GDL is a marginalized format, is Graphisoft doing anything?

[Anonymous]

I think that graphisoft is missing the boat with GDL. There is almost no support for it in the US and creation of objects is much more complicated than it should be. Much the way Dreamweaver revolutionized HTML creation, there needs to be a almost purely graphic way of creating objects. I would suggest the ability to easily import other objects from sketchup, dxf, obj, 3ds, etc, and modify them and turn them into gdl objects. www.formfonts.com's popularity and rapid growth is one example, they support several formats but not GDL and they just launched a Revit channel.
Here is a workflow example - I modeled a very complicated cast in place concrete fireplace and wall with multiple splayed openings, structural steel embedded, and designed to be cast with thermal breaks in multiple pours. This piece was basically impossible to model in Archicad. If you import as dxf, the faces are triangulated and you cannot assign cut fills, etc. Archicad should be able to import this from any format it was modeled in and easily make it an object the displays correctly in section, elevation, etc.
Is there any plans to make something like this a reality? Does anyone have any workflow solutions they have developed? (This may need to go in the wish list section, I'll just see how it develops.)

[TomWaltz]

You still believe in Santa Claus I'm guessing...

That's been a wish for as long as I've been on Archicad (4 years), and probably a lot longer from what I've heard,

[Karl Ottenstein]

M wrote:
I think that graphisoft is missing the boat with GDL. There is almost no support for it in the US and creation of objects is much more complicated than it should be. Much the way Dreamweaver revolutionized HTML creation, there needs to be a almost purely graphic way of creating objects. I would suggest the ability to easily import other objects from sketchup, dxf, obj, 3ds, etc, and modify them and turn them into gdl objects. www.formfonts.com's popularity and rapid growth is one example, they support several formats but not GDL and they just launched a Revit channel.

Your Dreamweaver (or Adobe GoLive) example is good ... and as Tom says, this has been wished for continuously for many years. Well, actually, a color-coding, more Visual Studio intelligence-type interface has been wished for. If you ignore the HTML code-view of Dreamweaver/GoLive and think abouut just the visual interface - which is what most people utilize - then Cigraph ArchiForma is perhaps a solution for you to consider.

ArchiCAD can import from all of the formats you mention... you use the open object dialog for most; for 3ds, you use the 3ds import plug-in that is downloaded from the Goodies site.

Here is a workflow example - I modeled a very complicated cast in place concrete fireplace and wall with multiple splayed openings, structural steel embedded, and designed to be cast with thermal breaks in multiple pours. This piece was basically impossible to model in Archicad. If you import as dxf, the faces are triangulated and you cannot assign cut fills, etc. Archicad should be able to import this from any format it was modeled in and easily make it an object the displays correctly in section, elevation, etc.
Is there any plans to make something like this a reality? Does anyone have any workflow solutions they have developed? (This may need to go in the wish list section, I'll just see how it develops.)

Show us an image. From your description, it sounds like the fireplace could be easily modeled in ArchiCAD without writing any GDL ... just have to know how to use SEOps, magic wand and Profiler. If more complex than you described, ArchiForma can likely do the trick visually.

As for triangularization/etc ... I would never import 3D objects as dxf or dwg unless there were no other choice. (Typically, manufacturer sites do not give another choice.) If you save your fireplace as 3DS and use the 3DS import plugin and check the smoothing box, you will not have the triangulation lines...and all textures will be imported into the created GDL object as well.

If you need to take sections of your object, an imported object will not cut with section fills as you might desire and you'll have to do some 2D work to improve the presentation. Another reason to learn to model these things in ArchiCAD itself and/or ArchiForma.

Your subject line about "GDL is a marginalized format" is different from your complaint about the interface... two different topics. As far as a format goes, GDL is far more powerful than any of the other formats you mention (one object can represent infinit other objects). Any GDL object can be saved in one of those other formats from ArchiCAD. I don't see any marginalization...and see no reason for a site like formfonts to offer GDL objects when you can convert 3DS so easily.

Karl

[Richard Morrison]

I thought that ArchiForma was this.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the advise. I have used 3ds import with mixed results, it is the best way to import objects currently but has been somewhat unreliable for me. When I say that it is a marginalized format, I don't mean the actual capabilities of GDL, just that it is too difficult to really utilize ( the Dreamweaver comment) and that almost no US manufactures publish objects in that format. I am a relatively new user and not an expert modeler. However, I am an expert in Form Z and Sketchup, I am used to thinking in a general modeling environment, and am having some trouble doing the same types of models with archicad's limited modeling commands. I have attached images of the concrete fireplace I mentioned, what do you think of modeling this in archicad? I'm guessing it must be possible but does not seem optimal as far as ease and speed of modeling. Perhaps I'm missing some possible techniques for 3d editing and creation? Also, my understanding is that Archiforma has not been updated to work past Archicad 8.1.
Thanks, Matt

[Anonymous]

And another image

[Richard Morrison]

M wrote:
Also, my understanding is that Archiforma has not been updated to work past Archicad 8.1.

Totally wrong. Works with current AC10.

[Karl Ottenstein]

M wrote:
...what do you think of modeling this in archicad?

Pretty "easy" to model - walls/slabs, splayed opening from lib and SEOp perhaps. If splayed opening won't cut as needed, then need to make a cutting object from walls or slabes (verticals) and roof (top cut) to cut the reveal.

Aspects are almost as easy as SketchUp, since to get the stepped-height wall there, you can just draw and push/pull. Here, you use the split command and height adjustment in pet palette (if visually in 3D), or edit height in Info box, or draw several walls, or... etc.

Karl