[Plugin] SketchUpBIM: Building Modeling made easy!

jolran

Thanks for the feedback D_e_x. Yeah, know about "families"..

Unclex. Unit conversion should be trivial for D_e_x to fix?
Like Thomthom suggested.
OR heres a version that works in "my plugin" code. I think I saw something similar in one of
JIM's plugins.


def unitconverter(value) 
   conv_val = [1.0, 12.0, 25.4, 2.54, 0.0254]
   unit_mode = Sketchup.active_model.options["UnitsOptions"]["LengthUnit"] # 0=inch 1=ft 2=mm 3=cm 4=m
   value = value / conv_val[unit_mode]    
   return value
end

However I will switch to Thomthoms suggestion later on. It's more logical and simpler.
If I understood him right it should be something like.

(value.to_f).to_l

Edit: Confirmed it works for me anyway. Thanks ThomThom! A bunch less code.

d_e_x

@brewsky said:

reading your license... I hope you can be persuaded to change that, would be great if defining BIM could really be a community thing

Cheers, and keep up the good work!

Thanks Jan! I am sure my friends and I will come back to you when we start writing the specs for the IFC import/export utility

b/w SketchUpBIM uses the BSD license which in my knowledge, is the most lenient license in the industry today! As this article (http://opendevice.blogspot.com/2007/06/best-gnu-gpl-vs-bsd-comparison-ever.html) states: "If you want to give your software away for free, use BSD. If you want to share your software, use the GPL."

@bigstick said:

This is such a huge task that I do wonder whether it is too much for one person. The point I made some time ago for creation of a 'framework' which could be used by lots of Ruby coders might still be a relevant one. We have lots of plugins, for windows, doors, stairs, roofs, joists, slabs, foundations, columns, beams etc. Wouldn't it be cool if they were all compliant with this BIM principle!
I accept that ensuring consistency with the standard might be tricky, but it might be worth looking into.

Thanks bigstick, I have downloaded this package. At the first glance, it came to me as more relevant to generic 3d modeling, as opposed to the concept of a "framework" and specifically, building modeling. But defi very interesting - I'll take a detailed look at this.

d_e_x

@unclex said:

how change the feet to meter？

@jolran said:

Unit conversion should be trivial for D_e_x to fix?

unclex, joel,

metric units is definitely moving to the top of the development list. However, I do want to spend a few more days before getting back to the code. I would like to collect as much feedback as possible from the community. I want to know if there are any stop-ship bugs, or any other critical features that are important to the people who would like to do "BIM in SketchUp"

right now.. let me get you excited about the video tutorial. It should be online in another hour!!

thomthom

@jolran said:

(value.to_f).to_l

Do you need to_f.to_l ?

Remember, you have Numeric.to_l and String.to_l. You might be doing more conversion than needed.

SU's Ruby API has methods built in so you really do not need to do much work yourself. If you find yourself doing conversion methods, you might be reinventing the wheel.

d_e_x

Here is the "Basic Tutorial" for SketchUpBIM. It is about 12 minutes. Request to all users to spend these 12 minutes to get a quick start!

[flash=853,480:2f7tt5ah]http://www.youtube.com/v/QYdVhomvwYk[/flash:2f7tt5ah]

jolran

@unknownuser said:

Do you need to_f.to_l ?

Hmm, yes the way I did it. I got an error "cannot convert to float" at first.
But now I see you mentionString.to_l. Doh! Totally overlooked that . It should do the trick. (The value is coming as a string from webdialog)
Think there was some problems in values coming from dialog at that time.

@unknownuser said:

SU's Ruby API has methods built in so you really do not need to do much work yourself. If you find yourself doing conversion methods, you might be reinventing the wheel.

That's why I brought the subject up here(again), since some users has requested metrics and I got the impression d_e_x was gonna try invent some new method. I could be wrong of course, but just tried to help

brewsky

@d_e_x said:

b/w SketchUpBIM uses the BSD license which in my knowledge, is the most lenient license in the industry today!

Hi Dex,

I'm no license expert, but BSD sounds ok.

You might want to check your license file's exact contents, the way I read it it seems to be a bit more restrictive than you meant it to be . It says "is not permitted" where I would expect "are permitted provided that..."

Cheers,
Jan

utiler

WOW, d_e_x; I'm excited!!!!! This is a very impressive project!

I'm going to make some notes and post some questions as soon as I can..

Congratulations on such a fine start!!

majid

just to say thank you, that is great. revit is easy to use and so lots of lazy minded (like me ) sometimes migrate there, . I like "smart" of SU ( it is smart and needs smart minds too), ,,,, just thank you again

fionmacool

This is a brilliant start Dex. It will scare the bejaysis out of many BIM... let's call them "enthusiasts" out there. I have wanted to see SU being used this way for ages, and due to not being well versed in programming, I have been only an armchair supporter. Here is a post I created in June 2010 on the SketchUpIreland blog regarding SU and BIM:
http://sketchupireland.blogspot.com/2010/06/sketchup-natural-bim-platform.html#links

Keep up the good work! Will be delighted to see a metric version of the plugin and a function for creating objects. I know everyone wants everything perfect and they want it yesterday- but seriously- thanks for doing this!

Elibjr

d_e_x,

Wow, I just want to say thank you and your crew for starting such an awesome plugin. I have used Revit and this reminds me of those basic principles. I think you should try to figure out a way to do specific opening sizes for windows and doors, curtain walls, and foundations next. Putting together a quick tower was simple. If the slabs were generated as components and not just groups that would be even better ... maybe. That way you could put a railing on a balcony slab and have it replicate to each successive level. This is the first time I could tell my "Autodesk evangelists" friends that Sketchup is so much more capable that any closed source product.... if not for ideas like this. This is why Blender is so great too, It's people like you and Fredo6, TIG, Didier Bur, Thomthom, Chris Fullmer, Jim, Al & Rich Hart, Whaat and so may more that make this the most dangerous site for any high end software company. It's stuff like this that will make (and have made) companies like Next Limit, Chaos Group, Autodesk and others to take note. Keep up the good work... also thank the admin for creating this website. This is why Sketchup will become the most powerful design package in the world... can wait for version 9!

brewsky

@elibjr said:

If the slabs were generated as components and not just groups that would be even better ... maybe.

I've been thinking about the same thing, but I think using groups is the best thing here, otherwise the component-selector gets cluttered with sooo many walls and slabs...
Maybe the best approach is to after creating the building-parts to combine the slab-group and railing-components as one big component if you need this repetition?

d_e_x, what are your thoughts on this?

Cheers,
Jan

Bep

Maybe interesting , http://www.ifcwiki.org/index.php/Free_Software

Bep

d_e_x

@utiler said:

WOW, d_e_x; I'm excited!!!!! This is a very impressive project!
I'm going to make some notes and post some questions as soon as I can..
Congratulations on such a fine start!!

Thanks Andrew, I'll look forward to it!
dex

d_e_x

@fionmacool said:

This is a brilliant start Dex. It will scare the bejaysis out of many BIM... let's call them "enthusiasts" out there. I have wanted to see SU being used this way for ages, and due to not being well versed in programming, I have been only an armchair supporter. Here is a post I created in June 2010 on the SketchUpIreland blog regarding SU and BIM:
http://sketchupireland.blogspot.com/2010/06/sketchup-natural-bim-platform.html#links

Keep up the good work! Will be delighted to see a metric version of the plugin and a function for creating objects. I know everyone wants everything perfect and they want it yesterday- but seriously- thanks for doing this!

Thanks I have started following your blog - very interesting and thought-provoking.

Metric units are on top of the development stack. "function for creating objects" - could you explain what you mean't here? No specifics required, I just would like to understand your suggestion; the way you are thinking about it.

d_e_x

@elibjr said:

d_e_x,
Wow, I just want to say thank you and your crew for starting such an awesome plugin. I have used Revit and this reminds me of those basic principles. I think you should try to figure out a way to do specific opening sizes for windows and doors, curtain walls, and foundations next. Putting together a quick tower was simple.

specific sizes for windows and door is already possible in this initial version and foundations is on the development list. Curtain walls (wow!), once I get a development team of 10, I'll pounce on the non-structural primitives as well Actually, now that I think about it, I know of a simple way to implement curtain walls.

@elibjr said:

If the slabs were generated as components and not just groups that would be even better ... maybe. That way you could put a railing on a balcony slab and have it replicate to each successive level.

my thoughts in the follow-up post.

@elibjr said:

This is the first time I could tell my "Autodesk evangelists" friends that Sketchup is so much more capable that any closed source product.... if not for ideas like this. This is why Blender is so great too, It's people like you and Fredo6, TIG, Didier Bur, Thomthom, Chris Fullmer, Jim, Al & Rich Hart, Whaat and so may more that make this the most dangerous site for any high end software company. It's stuff like this that will make (and have made) companies like Next Limit, Chaos Group, Autodesk and others to take note. Keep up the good work... also thank the admin for creating this website. This is why Sketchup will become the most powerful design package in the world... can wait for version 9!

thanks a ton for the encouragement!

d_e_x

@brewsky said:

@elibjr said:

If the slabs were generated as components and not just groups that would be even better ... maybe.

I've been thinking about the same thing, but I think using groups is the best thing here, otherwise the component-selector gets cluttered with sooo many walls and slabs...Maybe the best approach is to after creating the building-parts to combine the slab-group and railing-components as one big component if you need this repetition? d_e_x, what are your thoughts on this?
Cheers,
Jan

jan,

In SketchUpBIM, all elements that CAN be defined and stored with the help of parametric properties ONLY, are categorized as Groups. Generally speaking, these elements are structural engineering primitives like walls, columns, and beams. Other elements that require additional architectural details like fences, door/window casings etc may qualify as components. It becomes very interesting with elements like slabs - in such elements, the architectural world starts to overlap the structural engineering world. I have seen these challenges in my past life

We are looking at a very exciting feature that will become a critical addition to the software in a future version. And for this feature, we might have to switch some of our primitives to components. So, I think the choice between Groups and Components are in part determined by their intention of use. In our case, and in this first version, groups were sufficient.

d_e_x

@bep said:

Maybe interesting , http://www.ifcwiki.org/index.php/Free_Software
Bep

excellent resource; would come in very handy when we start working on the IFC Import/Export functionality.

Thanks Bep!

Jpac

By any chance would this effort by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory work with your efforts?
http://openstudio.nrel.gov/
It looks like energy modeling using intelligent SketchUp models. I've not used it, but it looks intriguing.

bigstick

OpenStudio does a good job simplifying EnergyPlus for SketchUp users, but its usability was (when I last used it, and I suspect still is) a bit complex and involved compared with what most of us are used to.

I'm sure it will be a must-have tool in due course, but I can't see how it could be practically linked to SketchUpBIM.

In OpenStudio you have to redefine your spaces in SU using new geometry which OpenStudio understands. There are strict rules about relationships between spaces and whether they touch or not. How spaces are created is (or was last time I used it) critical.

It's very very complicated to turn a complex 3d model into a simplified energy model automatically, and even if you do it, there may be so many anomalies and things that need to be corrected, that it will probably be a lot quicker and easier to remodel your spaces from scratch, snapping to existing surfaces.

So quite apart from the complexity of linking with OpenStudio (there's a lot here for the guys to do in making the basic BIM premise work well), I wonder whether there is much point in doing it at all.

Keep on going as you are d_e_x, we're all pumped and rooting for you