[New options in script parameters...how to use them?]

I've been making custom scripts and plugins for quite some time.  But, I just noticed, I guess after a 2021 upgrade, that there are new options for script parameters (I assume these didn't exist .  I got excited to see material and texture options, and a symbol definition.  I was hoping these would allow me user-input of textures and symbols.  But, they don't appear to do that.

 

Can anyone explain how these are used, or if they don't actually do anything with point plug-ins unless they're set up a certain way?

 

[Can a script change viewport class/layer visibilities?]

1 hour ago, Jesse Cogswell said:

@SamIWas ,

@line-weight mentioned in the original post that they have been using the eyedropper tool to do this, but it becomes very tedious if you have a large number of viewports spread across multiple sheet layers, the tool I wrote and posted above allows you to do it all in one go, and has the ability to force the viewports to run an update as well.

 

Sigh...that's what happens when I don't finish reading the entire post and move on to the responses....🤔

 

[Can a script change viewport class/layer visibilities?]

On 10/21/2020 at 7:13 PM, line-weight said:

 

Yes indeed ... although there is also the possibility that an investment of time doing something moderately engaging, to write a script say, is still worth it, if it avoids a smaller amount of time doing something incredibly tedious/frustrating.

 

Note that the eyedropper tool works on viewports with layer and class settings and is pretty immediate.

[accessing the message bar from vectorscript]

On 10/26/2020 at 1:26 PM, Pat Stanford said:

The Message command "stopped working" a few versions ago in that it does not operate during a Vectorscript, but only at the end of the script. At least that is my memory.

 

You can either use AlrtDialog, and require the user to hit enter to proceed. (this is my go to for debugging) Or you can try AlertInform and set it to be a minor alert. The problem with that is the second time you call AlertInform it ignores the Minor and pops up a dialog box instead of just putting the information into the message bar.

 

If you really feel you need a progress indicator you might be better off in Python and use Python objects instead of VW objects.  +1 to @JBenghiat 😉

 

So THAT'S why so many of my scripts don't report what they used to.

[Phantom old lines showing up randomly]

3 hours ago, Pat Stanford said:

When you Ungroup a PDF you typically end up with 3 items. A bitmap of the PDF on top. A white rectangle (we think it represents the paper). And finally at the bottom a Group containing all of the vector linework and text that VW can extract from the file.

 

It sounds like you had ungrouped the PDF and deleted the bitmap but not the rest.

 

Glad you found the problem.

Yeah...I've done the deal with PDFs for many years, ungrouping then dealing with the resultant parts.  For some reason, I just missed that they were there since they were hidden and weren't selecting.  

[Phantom old lines showing up randomly]

11 minutes ago, Pat Stanford said:

How complicated is your drawing? You might try exporting back on version to a VW file and then updating that back to your current version.

 

Is there any specific action that causes the lines to show?

 

Have you tried to Purge unused objects?

 

I just opened this back up to say that I found the issue.  The lines were there, but were covered with a white rectangle, thus not appearing when I showed everything.  I was sure I had deleted them, but apparently I had not.

[Phantom old lines showing up randomly]

I had imported a pdf, which I ungrouped to get normal lines.  It brought in hundreds of thousands of lines, which of course bogged down the machine.  I deleted all of it.  Weeks later, I'm working on the drawing, and periodically when zooming or performing a move command, these phantom lines reappear for a few seconds before going away.  Being that it's 100,000 of them, it causes a long pause on my MacBook Pro.  I have turned on every class and layer, and the lines are not actually in the drawing.  They are just phantoms showing up randomly.  Any idea how to get rid of these...it's absolutely draining my workflow speed.  I'm starting to think I will have to manually copy each and every existing thing to a new document...

[Pulling and assigning record fields to/from doors/windows]

16 hours ago, Pat Stanford said:

It actually is not that bad. There are a number of ways to do it with some fairly simple loops.

 

Probably the easiest would be a ForEachObject using a Criteria of Selected is True and PON = 'Door'. PON stands for Plug-in Object Name.

 

Code fragment not tested:

Procedure(Test);

Procedure Execute(Hd1:Handle);
Begin
  SetClass(Hd1,'MyClass');
End;

Begin
  ForEachObject(Execute, (((Sel=True) & (PON='Door'))));
End

Run(Test)

 

 

 

Holy crap, man...that worked!  This is going to make updating old files, and inserting new doors and windows, so much faster!

[Pulling and assigning record fields to/from doors/windows]

37 minutes ago, Pat Stanford said:

It actually is not that bad. There are a number of ways to do it with some fairly simple loops.

 

Probably the easiest would be a ForEachObject using a Criteria of Selected is True and PON = 'Door'. PON stands for Plug-in Object Name.

 

Code fragment not tested:

Procedure(Test);

Procedure Execute(Hd1:Handle);
Begin
  SetClass(Hd1,'MyClass');
End;

Begin
  ForEachObject(Execute, (((Sel=True) & (PON='Door'))));
End

Run(Test)

 

 

Thanks Pat!  I'll try this tomorrow and see how it goes.

[Pulling and assigning record fields to/from doors/windows]

3 hours ago, MullinRJ said:

Using: Message(GetTypeN(FSActLayer));

 

If I select a free standing Door I get type 86 (Plug-In object).

 

If I select a a Door in a Wall I get type 68 (Wall object).

 

To see the Door on a test wall I have in an open document, I needed to use:

Message(GetTypeN(NextObj(NextObj(NextObj(NextObj(NextObj(NextObj(NextObj(FIn3D(FSActLayer))))))))));

 

As you can see, the door object is deep inside the Wall object. The number of objects in front of it are not exact, and are determined by the wall's construction. You should use a loop to look for the Door, or possibly try ForEachObjectAtPoint(). There may be a more direct way to get to the Door-in-Wall that someone else can point to. I've just done a cursory quick dive at this. 

 

Again, make sure your handle is pointing to a Door object before trying to access its record.

 

HTH,

Raymond

 

Holy schniekies.  So, it looks like selecting a bunch of doors throughout a document and trying to change records in this way wouldn't work very well.  

 

What I was trying to do was create a script that would assign my default class scheme to doors that I pull in from older drawings.  

[Pulling and assigning record fields to/from doors/windows]

Just now, MullinRJ said:

Are you sure you have a handle to the Door and not the Wall?

 

Raymond

 The test script is set to give me an alert box with the handle.  If I put the door alone in the drawing, it returns a series of numbers.  When I put the door in the wall, and select only the door, I get a blank.

[Pulling and assigning record fields to/from doors/windows]

With the lighting device, I can just use SetRField and GetRField to get and set info for the lighting device.  With door, this doesn't seem to work.  As a test, I used GetRField(h,'Door','2DLeafClass') and GetRField(h,'Door','2D Leaf Class').  but neither works.  Is there different way to get and set door info via script?

 

EDIT:  I have found that it works when the door is not in a  wall.  But, once the door is placed in a wall, I can no longer get the script to pull info from it.  Surely there is a way.

[Import spreadsheet data into vectorworks and assign to record format.]

1 hour ago, rDesign said:

I believe that FileMaker can import from & export to Excel files, so presumably you could use this new 2021 Excel file functionality as the means to transfer data / records between Vw <—> FileMaker, without needing the MS Excel application itself. Just a hunch.

 

Yeah, I already do that via text files.  It's just an extra step in the process.   I know that a direct, immediate, and automatically updating connection is possible with Filemaker via ODBC.  I've gotten it working briefly on small projects, but it is mind bogglingly difficult.  I'm hoping for VW and FM to work together to make a solution with easy, automatic connection between the two.  FM Is so powerful when it comes to tracking and reporting data.

[Import spreadsheet data into vectorworks and assign to record format.]

1 hour ago, Hans-Olav said:

 

I just want FileMaker connection. I don’t even have excel. 

[2021 - Teaser Tuesday: Collaboration Improvements Make Us Better Together]

Dear god, please make this work with FileMaker. That would be worth the cost of the program alone for me. 
 

Well, maybe worth $1000. 
 

please please please

[Import spreadsheet data into vectorworks and assign to record format.]

On 9/1/2020 at 5:54 PM, The Hamma said:

I have a spreadsheet with a list of equipment and each piece of equipment is identified with a unique id.  I also have symbols in the drawing with a record attached and a matching field for every column in the spread sheet.   I was able to create a report based on the record and I am able to copy cell by cell manually from the imported spread sheet to the record report worksheet.  My question is has anyone written a script that would search a worksheet for a matching id and copy all of the following cells in the row to the other worksheet?

 

Are you saying you have a spreadsheet outside of Vectorworks and want to import  that spreadsheet, match each line to a symbol, and apply the data from that spreadsheet to the symbols, filling the necessary record format(s)?  If so, yes.  I have dozens of scripts which do this.  Each symbol/lighting device/plug-in has a unique ID, and the script matches the data from each line to the symbol using that.

 

It's can get quite complicated.  The  basics are to use OPEN(filename) and then  create a loop to read each line and separate each cell into a variable. Find any symbol which matches the key variable, and SETRFIELD to apply the variables to the records fields.

[Import spreadsheet data into vectorworks and assign to record format.]

On 9/1/2020 at 10:55 PM, Pat Stanford said:

Unless this is time critical right now, you might want to put this on the back burner for a few weeks.

 

Oh, well, that's just mean.  If there's some new great way of sending and receiving data from external sources (particularly Filemaker), I'm going to be quite a happy camper.

[Simple script to call custom tool?]

1 minute ago, JBenghiat said:

This should work:

https://developer.vectorworks.net/index.php/VS:CallToolByName
 

🥴 See!  I knew it was that easy and that I just overlooked something.  Thanks Joshua!

[Simple script to call custom tool?]

I feel like this is one of those moments where 'm going to smack my head into the desk when/if someone gets me the answer, but i'm just  too brain-tired right now to get it.

 

I have a bunch of custom tools which are in a tool pallete.   I just got a StreamDeck, and want to be able to call those tools from it.  Since there are only a few keyboard shortcuts left, those aren't a good solution to calling them.  My other solution is to create a script which calls the tools my name.  But DoMenuTextByName doesn't work for this.  I don't want it to create and place the tool, just activate it.

 

Anyone got any solutions here?

[Completely re-vamp keyboard shortcuts]

On 8/14/2020 at 12:16 AM, Jeremy Best said:

Hi @SamIWas, 

 

I can see how valuable such an enhancement would be for you and fellow power users, but based on my experience providing technical support for Vectorworks users, I suspect it would go largely under-utilised - much like the current implementation. There is another way, that can simultaneously broaden the number of shortcuts possible and coax more efficient use of the interface by more users. Maybe revisit your proposition after the release of 2021 😉

 

If 2021 has some new way of handling shortcuts, I'll be all for it.  If they also fix the script-limit issue which has been around for 8-9 years now, that'll be enough for me!

[Completely re-vamp keyboard shortcuts]

I made this request many years ago, but I'll try again.  

 

There are now so many menu items and so many tools, that the basic keyboard shortcuts aren't cutting it.  There are only so many combinations of keys and ways you can contort your hands to run shortcuts.  And most of the possible shortcuts are already taken.  And with the rise in automated things like streamdeck and programmable mice, being able to further expand shortcuts would be very handy.  This also benefits people like myself who build large custom workspaces with custom tools and scripts.

 

I again propose a system like Cinema 4Ds.  In addition to Command-X (or Control-X), or Command-Option-Shift-X,  allow hierarchical double-key shortcuts.  For instance, to grab the mirror tool in Cinema 4D, you press M then H (M for a mesh list, and H for mirror).  This increases the available shortcuts by multiple times and allows easy programmability for other devices.  

 

The current shortcut system is limited to just over 200 shortcuts.  That's a lot, and it does cover the most-used tools.  But those, combined with double-key shortcuts could easily allow for well over 1000.  

 

Obviously, this would probably kill some current shortcuts, and would require a change in muscle memory, but there would be a lot of gain on the other side.

[2020 desktop icon graphics- cluttered]

I, for one, do not agree.  The old icons look sterile and institutional.  

[Merge Circuit Name/Number into single field like Universe/DMX Address]

On 8/3/2020 at 4:02 AM, Sebastiaan said:

by the way. In Label legends I do place the circuit name and circuit number next to each other. It works fine the only downside is that you can not center the two fields as one. 

 

Yes...this is the issue.

 

Quote

also did you know that in the label layout you can group all fields together? This wil make your label behave as one object. 

 

Yep.  This is what I do often.  But, when you rotate, especially with "adjust flipped text" on, things get really funky.  Sometimes, the fields stay in order.  Sometimes they don't.  Sometimes, they flop to odd locations.  Sometimes, they don't.  The basic labels all work just fine, including the Universe/Address field.  I made my own custom field to deal with this issue, but then it sucks sending to other people.

[Merge Circuit Name/Number into single field like Universe/DMX Address]

On 8/1/2020 at 2:21 AM, Sebastiaan said:

also you could use a script to concatenate the desired fields into one. In the AutoplotVW Plug-ins there is a menu command called copy field to field which will do exactly what you want.  but this will require you to run it each time you make updates  to your plot. 

 

This is what I do currently.  And it works, but is error prone if I forget to run the script.

 

Quote

use a data tag. In data tags there are dynamic text fields where you can combine mutliple fields into one. Which you can then center align for instance. 

 

This is something I need to look into.  Maybe that would;d be a decent short-term solution.

[Undo causing a step back of dozens of steps...]

I have never had this issue before, but it popped up yesterday.  I do need to update to the newest service pack (which is happening currently...sloooowwly).  I've been working on 2020 SP3.1.

 

I've been working on a large drawing, and every now and then, I have to hit undo (obviously).  There have been several times recently where I hit undo, and it steps back some 10-15 minutes worth of work, completely erasing everything that was done in that span.  And redo does not appear to bring it back.   Has anyone else seen this behavior?

 

And just now I found that VW had not done the most recent backup or two (autosave every five minutes), so I lost all that work. 😡