Reusable parametric groups (Plugins, Reusable designs, Programmability)

Feature requests
1

Hello,

I would like to propose a feature that in my opinion would be groundbreaking and invaluable.

One of the most important things that’s still missing from shapr3d at the moment, is the support for re-usable features and plugins. This proposed solution aims to solve this in a natural way. I feel like that’s the correct timing to mention this, after you finished re-writing the app with parametric / history support.

Description
With the implementation of parametric, each action results in a history step, which is basically a declarative function that takes some inputs and has an influence at the design.

This mechanism is the exact same required for re-usable designs and plugins. What if you could define custom actions (ie. parametric steps)? Those group / compound actions would be comprised of many other “base” actions that the app provides.

So in short, we open up a new design, do some work, and then package all the parametric steps into a “compound” function. We also specify our dynamic inputs (ie. faces, axis, variables, checkboxes, as necessary). Now this compound action becomes a new tool that we can use on another design. This can be used for parametric screws, connections, and so on.

For the “plugin” part, it would be nice if there was also a “code action”, (which can also be part of our parametric compound actions), and with code can attempt to affect the given features, or other inputs and give some outputs.

Please tell me your thoughts, thanks for keeping up the great work!
Best regards,
Christos.

5 Likes
2

As a software developer I really like this idea :slight_smile:
All said above will be even better with variables support.

3 Likes
3

I’m also a software developer, so probably my solution is affected by that :sweat_smile:
Of course, variables is kind of necessary for this!

4

Reusable parts/blocks/components have been requested hundreds of times.

5

Maybe, but here I propose a specific way to implement this. And now with parametric, probably the timing is better than ever.

6

A CAD system I use at work does a similar thing with “design Libraries”, you can create templates of parts or actions with all the command and features that are needed for that repeatable task, you then drag and drop those functions onto defined inputs. It may be a point, or a face and an alignment edge etc. I use this frequently to create tab/slot and sheet metal smarts, so everything is consistent and efficient. But the ability is endless really, within reason

2 Likes