How To: Set up your Add-On development environment

[Doreena Deng]

What will you need?

You need to install a couple of things to get started with Archicad Add-Ons:

1. Development environment:
   • Windows: Visual Studio - The latest Visual Studio is fine, but make sure that you have the v142 platform toolset installed.
   • MacOS: Xcode - You can use the latest Xcode.
2. CMake (3.17 minimum version is needed).
3. Python for resource compilation and build script usage (3.8+).
4. Git for getting the source code.

 

Build the example code

The source for the example Add-On is located here: https://github.com/GRAPHISOFT/archicad-addon-cmake. You can acquire the code with any git user interface, for example GitHub Desktop, or you can just run this script from the command line:

git clone https://github.com/GRAPHISOFT/archicad-addon-cmake.git --recurse-submodules

Now go to the root directory of the cloned repository, and run the following command:

python Tools/BuildAddOn.py --configFile config.json --acVersion 26 27

That's it! The above commands will fetch the code from GitHub, acquire all the necessary Archicad Development Kits for compilation, and build the Add-On for the specified versions.

The result can be located in the Build/ExampleAddOn/<Archicad Version>/<Language> directory. In this directory, you'll find:

• A native Visual Studio or Xcode project that can be opened for modifications and rebuilding of the Add-On.
• The apx or bundle file that can be directly loaded into Archicad.

 

Start building your own Add-On

If you are ready to start building your own Add-On, create your very own copy of the template repository using GitHub:

• Go to the template repository: https://github.com/GRAPHISOFT/archicad-addon-cmake.
• Click on the "Use this template" button located at the top right corner of the page.
• Select "Create a new repository", set the parameters and click "Create repository".

Now you have your own copy and everything is configured. Follow the above steps using this repository and start building your own Archicad Add-On.