

Some plugins that use these techniques:

• Proper Animation - morrisdov
• mover - cmd
• mover modified with easings and dialog
• SketchyPhysics
• animation.rb - @last
• animation2.rb - @last
• animated clock - todd burch
• transformer beta - didier bur

[avariant]

Maybe the view just isn't refreshing on each iteration? Try adding a view.invalidate of view.refresh before each sleep.

[MartinRinehart]

@jim said:

Or a timer.

Thanks Jim. Lininger's piece has me moving smoothly.

@avariant said:

Maybe the view just isn't refreshing on each iteration? Try adding a view.invalidate of view.refresh before each sleep.

Thanks. invalidate() didn't work but refresh() worked, tho not so smoothly.

[Chris Fullmer]

Don't forget that refresh is new to 7.1 (or was it 7.0?). Anyhow, it is new and not compatible with older versions...

Chris

[thomthom]

@chris fullmer said:

Don't forget that refresh is new to 7.1 (or was it 7.0?). Anyhow, it is new and not compatible with older versions...

Chris

7.1
http://code.google.com/intl/nb/apis/sketchup/docs/releases.html