[help]Group component instances

[sm4rt]

Hi,

I'm beginner in SketchUp Ruby coding and in fact I've never code into Ruby... (only C++ PHP JavaScript skills)

Well I load and place some components using a "for" loop

  for i in 1..numberP
    point = Geom;;Point3d.new x0,y0,z0
    transform = Geom;;Transformation.new point
    model = Sketchup.active_model
    entities = model.active_entities
    path = Sketchup.find_support_file "mymodel.skp" ,"Components/"
    definitions = model.definitions
    componentdefinition = definitions.load path
    instance = entities.add_instance componentdefinition, transform
    # Calculate next panel corner for next loop.
    numinraw = num % numbyraw
    if (numinraw==0)
      x0 = abscisseRaw * rawNum
      y0 = ordonneeRaw * rawNum
      rawNum += 1
    else
      x0 = x0 + abscisse
      y0 = y0 + ordonnee
    end
    num += 1
end

And after that I want to group theses componentdefinition in order to apply them some other transformation...

I imagine placing a line like "group = model.active_entities.add_group" just after the instance declaration or selecting all instances after the loop...

But it does not work certainly due to the group declaration and the way I want to add components inside after

[TIG]

Before the loop set up an empty array

instances=[]

Within the loop after you've set instance push it into instances

instances << instance

After the loop

group=model.active_entities.add_group(instances)

Note: you could define entities outside of the loop and then reuse it - stuff you define in a loop is not accessible outside of it...

[sm4rt]

oh nice! thank you for it and for your note... (really need to study ruby first I think)

I've just to transform it now with two rotations but only the last one work in fact. if you got a lil tip for it... I'll calculate the resulting vector and angle of the two transform I need that's pretty strange...

[MartinRinehart]

In addition to TIG's info, you should move all the one-time code outside the loop.

model = Sketchup.active_model
entities = model.active_entities
path = Sketchup.find_support_file "mymodel.skp" ,"Components/"
. . .

I also heartily recommend that you use four-space indentation in spite of the fact that two spaces is a Ruby convention. Four is much more readable which is why it is mandatory in Python, convention in C++, Java, JavaScript, ... (every language I know, except Ruby).

New languages are always a PITA. Fortunately, quite a small subset of Ruby is all you really need to create SketchUp plugins.