Wow TIG,

thank you so much! Both edits work a treat , but yes yours is definitely more succinct - I have always had issues with my code being a tad too verbose, and possibly missing the trees for the forest...

After my previous post, I was thinking it did seem odd that I wasn't working directly with the definition, but I'm sure I would never have found it without the help

Thanks again - now onto the next tweak...

Cheers,
Doi!

Hi TIG,

thanks for the clarification, it is nice to know I wasn't completely lost and was heading down the right track in one of my circular attempts - when I encountered an "All entities must have a common parent" error I went back to my initial attempt for my first post...

The current issue now seems to be that my exploded_entities need a reference to their 'parent' before being added to the group, yet I thought this is what add_group/to_component process was doing? From what I understand from the API, you must have a Component Instance first, then use it to create the Component Definition - then multiple Instances can be created under the Definition?

Using your example, my code becomes:

orig_entities = Sketchup.active_model.entities
### Note; there is (correctly) no difference between calling .entities, or .active_entities here
...
#re-create component
temp_group =  orig_entities.add_group(exploded_component)
adj_component = temp_group.to_component
adj_definition = adj_component
adj_definition.name= orig_definition.name
adj_definition.description= orig_definition.description

The console throws:

Line 42 is the temp_group = orig_entities.add_group(exploded_component) method call.

If it helps, here is the entire script:

require 'sketchup.rb'

#
#
#
def parsecomponents
	# containers
	adjustedcomps = Sketchup;;Entities.new
	# data
	model = Sketchup.active_model
	orig_entities = model.entities
	
	layers = model.layers
	unattached_layer = layers.add "Unattached Elements" #anything that ends up here to be deleted...
	
	puts "Starting-----------------------------"
	orig_entities.each do |e|
		case e
			when Sketchup;;ComponentInstance
				totalfaces = 0
				adjusted = 0
				orig_definition = e.definition
				orig_transform = e.transformation
				# output working component
				puts e.typename + "; " + orig_definition.name
				if exploded_component = e.explode
					puts "Exploded into; " + exploded_component.class.to_s
					# parse component entities
					exploded_component.each do |ce|
						# swap material if required
						if ce.is_a? Sketchup;;Face
							totalfaces += 1
							if !ce.material && ce.back_material
								ce.material= ce.back_material
								ce.back_material= nil
								adjusted += 1
							end #end if
						end #end if
					end #end do	
					
					#re-create component
					temp_group =  Sketchup.active_model.entities.add_group(exploded_component)
					adj_component = temp_group.to_component
					adj_definition = adj_component
					adj_definition.name= orig_definition.name
					adj_definition.description= orig_definition.description
						
					puts "Recreated; " + adj_definition.name
					puts "Total Faces; " + totalfaces.to_s + ";;Adjusted; " + adjusted.to_s
				else
					UI.messagebox "Failed to Explode Component!"
				end
			else 
				# anything other than a component is not wanted...
				e.layer= unattached_layer
				puts e.typename + " moved to Unattached Layer!"
			end # end case
	end # end do
	puts
	puts "Completed----------------------"
end # end parsecomponents

###########################################
if(file_loaded("swapmaterials02.rb"))
	menu = UI.menu("Plugins");
	menu.add_item("Parse Model") {parsecomponents}
end
#------------------------------------------

file_loaded("swapmaterials02.rb")

Cheers Doi!

Hi,

My first post, so before anything else, hello

A bit of background on my component issue...
I have a model that I have 'inherited' (approximately 130 buildings) that need to be cleaned up - basically lots of unconnected entities, and components with materials applied to the back face etc. I have thrown together a quick and dirty script to fix these issues (I was a little surprised at how easy it was to fix all that; ruby is very nice to use)
Where things have gone a little screwy, is when I try to re-create the individual components.

All my searching keeps pointing me back to the API documentation, which is fine, but I must not be interpreting it correctly, and am now just going round in circles?..

The basic process I am trying to do is:

temp_group = exploded_entities.add_group
adjusted_component = temp_group.to_component

The API docs state that calling the explode method on a ComponentInstancewill return an Entitiesobject. I read this as an Entities container (array?) filled with the individual Entityobjects that make up the building - the Entities container class is the only one with the add_group method!?
Functionally I am able to access the exploded building as expected, as I said above the clean up steps work no worries, what I am finding is that the exploded_entities object is of type Array and as such throws a no method error when calling add_group?

Here is the code in question:

# output working component
puts e.typename + "; " + compname
if exploded_component = e.explode
  puts "Exploded into; " + exploded_component.class.to_s
  # parse component entities
  exploded_component.each do |ce|
    ...fixing stuff here
  end #end do
	
#re-create component
temp_group =  exploded_component.add_group
adj_component = temp_group.to_component
				
puts "Recreated; " + adj_component.name
puts "Total Faces; " + totalfaces.to_s + ";;Adjusted; " + adjusted.to_s

Here is the console output:

I know it'll be something really simple - it usually is

Thanks in advance