[Plugin] Three Line Tools (Updated March 9th, 2009)
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The Line Normal Tool reminds me of this guy
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HI Piyanan, that was the SCF Power toolbar. It took some of the more useful plugins and created icons for them. It is currently not available. But hopefully will be coming back in the near future. The icons and toolbar were made by CADFather.
Massimo, the tool is designed to work the way I think your describing. You should be able to click on an entity of any elevation and it should draw a vertical line to the specified elevation. I've included a video that shows it in action. Please let me know if it is not what you are expecting, or if your's is behaving differently.
[flash=510,495:23xflexj]http://www.chrisfullmer.com/forums/by_elevation_working.swf[/flash:23xflexj]
Chris
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@jcdb said:
The Line Normal Tool reminds me of this guy
See, he's not weird, he's merely trying to explain what on earth a "normal" is. And I thank him for it
Chris
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I meant that when I click on a surface that is, for example, at + 100 cm over the 0,0 original plane, and i type 200 cm for that line, the line will be long 100cm and not 200 cm, because the reference is the original plan and not the surface that I clicked on.
Massimo -
Hmm, yes the script is set up so that the groundplane is essentially sea level. If you want a line that goes to elevation 200cm, then you type in 200cm and it creates a line that endsw exactly at 200cm elevation.
If you want a line that is 200cm long, then use Lines by Height. And it will create a 200cm tall line from wherever you click.
I do not have a tool that allows you to specify a new 0,0 level. Is that what you are asking for?
Chris
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Exactly that, Chris. I had in mind something like “vertical lines by relative elevation” from a new 0,0 plane. I know that I can make a line by typing the length or by using “line by hight”, but if you have many lines to draw, all with different length, but with the same elevation from a new 0,0 plane that would be useful.
Massimo -
I know its not much consoloation, but if you figure out the total elevation you are going for, then it works just the same. If you know you want a line that is 200cm above a plane that is 400cm above the 0,0. Then make that first line go to an elevation of 600cm and it will be as long as you want and all subsequent lines will also go to the desired height.
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Thanks very much. The video explanations also help a great deal.
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first of all, thank you very much Chris, great tool!
I have two little suggestions:
1. use the select tool to select an object (e.g. terrain) then click one of the 'Three Line Tools' buttons. instead of clicking onto the terrain surface and manually placing lines you right-click the selected terrain and choose the option 'place line on each face'. now the plugin places a line on each face of the selected object
(important: if you work with a smoothed object make sure to enable 'view hidden geometry' to make sure that a line is placed on every face. otherwise the plugin will place lines only on those faces that are visibly divided).2. click one of the 'Three Line Tools' buttons to start the process of placing lines. but before you start, right-click and choose the option 'place components'. now the plugin places the same component instead of a line. the vertical axis of the component is aligned to the line within the component. if you worked with the 'elevation'-function, the component's height will be defined by the first one placed and all the others will be scaled.
this tool makes it very easy to later replace all these components with another one of your choice (trees, columns or needles, like in the above image).both these functions are disabled by default. so if you don't need them you can simply ignore them. but if they have been chosen once the settings will be remembered for this SketchUp session.
what do you think?
or 
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very interesting tool! many congrats (and thank you).
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Thanks!
@Plot, I'm thinking about it. Some of that functionality fits right in with some of Frenchy's wishes too. I just haven't had time to do it yet. If I get more time to work on this one again, those are good ideas.
Chris
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Hi Chris, I'm new to this forum. Thanks for the great plugin. I wanted to try something different today and I came across this plugin. I've had fun with it, just playing around. I also wanted to say the tutorial is good too. Not only does it show me how to use the tool, I could actually see what you were doing, the video was clear and your explanation was to the point.
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I don't quite get it. Seems like the tool should do that already. Do you have a quick drawing to show better what you mean? I think I don't understand how you're using (or wanting to use) line tools in your workflow.
Chris
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You answered too quickly ... I updated my previous posting. The more I think about it, the lines tools wouldn't.
I think what would be needed is a way somehow set the origin Z value to a specific base elevation (like a site's ground level or slab level of a building), and then somehow have your line tool reconize this and draw up from that value to a specified elevation or distance.
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Hi Chris:
Could you add one that draws lines UP FROM an elevation to a specified elevation.
I'm often given scan of old section drawings for piping which only give the elevations of their centerlines and joints.
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Ahh yes, I think the ability to set a base z height was requested before too. It could be done. I won't get to it soon though I'm afraid. But when I get around to updating scripts, that could go on my list of features to add. Thanks for the great suggestion John!
Chris
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Thanks Chris, for considering this. You've done so much already.
It sure would save me a lot of time from manually subtracting elevation valves to determine vertical pipe lengths or the placement of their horizontal centerlines (many elevations in the drawings I get are specified to the tenth or hundredth of a foot as pipe slopes are critical to gravity feed flow ... yikes).
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what are all these plugins ??? never saw them before
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I think that is a toolbar full of various plugins and with new icons. So they might be plugins you already have, just different icons. I'm not sure if they are still available as a group like that. But you can download them all separately.
Chris
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Chris,
Can you also make the normal tool work so if a single edge is selected (without a face), it'll draw a line perpendicular to that line? And then you'd just choose the rotation of that perpendicular line?
Or something like that?
Or would that have to be a fourth line tool?
Mark
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