Plugin publishing questions.

Grays42

Hi Sketchucation,

You guys helped me quite a bit last year, and after several revisions my CNC code is more or less fully functional. I never really had an interest in publishing it as it was for my own use, but if other people could benefit from it, it wouldn't be a bad idea. (It's months of work on my part and around 3,000 lines of code, including extensive unit testing.) I don't use GitHub and have just been using my Google Drive as basic version control.

The basic function of the plugin is to convert a Sketchup Group or ComponentInstance into "gcode" necessary to cut out the piece with a CNC machine. It will work with any Group or ComponentInstance that has a single flat base and I have covered all types of intersections I can think of.

Here's a gallery of the plugin in action (note that the lines are drawing the produced gcode after it has already been exported):

GPath plugin

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Here's a zip to the current version:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B22HAM7WzR-RWHluTTF5ekozdFk/edit?usp=sharing

Here's a sample of the exported gcode:

(Generated with Grays42_GPath)

(---------- HEADER ----------)
G90 (Absolute distance)
G40 (Tool Radius Compensation Off)
G20 (Inches)
G17 (All curves are in X-Y plane)
G94 (Inches per minute feed mode)
M03 (Motor on)




   (---------- WORKPIECE 1 ----------)
   (---------- WORKPIECE NAME; G1 ----------)
   (Group x-y bounds; [6.000",4.000"],[8.000",6.000"])
   (Group height; 1.000")
   (Group base z; 0.000")

      (--- WORKPIECE 1, PATH STACK 0 ---)
      G00 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z2.0000 F50.0000
      G00 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.5000

      (--- WP 1, STACK 0,  z0.350" -> z0.350" ---)
         G01 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.3500 F6.0000
         G01 X8.0940 Y4.0000 Z0.3500 F30.0000
         G02 X8.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.3500 I-0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X6.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.3500
         G02 X5.9060 Y4.0000 Z0.3500 I0.0000 J0.0940
         G01 X5.9060 Y6.0000 Z0.3500
         G02 X6.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.3500 I0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X8.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.3500
         G02 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.3500 I0.0000 J-0.0940

      (--- WP 1, STACK 0,  z0.350" -> z0.200" ---)
         G01 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.3500 F6.0000
         G01 X8.0940 Y4.0000 Z0.3151 F30.0000
         G02 X8.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.3125 I-0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X6.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.2776
         G02 X5.9060 Y4.0000 Z0.2750 I0.0000 J0.0940
         G01 X5.9060 Y6.0000 Z0.2401
         G02 X6.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.2375 I0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X8.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.2026
         G02 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.2000 I0.0000 J-0.0940

      (--- WP 1, STACK 0,  z0.200" -> z0.050" ---)
         G01 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.2000 F6.0000
         G01 X8.0940 Y4.0000 Z0.1651 F30.0000
         G02 X8.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.1625 I-0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X6.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.1276
         G02 X5.9060 Y4.0000 Z0.1250 I0.0000 J0.0940
         G01 X5.9060 Y6.0000 Z0.0901
         G02 X6.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.0875 I0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X8.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.0526
         G02 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.0500 I0.0000 J-0.0940

      (--- WP 1, STACK 0,  z0.050" -> z0.050" ---)
         G01 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.0500 F6.0000
         G01 X8.0940 Y4.0000 Z0.0500 F30.0000
         G02 X8.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.0500 I-0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X6.0000 Y3.9060 Z0.0500
         G02 X5.9060 Y4.0000 Z0.0500 I0.0000 J0.0940
         G01 X5.9060 Y6.0000 Z0.0500
         G02 X6.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.0500 I0.0940 J-0.0000
         G01 X8.0000 Y6.0940 Z0.0500
         G02 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z0.0500 I0.0000 J-0.0940
      G00 X8.0940 Y6.0000 Z2.0000 F50.0000

(WORKPIECE 1 REPORT;)
(Workpiece feed distance; 38.3273 inches.)
(Workpiece seek distance; 13.5754 inches.)


(FINAL CLEANUP)

(FINAL WORK RUN REPORT;)
(Total feed distance; 38.3273 inches.)
(Total seek distance; 13.5754 inches.)

I'm posting while on lunch, so I'll follow up a bit later this evening. My question is, if I did want to go about publishing it, is there anything I need to alter in the code? Could someone who is experienced with writing and publishing plugins please take a look and offer me advice or recommendations?

As I said, I'm fine with how it works for now--it does exactly what I want it to do for my own use. This is just for anyone else who would find benefit from my work.

Thanks,
Brandon

driven

hi the images look good,

why don't you just attach the zip here so it's easier to download [ i.e. I couldn't ]

then some of the 'ruby masters' may be inclined to take a look...

john

Grays42

Ah, sorry. I forgot that you can attach zips to posts here.

GPath Plugin.zip

tt_su

I had a quick scan of the code, looks fine for the most of it. Two things I'd address though:

gpath.rb


load 'gpath/main.rb'

def grel
	load 'gpath/main.rb'
end

That's a global method that adds itself to every object in the environment. I recommend wrap that in your Grays42_GPath like you did with everything else. For Extension Warehouse we'd reject an extensions for adding to the global scope.

In ui_handler.rb there is a bunch of globals. I'd recommend you convert these to instance variables in your top level module.

For double loading protection where you used this if not $gpath_ui_console_loaded then there is two functions file_loaded(__FILE__) and file_loaded?(__FILE__) defined in sketchup.rb that you can use.

Grays42

I made the edits you advised. Still toying with the code; after I've done some more testing I'll submit to extension warehouse.

tt_su

Another thing worth testing is the Undo operation. We find that many extensions submitted doesn't produce a clean undo history. Some times an action require multiple undo steps. In particular setting attributes cause this as many are not aware that setting attributes are undoable operations.

So take your plugin for a spin, try out the various functions and check if you can undo each operation with one undo step.

Grays42

Sounds good.

The draw step can be reversed or stopped by deleting the group the draw is writing to, but I don't have it enclosed in an operation. I can add that in. That's the only thing that really needs to be undone; I'm not really crazy about a single undo step rewriting the CNC environment variables and outputting the gcode to a file is a single step anyway that can't be reversed short of deleting the files from the filesystem.