capture_032

Comment

Comment by RWNB on January 10, 2012 at 10:57am

thanks for the detailed answer / notes!

uufffff! (:

Comment by peter fotiadis on January 9, 2012 at 9:56am

Er...me too > this is the other animal I'm afraid (Microstation + Gen Comp).

That said, this is the big thing with the GH/Rhino combo: how to invite existed stuff into the party (doable, obviously) and...how to bake meaningful assembly/component type of structures for the rest of the tedious work required > you know what I mean > the ugly part of our business > documentation drawings, BOM, tech etc etc etc.

For instance, let's focus to the planar glazing support items: absolutely no need to make them it via any smart app since they are plenty of them around in the market (unless you are I.M.Pei and you do that exceptional Pyramid wonder thing).

But...the goal is...hmm...to create some kind of "smart" (kinda, he he) solution where components (the "baked" ones, so to speak) are structured in such a way that further work (via conventional CAD apps) is easily managed. To speak in Rhino dialect: nested Blocks and/or nested Refs. Like having components in GH that could manage nested Block/Ref stuff (but I guess that you can do it rather easily via VB).

Back to that ugly truss: It's obvious that this is a nested collection of "repetitions" (should I call them iterations?) : meaning that a void top node owns a module truss that owns 2 supportive sub-trusses that are made by some pipes that own connecting items that own the planar glazing items etc etc etc.

With regard the "own" thing: Imagine a CAD file that is simply a container/place holder of some individual entities (called Models). These Models can be "linked" to others (in a nested parent/child relation). Links can be external of internal. They can be either References or Cells or Shared Cells. This the way that Microstation classifies/handles "entities" (a bit primitive, mind, but nobody's perfect - for the real thing see CATIA/NX).    

Back to that ugly truss: Obviously this structure (actually the assembly/component combo related with the given solution) has to be transfered into classic 2d extractions (say: plans, elevations, sections et all). This is done why a weird thing called Dynamic Views/live markers in Microstation (you define Clip planes in 3d space that manage 2d extraction content in something called Drawing Model that controls other weird things called Sheet Models, all these live linked etc etc).

To make things more spicy...these 2d extractions can been viewed as master detail directives: from where 1:1 classic details are made (that is: you apply more Dynamic Views and live markers and life goes on - red pepper extra strong Russian vodka is a must when you do that type of work).

This is where Rhino is out of his depth (but to be fair: it's not designed for this type of work) and also this is where Microstation has no competition at least for AEC purposes (but to be fair: it is designed for this type of work).

Of course Autodesk...well expect soon the Gen Comp equivalent for Revit...a fact that complicates things (for Bentley) a bit given the Revit mania in the AEC world. 

Moral: intelligence is good but it's only the tip of the iceberg.   

Comment by RWNB on January 9, 2012 at 9:07am

now i want to see the grasshopper definition! (: