Create rhino dimension object in GH script

Hi All...

Recently Giulio spent 30mins of his time introducing me to how to do custom components and debugging in VS. (thanks, Guilio :-) )

I have started, and have managed to do a component that creates a dimension in the rhino viewport.

When I change input parameters, It creates a new dimension, without removing the old one. That makes sense from the script I have, but it is not quite what I want.

How can I make it replace or delete the old dimension line when a new one is created?

Heres a part of the code:

if (((((((DA.GetData<Point3d>(0, ref pointd) && DA.GetData<Point3d>(1, ref pointd2)) && DA.GetData<Point3d>(2, ref pointd3)) && DA.GetData<Plane>(3, ref plane)) && pointd.IsValid) && pointd2.IsValid) && pointd3.IsValid) && plane.IsValid)
            {
                double u, v;
                plane.ClosestParameter(pointd, out u, out v);
                Point2d ext1 = new Point2d(u, v);

                plane.ClosestParameter(pointd2, out u, out v);
                Point2d ext2 = new Point2d(u, v);

                plane.ClosestParameter(pointd3, out u, out v);
                Point2d linePt = new Point2d(u, v);

                LinearDimension dimension = new LinearDimension(plane, ext1, ext2, linePt);
                Rhino.RhinoDoc.ActiveDoc.Objects.AddLinearDimension(dimension);

                DA.SetData(0, Rhino.Commands.Result.Success);
            };

cheers

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by David Rutten on April 14, 2011 at 10:46am

Hi Jes,

you'll need to store the ID of the annotation in some variable that doesn't get nuked when the SolveInstance method finishes. Basically you'll need to use a Shared variable, or even store the data somewhere on the disk.

Rhino.RhinoDoc.ActiveDoc.Objects.AddLinearDimension(dimension);

this function returns an ID, which you need to store, then delete that object the next time the script runs:

// Somewhere inside your GH_Component derived class, but outside of any methods in that class

private static Guid annotationID = Guid.Empty;

// Inside your SolveInstance

if (annotationID != Guid.Empty)

{ Rhino.RhinoDoc.ActiveDoc.Objects.Delete(annotationID); }

annotationID = Rhino.RhinoDoc.ActiveDoc.Objects.AddLinearDimension(dimension);

David Rutten

david@mcneel.com

Poprad, Slovakia

Permalink Reply by Philipp on April 14, 2011 at 11:43am

looking forward to play with!

Permalink Reply by Jes Tonsgaard on April 15, 2011 at 12:47am

Thanks David.

I had the idea that this whas what I needed, but I put the Guid declaring inside the instance solver, which as you said "nuked" the id whenever the function updated. putting it as "private static" did the trick.

I found the Rhino.RhinoDoc.Active.Objects.Replace() method, but it seems that it only works for text instances?, In principle it would be easier to do a replace rather than a "record ID, delete previous, create new" setup

... but hey, it works.

I'll try to add a little more functionallity to the script and add a bit of robustnesss in the code... I'll keep you updated.

(And btw, david, thanks for adressing the curve offset issue in the new version. Will test today if it works now :-) )

Permalink Reply by Jes Tonsgaard on April 15, 2011 at 1:04am

Hmm.. I kinda feared that that would happen.

Now only the dimension of the last object is drawn for list inputs...

I'm wondering how I should tackle that issue. Maybe adding GUIDs to "annotaionID" incrementally, and then flush that entire list of objects on an input update event.

Is the some method in the GH namespace that would return a true or false if the input is changed or not? I could then add that to this snippet:

if (annotationID != Guid.Empty)

{ Rhino.RhinoDoc.ActiveDoc.Objects.Delete(annotationID); }

Permalink Reply by David Rutten on April 15, 2011 at 2:45am

Yes, if you want this to work on a list of IDs, then you should use a static List<Guid> instead of a static Guid.

// class level

private static List<Guid> m_ids;

// method level

RhinoDoc doc = RhinoDoc.ActiveDoc;

if (DA.Iteration == 0)

{

if (m_ids != null)