[Plugin] Hatchfaces (v1.8 beta) UPDATED 15-Dec-2012

sadyo

Thanks Jolran, it's really awesome plugin
Then... AutoCAD would be far away now

jolran

Hi Atelerpaar!

I did not think of that until you mentioned it now. Good suggestion That would be the behaivior one would expect. Also files would get smaller. I will try my best

I have an new idea for getting different patterns. 2d DCs with intersection. Don't know if it is possible, have to do some research. But then a library of concrete and such could be made with a webdialog and thumbnails. Needles to say, quite a project..

Any interest in that? Or are textures already sufficient as they are for that purpose?

(my personal feeling is that textures get ugly in Layout unless perfectly scaled, Richards masking-method works ok, but is not 100% flexible)

jolran

Been at it all morning. Seems not that easy to erase surrounding edges as I thought.
Outer edges are most possible, but I suspect you just want the hatched (eg45 deg or so) lines remained? Probably missing something in my code..

@unknownuser said:

Takes alot of time at our level, to do even simple stuff.

Damn right about that

But you are far ahead of me in Ruby-knowledge

Cheers Sadyo

I guess this thread is supposed to be about updates and wishes? So won't discuss too much code in here.

TIG

Do you mean erase the surround edges to the hatching ?

To do that you need to examine the hatching group's geometry before your code to finally erase all faces.
Make an empty array
edges2go=[]
then iterate the geometry
group.entities.each{|e|edges2go << if e.class==Sketchup::Edge and not e.faces[1]}
i.e. 'edges2go' is now a list of all edges in the hatching group that are on the 'perimeter' - i.e. they have only one face. We will now erase them - this will destroy their faces too so you probably never need to erase the group's faces as there won't be any left!
group.entities.erase_entities(edges2go)
All perimeter edges are erased en mass.
How are you getting on with the 'holes' issue

jolran

He he! I can't make this work. I wish it was as simple for me as it is for you

@unknownuser said:

before your code to finally erase all faces.

By that you mean after the intersection and before the erasing?

The "hole" issue is putting a hole in my brain.

TIG

The two relevant lines in the code
gents.to_a.each{|e|e.erase! if e.valid? and e.class==Sketchup::Edge and e.faces.length==0} gents.to_a.each{|e|e.erase! if e.valid? and e.class==Sketchup::Face}
The first line removes any unfaced edges.
The second removes all faces.
What you need to do between them is add these lines
edges2go=[] gents.each{|e|edges2go << if e.class==Sketchup::Edge and not e.faces[1]} gents.erase_entities(edges2go)
This will remove perimeter edges and thereby all faces anyway... So after a test you should find the original second line to erase all faces is no longer needed...

jolran

Ver 1.2 zip added at first post.

jolran

Yeeyy!!! It works now!

I had to think a little bit Where some typos(I hope I did not destroy anything )

Anyway it works. Will post update soon..

gents.to_a.each{|e|e.erase! if e.valid? and e.class==Sketchup;;Edge and e.faces.length==0}
      edges2go=[]
      gents.each{|e|edges2go << e if e.class==Sketchup;;Edge and not e.faces[1]}
      gents.erase_entities(edges2go)

Thanks to TIG this plugin gets updated once more

sergey2402

Well done! You are doing greatly desired work!
I really, really like it.

jolran

Why thank you But I really think you should thank TIG and Kyuu.

Feel free to ask for ways to improve! Or even come up with ideas

ken

Well, this is starting to look good. My suggested improvement

If you do two hatches of the same face, is it possible to get both hatches in the same group.

Thank you for your work

Ken

sergey2402

Maybe hatches should be on its own layer?

jolran

Thank you for your input guys!! Good points!

I will answer more profound tomorrow. I'm a bit in a hurry! For Now, here is a minitut or tips, as a compensation that the hole "issue" isent fixed yet.

sergey2402

TIG, kyyu, please do not leave jolran alone. You are all together make a very necessary work.

TIG

We are helping him... [sometimes in the background ]

sergey2402

@tig said:

We are helping him... [sometimes in the background ]

jolran

About added features:

To put hatches in a layers(newly created OR selected) is possible, at least create a new layer. I was thinking of adding that anyway.

@unknownuser said:

If you do two hatches of the same face, is it possible to get both hatches in the same group.

It is a good idea, looking at how the plugin works right now. But it's risky business adding geometry inside groups, and you probably have to select the created hatchgroup before running. Wich in turn will not add that much improvement in workflow?
But if you really, REALLY want that feature... It won't hurt testing..

My personal view is that I should rather investigate the possibilitie to improve the plugin with a "pattern library" instead. No promises can be made in that regard though. It seams difficult.

@unknownuser said:

TIG, kyyu, please do not leave jolran alone

TIG's been helping me a LOT! Through PM's and more, otherwise this plugin would not exist. KYuu fixed the spacing and that was mucho importante.

TIG

The layer part is easy. Add some code to make/refer to the layer
hatch_layer=model.layers.add("HATCH")
If it doesn't exist it's made...
Then after the group is made use...
group.layer=hatch_layer
Done

You could add a 'crosshatch' option to the main dialog, because most of the time that's what's wanted anyway - "Crosshatch? " >> "Yes|No" [you'd need to insert a 3rd ['','',["Yes|No"]] in inputbox moving the title over to 4th place] - default would be 'No'. If results[3]=='Yes' you'd repeat the line drawing steps within the same group entities, but at +/-90 degrees, so there would be twice as many edges overlaid etc...

How are the 'holes' going...

jolran

He he! As easy as that, huh? Well there you have it guys!

I will work on those things. And put an option of angle on second hatching. That would give you as much flexibility as
needed for linehatching I presume?

The "holes"... Hmm difficult. I have been searching posts about that subject(Don't just want to add anything unless I actually understand what is going on). If I understood it right, holes are somewhat problematic in Sketchup. One have to
use both face.outer_loops AND face_loops to get to the face hole geometry? Where face_loops is innerloop? Or include.all loops? That is a big difference.

In API it says: Face outer_loops retrieves a "face loop object" But what does that mean?
Edges, vertices? Both? Is it an array?

For a newbie like me to interprate the API is quite difficult.
The posts in here are very helpful, but it takes time to search specific posts. There are currently around 146 pages * 25 * (number replies) in just the developper section.

So with that said, I am very greatful for your help TIG.

TIG

all_loops=face.loops i.e. its is an array of all loops including the outer one
outer_loop = face.outer_loop inner_loops = all_loops - [outer_loop]
Although some of this is of academic interest as we only need all_loops...

As I said before [in a PM]... you simply iterate through all loops and add a face for each loop using its vertices.
all_loops.each{|loop|gents.add_face(loop.vertices)}
You have the main face drawn... but with its holes filled in with other faces.
We can erase these by testing to see if each face in gents has an edge with only one face [i.e. it's NOT in a hole], if not then we'll erase it...

faces2go=[]
gents.each{|face|
  next if face.class!=Sketchup;;Face
  face.edges.each{|e|
    if not e.faces[1]
      break
    end
    faces2go << face
  }
}
gents.erase_entities(faces2go)

[this code is untested and might have typos !]
Now you should have a perfect clone of the face inside the group with any holes reproduced too.
Do your intersecting of the hatch lines etc just as before and then when you erase 'faceless edges' the ones now crossing these 'holes' will be erased too