Parametric design
About Rhino & Grasshopper and PARAM-O.

Control of existing object parameters

gavinNZz
Advocate
Can someone please confirm the following.......

Can I edit the parameters of a selected object (already placed) in Archicad through grasshopper or do I have to actually create that object from the grasshopper interface first?

I just want to use the grasshopper connection along with the Human UI add-on to build custom UI's for objects so that when a particular object in archicad is selected it provides me all the parameters associated with that instance and ability to then edit them though the custom UI.

I am sick of Archicads tiny 1980's object UI panel and need to find a way to drag it into the 21st century. Grasshopper seems to have pipeline in place but I'm not sure if i'm just doing something wrong or the functionality to edit existing instances parameters is just not there.

Thanks
Planworks Ltd
Residential Designer based in Tauranga, NZ
Archicad v9+
VR enthusiast.
Always wants more!
5 REPLIES 5
Laszlo Nagy
Community Admin
Community Admin
It is possible to do. Download the Grasshopper-ARCHICAD Live Connection 2.3 User Guide from

https://www.graphisoft.com/downloads/addons/interoperability/rhino.html#live-connection-plugin

and read the section towards the end of the PDF called "Accessing GDL Parameters of ARCHICAD Library Parts".
Loving Archicad since 1995 - Find Archicad Tips at x.com/laszlonagy
AMD Ryzen9 5900X CPU, 64 GB RAM 3600 MHz, Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB, 500 GB NVMe SSD
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leceta
Expert
if with "edit existing instances parameters" you mean to edit the paremeters of objects already placed in the document, then NO its not possible.

Laszlo Nagy, the chapter your refer is about accesing parameter of objects existing in the archicad library, but not those instances created on the document. Or am I missing something (big)?

Current state of grasshopper connection only can Read archicad database, even Create (some) elements on the database, but you cannot Update existing elements, nor Delete them. Just Read and Create. Not Update and Delete. This is an important feature that plugins has not implemented yet, if ever, known that GDL capabilities, after years of development, has not implemented neither. Again, Am I missing something or this is just a feature limitation by design?

This design decision is limiting use cases enormously. All examples seen all over there are about creating algorithmically some more or less complex geometrical setups. This is great, is a very handy feature, and gives great possibilities to archicad modelers, but In my opinion it is missing all the "information management" side of architectural practice that greatly would be benefited with this database UPDATE and DELETE features, that is being miserably dismissed.

so, definetively, IT IS NOT POSSIBLE to "edit existing instances parameters", at least the way I have interpreted it. I´am very concerned with this lacking feature, so please accept my vehemence.

P.S. I would be more than happy if someone could prove me that i´am wrong.
gavinNZz
Advocate
Thanks, I feared that was the case. I am really not sure what Graphisoft is thinking here. They have a very powerful tool in grasshopper that could be used in a great number of ways to enhance Archicad but yet it is limited???. It is like dangling a carrot in front of a donkey. He knows it's there and that it will taste good but if he is not given the carrot eventually he will go looking for other things to eat so the carrot gets left behind.

I am getting ever excited about the advancements in BIM technology but none of that excitement stems from Archicad. They will be left behind as the industry moves on without them. In 10 yrs Archicad will be the equivalent of a drawing board. We will talk about how we used to draw 2D details and how we had to wait for our sections to load.............
Planworks Ltd
Residential Designer based in Tauranga, NZ
Archicad v9+
VR enthusiast.
Always wants more!
Laszlo Nagy
Community Admin
Community Admin
leceta wrote:
if with "edit existing instances parameters" you mean to edit the paremeters of objects already placed in the document, then NO its not possible.

Laszlo Nagy, the chapter your refer is about accesing parameter of objects existing in the archicad library, but not those instances created on the document. Or am I missing something (big)?

Current state of grasshopper connection only can Read archicad database, even Create (some) elements on the database, but you cannot Update existing elements, nor Delete them. Just Read and Create. Not Update and Delete. This is an important feature that plugins has not implemented yet, if ever, known that GDL capabilities, after years of development, has not implemented neither. Again, Am I missing something or this is just a feature limitation by design?


Yes, you are absolutely right, I have not fully understood the original question.
Currently, we can select ARCHICAD elements in Grasshopper, extract all their settings, but the Object Node of GH will not modify that placed instance, it will always create a new instance.

Yes, it would be great to be able to select any element in ARCHICAD from Grasshopper and modify any of its parameters or settings (which is currently not possible to do).

You guys should make a wish for this. If you do, please post its link in this thread.
Loving Archicad since 1995 - Find Archicad Tips at x.com/laszlonagy
AMD Ryzen9 5900X CPU, 64 GB RAM 3600 MHz, Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB, 500 GB NVMe SSD
2x28" (2560x1440), Windows 10 PRO ENG, Ac20-Ac27
leceta
Expert
You guys should make a wish for this. If you do, please post its link in this thread.
Done:
https://archicad-talk.graphisoft.com/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=68519