James Russell

John, This kinda makes sense that it's greyed out. The OXOX arrangement style only really works for Sliders in terms of their internal track arrangements. The only way I've ever been able to do the door style that you're asking for is with the more advanced WinDoor component available in the Architect package (I don't know if it comes with Designer, you'll have to let me know!). Attached is a screenshot of the functionality of it within your file. Note the Object Info Panel and the ability to choose the number of doors L and R. If that option is unavailable then I'd probably say draw your own symbol and with the doors and such as you'd like them, insert it into the wall as is or use it as a custom door with the current door tool. J

Thanks for the provocative responses guys. I'll find some time and have a crack at Python goodness over the next few days. Still seeking an example/direction/ideas for triggering the Export > Image File command. If there's a Vectorscript command for it I don't think I've found it yet in the function listing, otherwise I'll be investigating a DoByMenu and attempting to figure the required settings post dialog box. I'll keep you posted brains trust. J PS. I enjoy looking in the pantry and finding Cans of Worms and Dull Cookies, they're my favourite brain snacks.

Thanks for your responses guys. @Klinzey - Totally hearing you and wishing that all units could potentially be added one day soon. Knew this was the case but was hoping to raise awareness of some of the issues I'm facing with my clients who wish to do load ratings and power calculations without taking the figures somewhere else. @bcd - I've used the =value(x) to solve most of the problems created from the ~2012 shift to current versions where Lighting Devices have been restrained in the locking of the field type. I was kind of hoping soon VW would implement an equivalent to Excel's RIGHT and LEFT commands, allowing you to remove sections of strings by length (in an attempt to remove the W for example from 750W and then running the value over the top to avoid mass library changes). As with every year I'll keep flagging this as a desire from down under.

@Michaelk (1) - Same-ish struggles, seemed relevant. Haha. Let me know if you stopover in Dubai, I'm here for ~ two weeks. @Pat Stanford - How dull! Do you think it's some sort of 'can't have two scripts running at the same time' thing and that a PIO needs something that the script is using? @Michaelk (2) - Maybe another cheeky DoByMenuTextNameThing? I don't know if that works for custom entries though. And if my above reply to Pat does become true, where an element of the scripting run process is the same for a PIO then it might be to no avail. Surely people have gotten around this; I'm looking at you Matt Panzer, Joshua Benghiat, Robert Anderson, Petri Sakkinen, and all the other smart cookies who play with the boundaries of PIOs. J

Also read this and let me know your thoughts: https://techboard.vectorworks.net/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=68071

Also what does this parameter control: Layer Ambient Status 150 TRUE or FALSE ObjectVariableBoolean ?

This is a tough-ish one in my opinion. Sometimes I'll do a details layer with several classes to turn items on and off. Most of the time Symbols just for ease of use. You could make heaps of classes but you've got to be really organised then and not overlap things class wise. You could reference the symbols in from other files, but then you've got multiple files to deal with which could be another hell entirely. I tried just then, and this might be a wishlist item now, but to create a viewport whilst in the 3D edit for a symbol. Call it a technical viewport. Interesting concept.

Cute. Not practical but cute for sure. Haha. I feel like Pat Stanford's gonna come in here and bust open some like like SetPref(12348,False) and it'll change the game. Triggering the script itself multiple times seems illogical, there just has to be a refresh that we just don't know about. A forced refresh designed for plugin objects. I tried running the Refresh Instruments command via a DoMenuTextByName to no avail, thought we could get tricky and use something that also forces a refresh in data. Arghh. J

Michael, Totally in the same boat now. Welcome to the party! If I hard break your script at anytime the door opens to the current listed amount. I also tried making your whole script a separate procedure with long wait times in between, but it only renders the very last frame same as if it limits out at 180 degrees. I'm just wondering if when the script is finalised if there's a bigger refresh that we're not aware of that forces all plugin objects to refresh all values. Super weird though, I'm seeing the same thing with all plugin objects: Lighting Device Colour Changes, Doors, Windows, Soft Goods, Human Figure, Plant Tool. I'll have a think on the plane. J

Continuing progress on my personal challenge series. I've played with several elements over the last few hours, and with a 14 hours plan ride ahead I'm looking forwards to getting into the depths of a few new ideas. Progress: New Set - Much more to look at and actualish scaled. Played with actual backdrops now that OpenGL is behaving. Can set record fields for PIO fields Lighting seems to work also, shadowing issues when enabled. Challenges: Soft goods not updating with RedrawAll. If you run this and let the curtain open counter go up (9 key) the curtain won't open. If you terminate the script with esc it will adapt to the width as required. I don't know why, it does have a force update button in the Object Info palette, not sure if this is triggered differently to an Redraw or UpdateObject. Lighting (see a post just before this entitled _Light On). Wanted to try fading lights at rates. Figured I could just SetRField data to the _Brightness or _Light On fields, seems not. If anyone has any links to scripts that involve moving the perspective of the viewer (much like the walkthrough tool) I'd love to hear about them. Even if you have a command in mind that might be relevant. It's somewhere down the line but I want to get into it soon. I'll keep you posted. J

So I've been playing with Spotlight LX Renderings for the last little while. When generating a report or looking at Pat's old (but so still awesome) script in reference to a lighting device there are three fields that come to my attention: _Light On _Lit Fog _Brightness As one of my most recent challenges in VW I've been working on automation systems for my Third Year Lighting class. A request was to be able to SEE transitions in VW, a challenge that I took on as a personal project over the next few weeks. (Commonly used ESP or WYSIWYG for this with no issue, more of a side request) These three fields seem crucial to the "Turn On" option relating to Lighting Devices. But upon manual entry into these fields (Via script or worksheet) the results are somewhat locked with no change to the light output. Can anyone shed some light on this? (Bad pun city) J

I had this rage about 5 years ago about the wattage and weight fields for VW Spotlight being text fields by default. Back in VW 2008 you used to be able to edit the Lighting Device.vso, change the field from Text to Integer and then you'd have to go through your entire library and make some changes to lamp figures (not an impossible task but a painful one still). Now days the spotlight preferences seem to lock these fields to text, which is incredibly dull. My question is why? We have so much capability for: - Dimmer Loading Calculators - Truss Weight Loading - Phase Loading - Point Load Calculations All within our smart two-way spreadsheet system. Just makes me a little angry.

Firstly Michael Klaers you make my weekend so much better! How strange though! Are you saying all these objects needed was a nudge to actually update? Apart from this mega update now thanks to MK's input it's looking kinda fun/cool. Progress: I've made a few changes with the flys, they now stop at a lower dead, which is kind of nice. I'm going to keep playing with this over the next two days. If you have feedback / concepts that you think might be fun to try list them and I'll either have a look at implementing them and/or try out your code! J

I've been working on my own challenge. Progress: Now with your keyboard you can trigger the Fly lines to move up, down or remain stationary. (1, 2 & 3 key) Notated code, sorry! Found more flexibility - about to work on up/down limits and perhaps changing key style to latching. Need Help With: Why won't OpenGL refresh. You'll notice that I'm running this whole thing through a viewport. In a standard design layer it won't RedrawAll. I've tried for resetting the viewport to no avail. Any input welcome! Opinions on concept. Post getting actual rendered modes to work I'm thinking temp dialog for control, got a design in the works. Anyone who has an example of exporting a .jpg from script would be much appreciated! I'll keep at it, don't be scared to break it. J

The major issue I have with this solution is the wipe out of shadowing due to the global rise in ambient light in all directions. (See attached for examples) It makes the objects loose all depth due to the whole 360 degree lighting thing going on, whether the ambient is at 25%, 70% or 100%. I'll have to have a play with fixed almost sun direction lighting to see if I can replicated this light that gets turned off, it'd be good to know if it can be enabled/replicated again for future reference. Thanks for the link and explanation though B, I'd remember seeing this a while ago but dismissing it. Good to check it out again now. J

Double offset objects make a great result! What a great tip, thanks.

Alan, Firstly you're right up my alley. Totally digging the radical thinking you've got going on here. If you've just seen my recent Challenge post then you'll know why! Moving animation is something I've wanted in vector works for a long time but it's always been an external product's job (Cinema4D primarily). I love using the animation works package regardless (You'll see the current flythrough on the Youtube channel below is all done in VW, not externally). What you've done here is the best option. I've tried several other solutions; animated gif inserted as textures, updating frames of movie file via script, even altering a hatch pattern via script to give these illusions. The end result seems to be do it in C4D. I'm not willing to give up, thus the new challenge series! I'll keep having a play with this one that you've proposed. Keep in touch, I like your thinking! Cheers, J

Hi there, and welcome to the forum, The dimension tool is entirely reliant on the things that you've drawn actually being the right size. It's basically so you can't fudge the measurements at all. Should you have drawn something indicative and you need to show a dimension that's not actually the size of the object you've drawn the only way to do so (as you've discovered) is to de-check the show dim value and replace it with your own in either the Leader or Trailer fields. If you wish to do this for just one of the dimensions and not the entire chain simply ungroup the dimension chain after drawing (Command + u for Mac) and they will separate into individual dimensions for editing. In reference to the second part of your question the 3 blue dots represent the growth points of the dimension. These are often referred to as pinning points. The one that you have selected is pinned in place meaning that if the item is to grow or shrink it does so from that point inwards or outwards. Let me know if you need any further help and I'll record a short video for you explaining the topic further. Cheers, J

Sam, I've had this issue also on several shapes. The common way that I fix it (without the need for a restart) is to temporarily change the Selection Tool (cursor) from Single Object Interactive Scaling Mode to Disabled and then back again. It seems to do a little refresh of all handles for the active document/layer/whatever. Kind of dull though, agreed. J

It is possible, see attached. I think your issue must have something to do with your base surface shape. I've used a sphere and parts from a cone that have been converted to nurbs surfaces. I'm more interested in how you've managed to do yours... J

Hayden, I can totally +1 on this vent session. Looking back at the original Lighting Device code from a 2008 printed copy of it that I have here (those were the days), a third hidden component is generated when your lighting device is added to the drawing. It seems there are three components created when a Lighting Device is generated. The 3D Symbol, the 2D Symbol, and a generic directional light commonly found in the visualisation toolset. The main issue is that there doesn't seem to be a way to get to this visualisation directional light component. In the ideal world I'd love there to be a class added for these visualisation lighting components (just like clamps is generated on first load) so they could be turned off and on to avoid this issue. It's one extra line in the lighting device generation .vso. Otherwise your current workaround is pretty much the same as mine currently. Good luck, J

I might be misunderstanding the question but can't you just change the sorting style on the worksheet itself? See this article for more info: http://kbase.vectorworks.net/questions/465/Different+ways+to+organize+column+data+in+a+worksheet If that's not it feel free to attach a basic example and I'm sure we'll all have a look. J

Sorry I've been missing the forums lately, it's back as one of my home tabs so I should be here a little more. I've been working on the designs recently for the Melbourne Comedy Festival which has a centrepiece of a large revolve with several set elements. As part of a cute package I threw together I ended up using the Orbital Animation feature to do a really nice rendering of the items on the revolve. I then got to thinking how hard it would be to implement this functionality into the actual planset, re:automation. Attached is me around 2 hours in (It's 2015, viewer will still open it or I'll downsave if needed peeps). (Note not to scale, no detail, it's just the concept). It's around 900 frames long, and I haven't put compensation in for multiple runnings of the script within the boundaries yet. That aside I've learnt several things! 1) Seems that 3D isometric views of a design layer aren't visually affected by RedrawAll until you change perspective, render type or between Top/Plan and Plan. 2) All rendering styles except Wireframe and Sketch don't update in any 3D view from the design layer. 3) Viewports do update in Isometric modes. Why I have no idea. 4) Even with a wait command and an UpdateVP the viewport with any other mode other than Wireframe or Sketch won't update even one frame. So my question is this Brains Trust. Can you run and/or edit and run my script and get an OpenGL animated rendering in a viewport and/or the raw design layer? I have a feeling it's a few lines away from doing it just can't quite get there. Hope you're all well. J PS. On a side note if anyone knows how to set the perspective and co-ordinates of the Viewport Portal feel free to attach a linked article.

So randomly chose this as a challenge today to get back in the swing of things. It is possible to differentiate between viewport items via their 3D world orientation in the referenced file. For example if you were to draw 10 circles within above the X-axis and save this as File01. Then create a new document with 8 circles drawn below the X-axis and save this as File02. Now create a new (Master) document and reference these two documents in as Design Layer Viewports. They can be placed anywhere. In this new (Master) document you can create a rectangle that covers a portion above the X-axis where the circle would be in File01, and give it the name Location01. Similarly you can create a rectangle covering the virtual space below the X-axis and name it Location02. Note these viewports do not have to be within the locations to work, they just need to cover the origins of the circles from the original files. Now generate a worksheet with the criteria of Loc=Location01 & T=Circle. It should only show you a count of 10 items. A criteria of Loc=Location02 & T=Circle should result in 8 items. Hope that made sense. Let me know if you come up with another solution! J PS. Sorry I used Circles not spaces for proof of concepts, haha.

Hey everyone, First time posting in the scary Landmark forum, surprising not that different to the others As the summer season rolls around I'm finding myself doing more and more outdoor designs and with that come Trees! Nearly every plan I come across is a DXF that someone has drawn in 2D from 10 years ago, and trees are represented as circles and a centermarker. Gurus out there, is there a function/tool/menu command that can turn my tree circle into a 3D library/generic tree with dynamic scaling to still keep the dripline of the tree the same and guesstimate the height accordingly? Keep drawin', J