Octopus

461 members

Description

Octopus is a plug-in for applying evolutionary principles to parametric design and problem solving. It allows the search for many goals at once, producing a range of optimized trade-off solutions between the extremes of each goal.

Also see octopus.E for custom evolutionary algorithms.

 

Download the latest version on food4rhino

It is part of a range of tools developed at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, and Bollinger+Grohmann Engineers.

 

  • search for single goal + diversity of solutions
  • search for best trade offs between 2 to X goals
  • improve solutions by similarity-goals
  • choose preferred solutions during a search
  • change objectives during a search
  • solutions' 3d models for visual feedback
  • recorded history
  • save all search data within the Grasshopper document
  • save a solution as a Grasshopper State
  • export to text or text files


Octopus introduces multiple fitness values to the optimization. The best trade-offs between those objectives are searched, producing a set of possible optimum solutions that ideally reach from one extreme trade-off to the other.

Based on SPEA-2 and HypE from ETH Zürich and David Rutten's Galapagos User Interface. Developed by Robert Vierlinger in cooperation with Christoph Zimmel, karamba3d.com and Bollinger+Grohmann Engineers.

 

To install:

  • Copy the .gha and .dll file into the Grasshopper components folder 
  • Right-click the file > Properties > make sure there is no "blocked" text
  • Restart Rhino and Grasshopper

 

Some examples are provided here. 

New commented examples and a brief manual are provided in the download of octopus on food4rhino.

Comments Discussions Members

Automatically run solver and output best solution after N generations

by Max Marschall

Nov 9, 2018

Below is a schematic of what I want to do, namely:

  1. Trigger a solver like Octopus or Galapagos from within a definition (not by double-clicking the component), run the solver for a fixed number of generations, then only output the best solution (I only have 1 evaluation metric)
  2. Optionally, I would like to automatically increment an additional parameter and rerun the process for each parameter setting

Not sure how to go about this - any tips to point me in the right direction would be much appreciated!

  • up

    Thomas Wortmann

    I've done something similar, but it required serious coding in C#. 

    I used "reflection" to call some of the methods in Galapagos to automatically trigger it.

    1

    Nov 9, 2018

    • up

      John Harding

      You can use Octopus Explicit and Anemone/Hoopsnake for this I think. When I have time I can dig out an old definition.

      Nov 10, 2018

      • up

        GabrielaSullivan

        Thanks for the advice. Struggling students! I can’t tell you how much this https://www.grabmyessay.com/do-my-homework homework service has changed my life. I used to be overwhelmed with assignments and then I found this gem. The team of experts here are like my academic angels. Not only did they create a perfect, plagiarism free paper, but they took the time to understand the details of the task. The peace of mind that comes with their money back guarantee is priceless. Trust me, if you’re in a bind with homework, these people are the real deal!

        Dec 18, 2023