It would be great if there was a way to export a grasshopper definition to a standalone graphical interface
(just a 3D viewport and a few controls as with the remote panel. No code needs to be visible) in order to showcase a design to a client in a pc that doesn’t have rhino installed and maybe even being able to email it or publish it on the web.
As far as I know there is no ready solution for that. (although it would be great if there was!)
but is there some work-around like a script or something that can show an interactive version of a design?
3 Likes
I thought of a standalone editor Standalone GH editor but this idea would also be übercool… Get rid of that chunky Rhino!! (Just kidding…)
We live in an era that a design has to be overviewed almost all along the process by the client -or collaborators-.
Providing people with still images or even videos is slowly becoming un-competitive
1 Like
If you’re okay with online solutions, Speckle sorta does that:
There are also other similar options if I recall (ShapeDiver etc.).
3 Likes
Looks very interesting, I’m looking into it right now!
I doubt this will ever be feasible, because GH heavily relies on Rhino. And unless Rhino becomes freeware this will never happen.
However you could export the display meshes as obj or stl and open it up in the windows 10 shipped 3d viewer. There are for sure platform independent mesh viewer, Speckle seems to be a specialised solution for Grasshopper.
I don’t know its internal acrchitecture but I don’t see why it would need to become freeware.
A lot of applications out there offer a viewer version. and lately mostly online.
(of course it is just for static models. I bet It must be immensely more complicated to do this for something with parametric interaction.)
still, one can still dream and hope!
If you allow any client to play with sliders (et al) … well … it’s your take but I wouldn’t be very optimistic for the results (the stuff that we discussed IS totally different story mind: a team of idiots + the Lord + many workstations + the rich/lucky client > …).
On the other hand making an active demo without your presence … see above. If laptops were not invented that could be an issue, mind.
On the other hand you can animate a slider (or more via code) and get a collection of still frames and then do an avi (or many) using stuff the likes of VideoPad, Camtasia or whatever suits you. Remind me to send you a preview of the latest WOW stuff (a recursive plant in agony).
On the other hand clients these days are used to high quality stuff (the so called virtual reality) and I doupt if anyone could been impressed from the things that any parametric app can (or can’t) do.
On the other hand if you demonstrate to a client a world of unlimited potential solutions … that may have a disastrous impact on your fee (DON’T do that at any cost).
Moral: clients are for paying dollars for things that they think take a lot of time/effort to prepare.
I went through it a little bit,It is essentialy an enriched 3D viewer… I don’t see any (parametric) interactivity!
It offers data access which is fine, but I was talking about being able to change the parameters with sliders…
This reminds me of the woodworker that scolded his son for cleaning the sawdust from the floor, because the clients would think that the shop does not have a lot of work! 
I see what you say and overall I agree but it would be nice to give a -limited- freedom to the client sometimes.
Also: All jobs are not the same. Grasshopper can be used from jewellery to Giant construction complexes, all situations and clients are not the same.
p.s. You don’t get paid to turn the screw, you get paid for knowing which screw to turn!
1 Like
No: I’m getting paid for promishing (supposedly tricky) things that would never happen 100% … but since hope dies last …
Moral: keep client blind.
Man! how do you always turn practical questions into theoretical discussions! 
I greatly enjoy these discussions but since (on the specific subject) I’m mostly intersested in the practical aspect, I re-pose the question:
Is there a way to give someone an interactive viewport of a GH definition, without Rhino?
1 Like
no,
if its theoretically hard, its practically close to impossible. Grasshopper is simplified seen a nice GUI for Visual Programming in Rhino. Without Rhino there is no Grasshopper. Grasshopper needs an own geometric core and much more for independence.
1 Like
Worse, Grasshopper even needs a little bit of Rhino for the UI itself. Drawing methods that require the Rhino geometry SDK could probably be re-implemented without too much hassle though.
It takes about 3~5 months of full time work to swap out the underlying kernel for GH. We did this when switching from the old Rhino_DotNET.dll SDK to RhinoCommon.dll. This includes both the code inside all components, as well as preview code and things like point and line and circle getters. But note that the old and new SDKs were functionally almost fully identical, stuff was only organised in a different way.
2 Likes
so this idea is dead. 
There is this also: https://shapediver.com/
You just upload the gh file.
3 Likes
I wish there were more ‘likes’ !!!
I just uploaded the gh file and it worked!!!
I’ll give it a try with something more complex (also, I guess it won’t support plugins)
Thanks Michael!!!
…although as @PeterFotiadis noted, it looks far too easy now that I look at it!
1 Like
is this legal?
I don’t know, but you’re allowed to run as many instances of Rhino as you want on a single computer for a single license. Since people aren’t actually ‘using’ those instances remotely, I guess the case could be made that there’s only a single user.
1 Like