@n lindenthal said:

My Mac has proper animation with proper_animation, if I drag the folder »extensionmanager« out of Tools folder. Then the right mouse click menue on marked objets has the item »Transformation«.
Now the question would be, whether this same folder »extentionmanager« also disturbs the context menue of SketchUp on Windows PC.

I can not find a comparable folder on my Windows machine.
My Plugin itself is properly wrapped in a module and is not using any global variables, so there should be no collision with other plugins.
Can you zip and email me the contents of that folder ?
See if its removal has no other negative consequenses.

Robert i emailed you PM with the older version of the plugin.
See if it does not crush on a MAC.

if you want a full report of all entities "Position X" data with all other "dictionary attributes" - you can use "xml_dictionary_attributes.zip" from http://morisdov.googlepages.com - you get an online web dialog with all the data in addition to the XML file on the disk.

I am glad you all find this plugin usefull and hopefully are able to get more out of SketchUp and are more productive for your customers.
John - you already have the functionality you requested - note that the "get" is grayed out until you "set" its position, only after which it becomes "active" non grayed.
Anyway all your feedbacks will be noted and considered for coming versions.

Cheers, Moris

Hello Guys,

1. When rotating an object, Setting the axis so the origin is at the center of rotation - as suggested by DaveR - is probably the eaysiest way to control the "center" of the object you are animating/rotating.
2. I dont have access to a mac machine so all my ruby programming and tests are done on windows only.
3. I read some post by RickW that Each scene/page can get its own "transition" time - so i can probably do it - but, we will never compete with true "timeline" based animations like 3DSMax and Maya, you can use few scenes to simulate a single long leg of an animation part.
4. When an object is selected for "animation" - in "Windows->Preferences->Shortcuts" you may define "Position X" shortcut keys if you want.
5. I am traying to keep this plugin "simple" by adding only "must" features if we have to, maybe later we will add more "nice to have" settings.

Keep on the good work, Moris

Please download latest version supporting unlimited number of positions/scenes.

1. Sketchy Physics has its own "animation" so it is better to setup there a starting position of a "natural" chain reaction (gravity), without "proper animation"
2. "proper animation" does not have its own speed control, but relies on sketchup settings of scene transition times. you may use few scenes as part of a single long leg of a animation part
3. the intent is not building a new "Lively" like 3D world, only unleashing current sketchup users creativity demonstrating their models to customers

I guess google will release a 3D software tool for Lively, maybe Sketchup 7 ?
Lively can be more attractive destination than 3D warehouse or google earth.

Post more animated models, Moris

please download latest version 1.01 - should fix "shrink" on rotation.

I am glad you like this, now lets see your creativity results.

1. this plugin is written only in ruby, so it should be good for both mac & windows.

2. when saving your sketchup model the "positions" are saved in it too, so if you email your model to a friend and he downloads this plugin, he should have the same animation functionality.

3. this plugin uses the new SU version 6 "observer" class to hook into the "scenes" change, this "observer" is not called by SketchUp "Export -> Animation" so right now you cant standard export this to an AVI - just see it in sketchup.
   http://www.sketchucation.com/forums/scf/viewtopic.php?f=180&t=10926
   for the mean time hide the axes and use some screen capture utility to export videos.

4. later i will add more than 4 positions, start experimenting very slowly.

5. Youtube too does not like my wmv9 video - try
   http://www.metacafe.com/watch/1455250/morisdov_plugin_proper_animation_rb_for_sketchup/
   the resolution is terrrible but better than nothing

   i trust you come up with better viedos

proper_animation_pics.zip

Animate the model entities on each scene, not just the views.
Make SketchUp models live by integrating movements to preset positions
to demonstrate models in real life action from closed and opened doors
to full progress of a construction site or assembly procedures... etc

download "proper_animation.zip" file from http://morisdov.googlepages.com

review attached demo video "proper_animation.wmv"
I trust you to come up with better animation ideas and uses

Moris

Proper_animation_1.08.beta.zip

proper_animation.wmv

Hello

Inside SketchUp it works fine but when creating an AVI file with Export -> Animation
the - Sketchup::Pages.add_frame_change_observer - is not firing between frames.

Is there anything i should change or another observer i can use between frames in Export Animation ?

Thanks

This is a work in progress unfinished version.

Since i have no experience with Open-GL and need ads billboards in SketchUp
I thought of sending the screen coordinates of the four corners of a
face as a video dispaly canvas to an external Java class of video play.
The problem arrises if you need the video to be partially blocked by a
sketchup body in front of it.
As a simpler solution i am trying to use changing textured materials, but
If i preemtively load the textures they are a memory hog.
When i load them in real time they are a cpu hog.
I think the "importer" implements much less cpu taxing process but
the documentation about the Importer is missing -
http://download.sketchup.com/OnlineDoc/gsu6_ruby/Docs/ruby-importer.html

Any ideas where the cpu cycles are wasted ?
i will try later - threading, loading blocks of 10, more ideas ?

http://morisdov.googlepages.com/SketchUp.video.tex1.zip - main program and 10sec of video - 1.5 MB
http://dovmoris.googlepages.com/SketchUp.video.tex2.zip - more frames for above video 6 MB

Thanks

setting to nil or killing its thread will not stop it.

only solution i managed is a new "UI.play_sound" command on new existing and valid wav file, a short one.

Any way to stop UI.play_sound ?

i tried UI.beep and UI.play_sound "new one" - without success

I agree with your thinking.

if you expect financial rewards from the add-on's you develop for sketchup, you must touch base with furniture (and related) manufacturers as soon as possible, much before you are finished with your development.

for my projects sketchup is just a half way tool to google earth as the end platform.
I just automate 3D models manipulation and place em on google earth.
I have only modest familiarity with the main base of sketchup "manual" users.
Corporations controlling their assets in 3D in real time are motivated by a different logic.

Update us on your progress in a new forum thread hopefully soon.

I am also linking 3D models to a backoffice ERP system.

the following XML+Webdialog reporter ruby might be of use to you -
http://morisdov.googlepages.com/xml_dictionary_attributes.zip
I am working on a webdialog editor version , but i have issues with variable types and arrays editing so its not for public release, let me know if you need it.

Try -

ents=Sketchup.active_model.active_entities
ents.each {|ent| ents.erase_entities ent}

Is it so hard to select all + delete ? just dont call it labor intensive

The problem is you dont know who might have used what "name" , there are far too many other people out there for one to research their obvious common sence choices of keywords.

I believe its best to anticipate errors and exceptions and handle them gracefully with clear messages to the end user.

Now if there would have been somwhere a virtual pc with sketchup and most current versions of scripts installed - a report can be written for all "used keywords" - so a new plugin before release to the public could be forced to test for non violation and then added to this repository itself.
Version updates should be possible so one replaces his old version with new one.

That can have many benefits for end users downloading plugins froma single place and knowing they probably dont break each other, and latest version.

I have an HTC mobile phone with windows mobile version 5 operating system.
you can not copy and run win32 exe files, you need to write programs for it using microsoft visual studio and target specifically that end device that supports a subset of microsoft .Net framework.
there are some tools that translate ruby to c# and there is also ruby add-on for visual studio, but -

Its not wise to choose the wrong tool for the job especially when targeting these kind of devices - what is it that you need to do ?

Thanks Didier for quick reply,

I use a unique key named "YouTube" (not very original right ?)
so there should be no problem at all for others that might
already have an existing dictionary named "link_data".
I did not know you used "link_data" since i have seen it in other
ruby examples from others not mentioning you - so i dont know who was first,
and it was indeed the first most logical name for my purpose.
You agree it is much faster to program searching google for syntax examples.
Anyway to satisfy any doubt of conflict i changed the dictionary name
to "linkdata" (without the underscore).
Others may use MY dictinary name "linkdata" with other key names
as long as they dont use MY key name "YouTube".
If there is a copyright on using "YouTube" as dictionary key names i guess i will need to change that too.

I have written a nice plugin that can be beneficial for education,
presentations and customer demonstrations.

It integrates YouTube videos into SketchUp in a simple clean way than can be used by anyone.
You can associate a YouTube video with each SketchUp entity
by copying the " Embed:" text provided from YouTube.
you can have many videos associated with a single sketchup model
so each entity in your model is linked to its own video.

You can download it here:
http://morisdov.googlepages.com/YouTubePlugin.zip
instructions in readme.txt file in the zip.

Let me know if you find it useful.

Moris