recommend the plug-ins for grasshopper you like best!

I am a undergraduate student in major of architecture, and I found there were thousands of plug-ins for grasshopper, but I don't know what kind of functions they can provide.

I believe every of you might have used some plug-ins for grasshopper, therefore, please recommend a couple of plug-ins that you like or you think which is very practical, and describe what we can do with them. It is better if you would like to attach some images or ghx file to show their functions!

Thank all of you and join in the discussion!

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Luis Fraguada on April 11, 2010 at 7:39am

Thousands of plug-ins for grasshopper? What is a plug-in for grasshopper? Custom component sets? From what I know the actual number of 'publicized' custom components is less than 10...

Permalink Reply by David Rutten on April 11, 2010 at 8:16am

I'm confused too.

--
David Rutten
david@mcneel.com
Poprad, Slovakia

Permalink Reply by Ben Sitler on April 11, 2010 at 9:37am

Yes, so like Luis said, there are not that many Grasshopper plug ins. However, since we do not yet have the Grasshopper App Store (only teasing David!) here is a brief overview of some plugins (some are not yet released):

SSI http://geometrygym.blogspot.com/ (actually a Rhino plugin) by Jon Mirtschin
Galapagos http://www.grasshopper3d.com/video/galapagos-day-02 - Genetic Algorithm by David Rutten
Kangaroo http://kangaroophysics.com - Numeric Form Finding / Physics by Daniel Piker
Jellyfish http://spacesymmetrystructure.wordpress.com/2009/10/22/jellyfish-fo... - magnetic displacement by Daniel Piker
Rabbit http://morphocode.com/rabbit/ - Cellular Automata by Morphocode
ModeTools http://modelab.nu/?p=2226 - Specialized Bake Components by Studio Mode
Firefly http://www.liftarchitects.com/journal/2010/3/11/firefly-beta-releas... by Lift
C# Components http://www.giuliopiacentino.com/grasshopper-tools/ -- A mixbag of useful tools by Giulio Piacentino
Weaverbird http://www.giuliopiacentino.com/weaverbird/ - Topological Tranformations by Giulio Piacentino
GHowl http://www.grasshopper3d.com/forum/topics/ghowl-interoperability?co... - Interoperability by Luis Fraguada, Damien Alomar and Giulio Piacentino

As a structural engineer, I've used SSI the most, although Kangaroo was probably the most anticipated and each offers some fantastic functionality. Of course you could also check out http://www.grasshopper3d.com/page/addons-for-grasshopper
And you do know VB and C# scripting components. They are useful.

Best regards,

Ben Sitler

Permalink Reply by taz on April 11, 2010 at 10:35pm

Though you might be joking about an App Store, it will only be a matter of time before someone starts charging for a GH plug-in. It's inevitable.

Consider that some Rhino plug-in actually cost more than the Rhino software (see RhinoCAM for example).

Chastise me severely for not actually reading the GH license agreement at installation, but I don't think there's anything to restrict someone from making a commercial profit off a freely distributed plug-in.

I could be wrong about this. Better check with the legal department.

Permalink Reply by Damien Alomar on April 12, 2010 at 8:43am

Selling a plugin for grasshopper...Most likely not
Selling grasshopper...Most likely illegal ;)

Most licenses that prevent you from "adding" something to the program for commercial basis are open source licenses (GPL2, MIT, etc), and part of the reason that this is not really allowed has to do with freedom to access the code. Since I don't see the GH source floating around (and don't expect to), then I don't think that there are any statements that prohibit someone else making a commercial plugin that works with GH.

Permalink Reply by taz on April 13, 2010 at 8:00am

Interesting...

Does anyone ever talk about pricing in the plug-in newsgroup? Is it just what the "market" will bear or is it in some way related to development "costs"?

Permalink Reply by Damien Alomar on April 13, 2010 at 8:47am

Ehh... They may have some words to say if they think a price for a plugin is a little high, but in terms of discussing what a plugin should be priced, that discussion almost never happens and IMHO is somewhat unprofessional.

Software pricing is always hard because its dependant on number of seats moved and you tend to have things like upgrades and educational pricing in there too, not to mention resellers. A good firm will of course know what their costs are and make sure that the pricing of the software will allow them to reach their target revenue at the number of seats they expect to sell. There's also a lot of other factors in the cost of software and they may be anything from industry, to expectations, to cost of related/base software.

Permalink Reply by taz on April 14, 2010 at 9:17am

Ah yes, those are other obvious things that if I had spent more than 2 seconds thinking about I probably would have realized. I suppose a firm that is actually considering commercial distribution needs to have an actual business plan. Pricing can be set to support the viability of the business and thus is (more or less) specific to each individual business.

Thinking about it a different way, all those reasons (and probably then some) are why David keeps saying he wants to keep GH free. Techinically there's no obligation to upgrade GH or even provide any support (but the expectation is there...).

But what about the App Store model? Clearly any individual can make an app and sell it for $1.99. Determining app pricing must involve other considerations than regular commercial development.

P.S. my favorite app of all time: I feel rich

Permalink Reply by Ivan Kiryakov on April 11, 2010 at 10:30am

Joyce, there are 100s of grasshopper Definitions a couple of Custom Components for Grasshopper and only few plug-ins for Grasshopper, but mostly Rhino plugins , so start googling in that order also the tutorials list section on this website has a lot of helpful stuff

cheers

ivan

Permalink Reply by Joyce Shun on April 11, 2010 at 9:31pm

Maybe I mixed up the components and the plug-ins, but now I have made clean the differences between them, thank you all for correcting my misunderstanding!

Permalink Reply by taz on April 11, 2010 at 10:06pm

I use my blog to keep track of things (at least for my own uses).

It may not be better or worse than any of the other lists of links out there but I try to keep it up to date.

FANCYWIRES

Permalink Reply by Joyce Shun on April 12, 2010 at 4:03am

your blog is fierce！