@thomthom said:

Aye! I'm just nowt getting to grips with C. Looked at it before, but never got into it.

Well, of course Thom, same thing here. A bit ago started learning it here, but ran out of batteries at chapter 4.

It's not because I'm lazy, its all that there is a language that is much easier, simpler, similar power, really reliable, plus FUN!!! It's Ruby, a Gem ...The programers' task is to develop a better way of interacting with things. Since, Ruby was developed, an easier way of programing, we decided to move to easier step. Moving back to C++, is like experiencing Microsoft Word 2010, and then getting back to 2002 version.

@thomthom said:

But I still don't think you'll get much joy in Ruby C Extensions to create your own raytracer. Simply because you can't get around the fact you need to obtain geometry data from SketchUp that would have to go via the Ruby API - and that process alone would probably be too slow for making any custom raytracer faster than SU's native.

Thanks, I also got that... I'll just use the native raytest, SU gives a lot of power to its processing.

Learning C++ by interacting with interesting Sketchup is a much better, than learning it with simple "hello world" tutorials.

... many thanks, just what I wanted

Bookmarking these links is also what I prefer to do, otherwise I don't know.

For replies, suggestions and pointing out very, very important stuff, I would sugggest a,

Thanks, just Thanks!!!

@thomthom said:

You can always create Ruby C Extensions - but you'd have to use the Ruby API interface to communicate with SketchUp.

something new, any examples???

@thomthom said:

Anton, the C++ SDK is for reading and writing SKP files. Not for communicating with an open SketchUp instance like the Ruby API.

O , okay then , I guess.

TIG, before I go on complain, do you agree with the current raytest task below?
If not ,then simply state how it works, if you know

Current Raytest Tasks

• Search throught all the entities
• Change its point and vector relative to group's/component's transformation each time it enters the group/component (each group has its own coordinate system)
• Check's whether it intersects the face, or the edge
• convert intersection position to current transformation of the origin
• return the closest point and the object, with its container path

@dan rathbun said:

FYI... SketchUp uses PaintLib internally.

It's openSource... see: http://www.paintlib.de/paintlib/
and the source here: http://sourceforge.net/projects/paintlib/

Thanks, converting textures to the other formats, sounds good.

Is there is a reference on how to create a bmp(a simple file mode) file, set the width/height of the image and set the color of the each pixel?

@thomthom said:

@anton_s said:

Lets, say I write Two of my own simplified raytest functions (similar to
Raytest 2). One on C++ (raytest2cpp), compile it to .dll, and extern it into some of my Ruby module using dl. The other, on Ruby (raytest2rb). On SU, which of these will work faster, why, and approximately by how much percent faster?

In order to do your own raytesting C++ function you'd have to pass the function all the 3D geometry in the model, and I assume that will eat up any performance gain you'd get from the actual custom raytracing.

But, isn't that what the current raytest function does??? Gets all the models geometry, and then calculates the intersections, returning the closest point?

TIG

That still does extra work by searching through the ALL groups, getting ALL the models geometry, and then return's true/false/nil dependending whether the intersection is with-in or on the specified entity.

I already have the raytest function I want written in ruby, but I also wan't to write it in C++. I'm just not sure whether my C++ raytest version would work faster than my ruby raytest version or not.

To me its hard to figrure how to use SketchUp C++ SDKs in C++ code - I never seen, nor found any examples on it. - Strange Sketchup, releasing C++ SDK and no examples on using it.

@thomthom said:

In order to do your own raytesting C++ function you'd have to pass the function all the 3D geometry in the model, and I assume that will eat up any performance gain you'd get from the actual custom raytracing.

Well, I don't actually plan to raytest throught the all entities, but just throught the one the user chosen: model.entities[3].raytest2, and to make it faster I would just have it get the certain entity's faces, only once the user calls the other method, like entities[3].getfaces, and the getfaces function will store all the groups' faces in the certain hash: {entities[3] => [faces]}

To write my dll, I plan to use Microsoft Visual Studio C++ Express. I just don't yet know how to use the ruby SDK reader and writer, plus my C++ programming skills almost equal to nil. I had the post above to make sure that I don't keep learning C++ for no reason.

Okay, so Thomthom says its fixed and TIG has some conserns ...well, I never had any issues with raytest, though, I guess I'll note, if discover any.

Anyways, the bellow question is a bit off topic, but to make sure:

Lets, say I write Two of my own simplified raytest functions (similar to
Raytest 2). One on C++ (raytest2cpp), compile it to .dll, and extern it into some of my Ruby module using dl. The other, on Ruby (raytest2rb). On SU, which of these will work faster, why, and approximately by how much percent faster?

Hello, I got a bit of interest in creating texture image files via Ruby or/and win32-api, and thus, sincerely NEED your help. It started out with a simple-rays plugin. Simple-Rays basically scans with a simplified raytest, calculates the shading, creates the shading textures, and colors the faces. To me, it was a pretty interesting to discover, that it creates the texture images and uploads them to SU. Of that, tried, figuring out how Simple-Rays creates images, but figured its too hard, and thus need help!

Want To Know How To:

• Create the right file for the image "wb" or "wt"
• Create a bitmap
• Set color for the certain pixel of the bitmap
• Write a bitmap into the file
• Save the file into different modes (.bmp, .jpg, .png, or .jpeg).

Already Know How To:

• Upload an image to SU
• And Use it For my benefit (pretty simple)

Maybe, there already is some topics for that, but I couldn't find. Url links, and example scripts would help.

Thankyou

I Downloaded "SU8-raytest-bug.skp",opened it in SU8M2, and in the Ruby console, with the same consept wrote model.raytest("construction point position", "vector of construction line") and it worked right; returned the right intersetion point, the right face and group.

So, is this bug already fixed?>

@unknownuser said:

You can render with Vray in full screen now!
Just have to bind a keyboard shortcut for the now hidden render button... or detach the vray toolbar.

Nice Work Anton!

Thankyou, didn't thought that this plugin would be that useful.. Yesssss!!!

Uuuum, I always drink tea, while using sketchup...

Very, useful tool... Thanks

@newrui said:

I hope so too, fingers crossed!

No doubt

@newrui said:

Hi Anton, is it possible to make this work with Macs? Perhaps use Lion's full screen feature? SU is desperately in need of window/toolbar management under Macs... Thanks!

Hello Newrui,

Mac is a tottaly different library. Its way of using and its features are tottaly different from Windows API. Truly, I, myself never experienced Mac OS, nor its library, and I don't have it. I'm sorry, I can't write one for Macs, though, there are a bunch of users outhere that are and I think these could get their hands or heads on keyboard and write one for Mac.

Is there a way to change sketchup::text font and size through some code?

@cadfather said:

is there a way that i could chain a few of those commands?
say i press F12 and sketchup goes full screen + no controls + no status bar + no scene bar.. etc?

Well, rightnow threre isn't, but I'm planing to add two new command items to "window/settings". One will be "chain multiple" and the other "set multiple". The "chain multiple" will open a dialog box with a checkbox for each command ("full screen", "controll bar(s)", "status bar"...). The "set multiple" command item will show/hide the items that are checked in the dialog box. Like if "full screen" and "status bar" is checked, the "set multiple" command will toggle sketchup between "full screen" and show/hide "status bar".

I already started doing that, but not having knowledge in html, javascript, css, and other will slow down the release of new version.