topic Re: Add-on for rounding measurements in Archicad C++ API

Add-on for rounding measurements

pedrocollares — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 02:56:10 GMT

Hi all,

I wonder if there's an add-on ever made for the following purpose:

In a current project we're developing, there's a bunch of bad measurement values (for example, 25.03 cm instead of 25.00 cm). And they're always really close to the correct measurement value.

Logically, we don't need the ".03" amount, it is only a matter of design inaccuracy. It would be great if we could run an 'element rounding-off' plug-in, which snaps every selected element to the closest round measure (admitting 0.5 and maybe 0.25), considering the project origin as a major reference to those measurements.

Anyone ever heard of such?

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

Gerry Leonor — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 03:11:21 GMT

why not change the settings in the Project Preferences?

Working Units is what will be displayed in your dimension tracker, door / window sizes, wall heights etc. if you set it to Meter, your door leaf will be 0.9 x 2.04m in size. if you set it to Millimeter, it'll be 900 x 2040mm in size.

the Dimensions settings will be the output of your dimensions & will print / publish depending on what you've set it to. there are already some out of the box Dimension Combo in there. see what fits best, otherwise make it suit your own.

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

pedrocollares — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 03:40:27 GMT

Those configurations will only allow me to hold accuracy in my documentation, and that could be enough, but when we collaborate with other appointed parts in projects (Which might even work in different units/dimension settings) we need to maintain our model accuracy, more than only documentation.

Small flaws in measurements can put out errors in collaboration, such as beam/wall bad overlapping and so on. We have guidelines of never modeling in measures not divisible by 0.25cm, and such tool I mention above would make auditing easier.

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

Gerry Leonor — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 04:03:34 GMT

yes, i understand. you want to control the accuracy down to the modelling level & not up at the documentation level.

this has always been an issue for the juniors in our office. in our last internal CAD lunch talk, i had to go through & show them how to model things orthogonally to avoid having walls at an 89.9994 angle & have odd dimensions like 1203.04mm

unfortunately i can't think of a way to avoid tiny dimension mishaps such as these without having to do 2 or 3 extra steps beyond the typical modelling methodology. (eg. modelling walls orthogonally to the side to avoid grabbing a random spot in the active model & using that as a snap guide reference which could cause mis-alignments a few steps ahead.)

perhaps turning on the Grid Snap feature will alleviate some of it? i couldn't stand it for more than 5 minutes. i'm open to hear of other solutions for this.

to me, this part of the software was either too smart by allowing these miniscule dimensions, or too dumb to actively prevent such tiny misalignments.

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

pedrocollares — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 04:18:40 GMT

We have a few ways of trying to avoid it.

The grid is one, but it is too rigid in such a way you'll always turn it off eventually.

We even crafted a custom label in GDL meant for auditing, to figure out if elements X and Y coordinates to the project origin are divisible by 0.25, and if their rotations are OK.

But once inaccuracy is there (Projects go through many different hands), having to deal with it can be frustrating.

Since I'd be able to instruct exactly what I'd want that imaginary add-on to do, it seems to me a feasible thing. I might dive into crafting add-ons at some point just to put up that thing 😅

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

Gerry Leonor — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 04:32:06 GMT

yes, we've started to implement model checking tags such as that in our template, thought not as clean as yours. it's a shame it's gotten to that degree & still annoyed it's not dealt with at the earliest stage -- during the modelling of elements.

apologies if my first answer sounded condescending. didn't read your signature & assumed it was a CAD junior asking for tips.

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

hevi — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 08:44:21 GMT

The cost of these errors increases as models becomes more advanced while at the same time the relative cost of avoiding these errors increases as it becomes easier to model freely. I think this is a real problem that warrants a solution from GS.

To me the obvious solution is to decrease the cost of avoiding these errors by implementing the ability to lock input to working units number of decimals. Graphical input methods are likely to be the culprit behind most of these errors and if the input could be locked in terms of decimals a lot of errors would be avoided. This would also allow for much more efficient modelling throughout the design process as we to a large extent could rely solely on graphical input.

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

fabioferrini — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 14:16:24 GMT

Same problems here, very frustrating. We Also often waste a lot of time to restoring our files. Lock Imput seams to be a great idea!

Graphisoft what do you think?

Fabio

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

fabioferrini — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 14:32:09 GMT

🆒 Great solution! I will be impertinent, but could you please kindly share with us the GDL script of these great labels? Thanks in advance 🙏

Fabio

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

DGSketcher — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 14:33:13 GMT

I run two different dimension systems that can be switched in the Quick Settings at the base of the screen. The standard one is WYSIWYG as published and assigned to the View settings. The other shows the smallest value possible, so any dimensions can quickly show the errors without the displayed extra accuracy impacting the View & Published layout.

Behind the scenes I think things are getting a bit messy with AC. I have always been super critical of my own drawings, but I am generating a growing number of errors. It is difficult to pin down but I think the following are part of the problem...

1. GS are reducing processing accuracy to increase display speeds of increasingly complex elements.

2. AC is prone to pick up on element nodes that are irrelevant to the current drawing.

3. The blue guide lines can throw unwanted intersections into the pot, particularly when the circular guides start to appear just off the required point.

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

fabioferrini — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 14:40:39 GMT

that would be great... if it existed it would win the award for the best useful plug-in in the world, for our studio!

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

pedrocollares — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 22:25:42 GMT

Hey! I developed such label to our architecture firm and it currently belongs to our own library. But I could develop a similar label suiting your needs. Being the case you may e-mail me 🙂 (pedrocollares@gmail.com)

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

julienK — Wed, 26 Oct 2022 05:41:55 GMT

here's a quick demo for an addon checking wall length:

It checks all selected walls and change the cut fill to red if its length is not a multiple of the 'step' variable. This gives a quick visual reference to find errors in the model.

void lengthCheck() { API_GetPointType pointInfo; GS::Array<API_Guid> inds; GSErrCode err; API_SelectionInfo selectionInfo; API_Elem_Head tElemHead = {}; GS::Array<API_Neig> selNeigs; double startX, endX, startY, endY, theta, dx, dy, Lprev,step,rem,L,eps; Int32 index; GS::UniString strType,dir; GS::UniString name, strName; API_Element element = {} , mask; err = ACAPI_Selection_Get(&selectionInfo, &selNeigs, true); BMKillHandle((GSHandle*)&selectionInfo.marquee.coords); if (err != NoError && err != APIERR_NOSEL) { ErrorBeep("ACAPI_Selection_GetInfo", err); return; } ACAPI_ELEMENT_MASK_CLEAR(mask); ACAPI_ELEMENT_MASK_SET(mask, API_WallType, penOverride.overrideCutFillBackgroundPen); ACAPI_ELEMENT_MASK_SET(mask, API_WallType, penOverride.cutFillBackgroundPen); ACAPI_ELEMENT_MASK_SET(mask, API_WallType, penOverride.cutFillPen); for (index = 0; index < selectionInfo.sel_nElemEdit; index++) { // Get selected element BNZeroMemory(&element, sizeof(element)); element.header.guid = selNeigs[index].guid; if (ACAPI_Element_Get(&element) != NoError) continue; startX = element.wall.begC.x; startY = element.wall.begC.y; endX = element.wall.endC.x; endY = element.wall.endC.y; step = 0.002500; eps = 0.0000100; if (abs(endX) > abs(startX)) { dx = abs(endX - startX); } else { dx = abs(startX - endX); } if (abs(endY) > abs(startY)) { dy = abs(endY - startY); } else { dy = abs(startY - endY); } L = sqrt(dx * dx + dy * dy); theta = atan2(dx, dy) / (2 * PI) * 360; if (dx < eps && dy > eps) //vertical wall { Lprev = dy ; } if (dx > eps && dy < eps) //horizontal wall { Lprev = dx; } if (dx > eps && dy > eps) //if not orthogonal wall { Lprev = L ; } rem = fmod(Lprev, step); if (rem >= eps && rem < step - eps) { element.wall.penOverride.overrideCutFillBackgroundPen = true; element.wall.penOverride.cutFillBackgroundPen = 181; element.wall.penOverride.cutFillPen = 181; ACAPI_CallUndoableCommand("Element Test API Function", [&]() -> GSErrCode { err = ACAPI_Element_Change(&element, &mask, nullptr, 0, true); if (err != NoError) { ErrorBeep("elem change err", err); } return err; }); } } return ; }

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

fabioferrini — Wed, 26 Oct 2022 05:43:48 GMT

Dear juliencuadra,

thank you so much! ❤️

have a nice day

Fabio

Re: Add-on for rounding measurements

vdentello — Wed, 09 Nov 2022 17:00:30 GMT

I'm developing that but still wasn't able to finish it.