Need Advice About This Advice [Groups or Components?]
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Dale, one of things that makes it easy for me is not having a keyboard shortcut set for Make Group. 'G' makes components and that's the way I always make them. That makes it more work to make a group than a component.
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Not to beat a dead horse but also remember there's the Make Unique command so that you can break the relationship of components when you do want them to be different. With the stuff I draw, I might want to have elements related to each other for awhile but then later in the process, I will break the relationship. Legs on tables with drawers are a good example of that. They need the same treatment up to a point. When it comes time to draw in the joinery for the rear apron and the front blades above and below the drawer front, the front and rear legs need to be separated in the process. Make Unique to the rescue.
Make Unique also comes in handy when you want to modify a model to make a different model. The bench was made from a copy of the fern stand in the background.
And in the next image, every piece of furniture was drawn starting from the chair on the left. By the way, all of these pieces of furniture are production pieces and the shop uses a similar idea for actually building these things.
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You know you need to share ALL your textures with me don't you?
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That's only two and they're components as well. I just use Make Unique and modify them.
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I'll be starting a pretty ambitious model soon, and I'm going to go the component route and see how it goes. I think the hardest part will breaking old habits.
Thanks for all the input and advice, much appreciated.
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Hi Ken,
So I'm assuming that you are referring to models you've already created using groups instead of components. I periodically receive models from others where this is the case. I would make components of each of the groups. Let sketchUp name them and assume it names them Component#1, Component#2, etc. Rename Component#1 if you wish. That can be done at any time later. Select all of the numbered components and in the Components browser, right click on Component#1 in the browser and choose Replace Selected. No plugin needed.
I don't have it but I think ThomThom or TIG did a plugin that will hunt through a model for identical groups and make them components. It might speed things up for you.
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@hellnbak said:
I think the hardest part will breaking old habits.
Get rid of your keyboard shortcut for making groups or change it to Make Component. That'll be the easiest way to break the habit.
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Dave R
Thank you for your reply. Today is the day I will almost stop using groups. This for me could be a "DUH" thread.
Ken
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@dave r said:
@hellnbak said:
I think the hardest part will breaking old habits.
Get rid of your keyboard shortcut for making groups or change it to Make Component. That'll be the easiest way to break the habit.
That won't be hard, 'cause I don't have any keyboard shortcuts for making components or groups. I know, I'll make some shortcuts, and then get rid of them!
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How come there's no "snork" smilie.
Use G to make components. that's the default keyboard shortcut, anyway.
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This is a most interesting discussion.
Dave R, I have after looking at your post decided that components are the way for me to go. I hadn't used component that much, preferred groups. Now that read your posts and how you use component this is the way I will start modeling.
However, I have a question. I have a plugin that makes identical groups until I change the parameters, then it will make another series of identical groups. Is there a way I can select all the identical parts, and make them one component definition? Such if I have 10 parts all the same, select all tens parts and give them one component definition, so that after this conversion, I only need to modify one of the ten to modify all the ten.
Thanks for the discussion, you have changed my modeling procedures to the better.
Ken
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@dave r said:
Dale, one of things that makes it easy for me is not having a keyboard shortcut set for Make Group. 'G' makes components and that's the way I always make them. That makes it more work to make a group than a component.
Good idea.
I've been doing pretty good mostly, except for forgetting to "make unique" on a couple of trusses I was working on.
But the fix was relatively easy. -
Dave R
Could you do me a favor. I tried you method of replacing one component by another. However in the attached Sketchup file, whenever I turn all the groups into separate components by the plugin tt_groups2comps.rb, by Thomthom and then select all components expect the chosen one, when I select replace, all the selected bolt components disappear. The process works on other components so I know how to do the select components and replace. However with these bolts I can not get it to replace the selected components, the outliners indicated they have been replaced but they do not show up in the model.
Note, if I explode all the bolts, then make them groups and then make all the groups components by using the plugin tt_groups2comps.rb, by Thomthom the process works. However without exploding I can not get the replace components selection to work.
So what is different about these groups? What am I doing wrong?
Thank you in advance.
Ken
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They are all in the same space.
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@unknownuser said:
They are all in the same space.
Note sure what you mean by "They are all in the same space"
Thanks for your reply.
Ken
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Ken, I don't know what you did when you made your bolt groups but Rich is correct. When you use Replace Selected it doesn't delete the bolts, it makes them so they all occupy the same space. Since I have no need for Thomas's script, I just made each bolt in your file into a component by right clicking on it and selecting Make Component. I also changed their axes so the axes are centered on the bottom of the bolt. I wrote before that it would name them Component#1, Component#2, etc. It actually names them Group#1, Group#2, etc. You can see in the Outliner that although their names make them look as if they are groups, they are in reality components as designated by the < and > marks. I changed the name of the one nearest the origin to "Bolt."
In the Outliner I selected all of the other bolt components. then right clicked on the bolt component I wanted to replace them with. I chose Replace Selected...
...and presto!
Hey, Rcoky! What me pull a rabbit out of my hat. Nothing up my sleeve...
No doubt about it. I gotta get me a new hat!
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@unknownuser said:
...Is there a way I can select all the identical parts, and make them one component definition? Such if I have 10 parts all the same, select all tens parts and give them one component definition, so that after this conversion, I only need to modify one of the ten to modify all the ten...
It's only page 2 of this discussion so there may be an answer below but TT's selection toys (I think) has this function. It can select copies of the same group definition and then turn them into components.
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I am currently working on a model where I am creating only components, and one of the little benefits I am finding is that I am modeling way more accurately. With my old method of rag tag collections of groups, non groups and components, it was easy to have, at some point, an inference snap that although it created a face, was slightly off. It seems to me much easier to catch these errors when you are creating components and therefore get a much more accurate final product.
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Dale, that's really cool.
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I too am now using only components in a project, and it really simplifies the whole modeling process. For me, this is the way to go. Thanks, Dave
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