Medeek Wall Plugin

juju · 23 Aug 2018, 14:07

Ethnological Indians

I believe the PC term would be Native Americans, of course there are identifiable sub-groups to that, but I'm no history buff and really don't know all that much of the history of the Americas.

medeek · 23 Aug 2018, 18:48

@juju said:

@pilou said:

Ethnological Indians

I believe the PC term would be Native Americans, of course there are identifiable sub-groups to that, but I'm no history buff and really don't know all that much of the history of the Americas.

I get my native american (first nations) side from my mom, Gitxsan and Nisgaa from northern BC, Canada.

medeek · 25 Aug 2018, 03:26

A preview of the "Add Material" sub-menu:

Fiddling around with HTML and Javascript is somewhat tedious and time consuming but I think the end result will be worth the effort.

I've never tried nesting modal HTML menus before so this has definitely been a learning experience.

alpro · 26 Aug 2018, 23:08

I tried to incorporate this extension into a project a few versions ago but it seemed to slow my work flow, don't know if this was because I just wasn't familiar enough with it or that it just wasn't mature enough yet. You have been making a ton of progress with this extension so I figured I would give it another go with a new project and post my thoughts here as I went through the project. So here's my 2 cents so far.

Still too many clicks but I haven't set up any presets yet.
If I draw walls in polyline mode, it would be nice if I then needed to edit that wall, I could edit all the walls at once that were drawn with that polyline, just way too time consuming clicking on individual wall sections to edit. I do realize editing different wall sections is also handy. So how about an option to edit in polyline mode or apply edit to rest of walls or something along these lines.
Color materials, I do like the graphical input but would also like to be able to type an input, I changed the color of my wall studs and the way things are now it's nearly impossible to match the rafter color, would be a snap if I could just type in the same hex color code as my wall studs. Hopefully the material editor will take care of that.
Anyway, that's it for now, will continue to post as I work through this project.

medeek · 26 Aug 2018, 23:56

Version 0.9.3 - 08.26.2018

Added a Custom Material Library/Manager in the Materials tab of the Global Settings.
Enabled custom materials for sheathing, cladding and ext. wainscoting in the HTML wall draw and edit menus.

Being that this a completely new feature I may have missed something in my testing but overall I'm fairly happy with the way it has turned out.

Currently I am limiting image type (for textures) to .jpg or .png, but may extend it to other image types if the need arises.

As noted in the changelog notes above the custom materials are only able to be applied to sheathing, cladding, and wainscoting. I will be extending this feature to other elements in the near future (ie. gypsum, trim, casing etc...)

Clicking on the status icon (red or green) will allow the toggling between inactive or active status. If a material is listed as "inactive" it will not appear in the draw or edit menus and cannot be utilized in the model. This feature has been included so that a user can define as many materials as they like but only activate a handful that they may need for a project, thereby keeping the drop down menus from becoming too cluttered.

One thing I have thought about doing is grouping materials within the material manager. This would then allow the user to determine which materials get loaded into which drop down menu. (ie. sheathing, cladding etc...) I haven't implemented this yet since I haven't determined the best way to handle this yet within the interface but it is probably something for future releases.

medeek · 29 Aug 2018, 11:00

Version 0.9.3b - 08.29.2018

Enabled the ability to group materials (in the Material Library) and control which drop down menu they will appear in.
Added an SKM file import utility to the Material Library.

medeek · 30 Aug 2018, 08:13

When an interior wall terminates without adjoining other walls at a corner or tee, it is what I call the "end" condition. Up until now when gypsum was turned on it was only being applied to the exterior and interior face of the "interior" wall.

Now if an interior wall panel has an end condition it will also receive wall board treatment on the ends in order to complete the wall panel:

Also note that I have enabled the Wall Gypsum Corner parameter in the Sheathing Tab of the global settings. This will allow for either "flush" or "miter" treatment of the gypsum, the screenshot above shows the gypsum with mitering.

These two items were per user request.

medeek · 31 Aug 2018, 02:44

Version 0.9.3c - 08.30.2018

Enabled the Wall Gypsum Corner parameter in the sheathing tab of the global settings (MITER/FLUSH).
Interior walls now receive end treatment when gypsum enabled.
Gypsum wrap enabled for openings in interior walls that do not have a window or door installed.

pilou · 31 Aug 2018, 21:29

For French measures
Look pages 3, 6 & "Ossatures MBOC" (page 7)
https://sud-bois.fr/upload/500ec043dcba7t.pdf

medeek · 1 Sept 2018, 01:54

Version 0.9.4 - 08.31.2018

Added additional (New Zealand) standard metric stud sizes: 45x90, 45x140, 45x190, 45x240, 45x290
Addressed multiple bugs having to do with metric templates (glulam headers, columns, SSWs).
Added (New Zealand) standard metric sizes for window and door headers.

If you are using metric templates you will want to update the plugin to this latest version which addresses a number of critical bugs when using metric units. I really need to spend more time in metric templates testing things. Unfortunately, most of my time is spent working in imperial/US units so that side of the house is more thoroughly vetted.

While I'm on the topic of metric templates I still need to provide standard size metric columns and beams (the plugin currently defaults to imperial sizes for these two building elements). I have a pretty good idea on column sizes in New Zealand since I just spent some time perusing their building code and becoming familiar with it but I need some input from other countries who use metric lumber sizes (ie. UK, France, Norway, Sweden, South Africa, Germany etc...)

Please feel free to email me directly at nathan@medeek.com with regards to metric sized beams and columns you would like to see added.

facer · 1 Sept 2018, 13:57

Timber sizes - Australia

Softwood and Hardwood Timber Sizes
https://www.softwoods.com.au/timber/timber-lengths-and-sizes/

Hardwood and Pine Timber Sizes
http://harpertimber.com.au/industry-standard-timber-sizes/

medeek · 1 Sept 2018, 22:03

Version 0.9.4b - 08.31.2018 thru 09.01.2018

Fixed a bug with corner stud placement where corner angles are extreme values.

The one thing I am noticing with this plugin is that the level of complexity is such that it is hard to predict all of the potential states it can get itself into. Each time it gets itself into a state for which it does not have a solution it will typically throw an error and you will see your wall panel appearing at the origin in some fashion or another.

I am doing my very best to find all of these unanticipated states and rectify the logic or add additional logic as required. A number of dedicated users are helping in this process, I appreciate the assistance and the patience with the plugin and my programming.

medeek · 3 Sept 2018, 20:08

Version 0.9.4c - 09.03.2018

Improved the Tee intersection algorithm of the auto-corner configuration module.
Fixed a minor bug in the Windows tab of the Global Settings.

I thought I was getting close to releasing the garage door update for the door module but it has it's own levels of complexity so rather than tangling its code with the regular door module I will be splitting it out into its own module/container. Upfront, this means a bit more work but in the long run it will pay off since management and future upgrades will be much easier and less of a hassle. I appreciate everyone's patience since this feature it sorely overdue.

medeek · 4 Sept 2018, 22:39

Not wanting to clutter the toolbars any further I waffled quite a bit on this decision but I think it makes more sense to provide a separate icon and a "Draw Garage Door" feature, hence the new menu will appear as below:

Garage doors are kind of their own beast. Typically much larger than a simple man door and various options such portal framing further complicate the matter. By completely separating the two I am better able to fully customize the UI for garage door specific parameters and features.

medeek · 7 Sept 2018, 05:50

The recent update with the gypsum option (miter) needed some further attention. While I was sorting that out it became obvious that, along with tee intersections, columns that are not full height need to have the ability to cut out the gypsum, sheathing or cladding when the column is less than the full height of the wall.

Note that the advanced options for columns allows the user to specify which element to trim away as shown in the column edit menu above. In some cases the beam may project through the wall to the exterior of the structure. In this case one would want to cut away the interior gypsum, sheathing and cladding as shown. The exterior gypsum is referring to interior walls with gypsum cladding on both sides.

medeek · 7 Sept 2018, 21:09

Tee intersections will now automatically remove the gypsum where the walls meet:

The algorithm which notches out the top plates is very similar to this algorithm, which notches out the gypsum. For interior walls, as shown above, the tee intersection may be on either the "interior" or "exterior" of the wall. Hence the algorithm needs to be smart enough to detect which side of the wall is being affected and notch the appropriate gypsum wall panel.

Further refinement is probably in order since the result is not a true mitered corner however it is a start and certainly and improvement from when tee intersections were simply ignored with the gypsum.

medeek · 10 Sept 2018, 03:33

The number of garage door types and variants is almost exhausting, yet another plugin within a plugin. To begin with I will start with the following door types:

Solid
Panel (Panels will consist of 18" or 21" panels (or metric equivalents: 455mm, 525mm) arranged in such a way to allow for 3" (70mm) increments in door height.)
Standard Raised Panel
Long Raised Panel
Standard Flat Panel
Long Flat Panel
Glass Standard Raised Panel (Glass indicated that the top panel will have glass inserts)
Glass Long Raised Panel
Glass Standard Flat Panel
Glass Long Flat Panel
Full Glass Standard Panel (Full glass indicates that entire door is glass)
Full Glass Long Panel

There are many other garage door variants: Carriage doors etc... those will be added per user request.

juju · 10 Sept 2018, 06:27

If you could build these child plugins in a way that a person could do a basic execution of whatever and could purchase the child plugin for the additional functionality it may be a good indicator of demand for the child plugin while bringing the main plugin cost down (thus more accessible) and a separate income stream from the child plugin (which may or may not be able to be used on its own).

medeek · 10 Sept 2018, 09:25

Slowly working through the garage door module. Here is a first look at the garage door casing:

(Painted blue for emphasis)

With this new module I'm getting things right from the get go. Materials options are incorporated from the new Material Library so that piece of the puzzle will be much more streamlined and easy to use.

Since I am working through this a little more slowly (and carefully) it may be a few days before I release any fixes, I apologize for the delay.

As I mentioned in a previous post I have broken garage doors out into their own separate container, as such garage doors have their own edit menu etc... this is a little bit more work but will result in more flexibility and long term improvements will be more attainable.

medeek · 10 Sept 2018, 19:50

I'm fielding at least 5-10 questions per day on the plugin (need to put up a FAQ). However, I thought this particular question on utilizing layers within the plugin was worth posting here:

QUESTION:

Just to clarify, all pre-loaded layer names for all Plugins can be changed/modified through the global settling interface.

Can layer names be changed at anytime or must layer name changes be in place at the start of modeling? How would you update existing model layer naming to new names?

ANSWER:

As mentioned in previous posts, editing or do anything to modify a wall panel (ie. adding a door or window) will cause the plugin to redraw the wall panel from scratch.

This is particularly advantageous for making layer modifications (changing a layer name).

Try it out, create a wall, then update the name for the framing layer (or any other layer name being used) to something different in the global settings.

Then regen the wall panel(s), ie. drop them down to 2D and bring them back up again into 3D. You will notice that the new layer name has been added and that the old layer name is also still present. If you have regenerated all of the wall panels then nothing should remain on the old layer unless you have manually placed something there, and you can safely delete it. SU will prompt you if something does remain and what action to take.

So the long answer to this question is that layer names can be changed at anytime and are not restricted to being set at the start of a model.