Managing Large Projects

Grasshopper
1

2 questions :

I have not found any solution to this so Here my question.
We have large GH project, 2 components are far away each other and to view both
a large zoom scale is needed.
a fast way to connect the wires ?
If I zoom in and start dragging it takes forever and You get lost,
from a large zoom scale You are unable to pick the output of a component due to its small size
I have found no simple way to work out this
any hints or something I am missing ?

  1. Is there a way to hide all the connections and see only those for the selected component ?
    this will simplify a lot when it comes to read a GH project made long time ago or by someone else

thanks
gd

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2

Use two containers to go between sections of your code. IE do a bunch of manipulations to get a set of points. Put the output into a point object. Then connect it to another point object and bring it to the start of your next operation. It also makes change much easier if you want to change the source of the points.

You can also look at breaking your project up into multiple Grasshopper files or using clusters.

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3

I start dragging a wire while zoomed in, then scroll wheel to zoom out, scroll wheel to zoom on on remote target, finally connect wire and let go of left mouse button.

I’ll admit it’s cumbersome, but then if you have a file so large that you have trouble connecting remote parts of it, I’d say you have deeper problems. On the other hand, GH1 doesn’t provide a huge amount of tools to alleviate these problems, so you’re pretty much stuck between a rock and a hard place.

If you have access to Rhino6, then be sure to check out Wire Relays and Data In/Output components. The former is a useful tool for organising long distance or intersecting/overlapping wires, the latter allow you to split a large file into smaller chunks and pump the data from one chunk into the next.

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4

Check out the Telepathy plugin:


I’ve found it really useful for wire management, even for medium sized projects where you have a single ‘main’ object that gets piped all over the place.

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5

Hi David
Yes I have found that click and keeping the mouse left btn down while scrolling works but a bit difficult to get used to.
I will look at the Rhino 6 features then
Tnks
Gerry

6

I would attest to @qythium’s post.
Telepathy can help you organize your canvas in very distinct groups, separated according to functionality.
In an example bellow, there is a small definition where all inputs are on the left, and all outputs on the right:
that way, no matter how many such groups you have on your canvas, there is no spaghetti between them and you can move them (the groups) around as you wish.
telepathy

telepathy
telepathy.png1315×471 34.3 KB

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7

In my experience it is best to avoid letting definitions get that big in the first place. Once a gh file gets really large, it’s pretty unlikely it will solve interactively, so there’s not a whole lot of benefit keeping it all together.

I’m a big fan of this approach, Elefront enables you to break projects up into multiple files. For example an architectural project might be structured like this:

  1. massing.gh
  2. panelization.gh
  3. rationalisation.gh
  4. fabrication.gh

where the input for each gh is the previous file. Since Elefront allows you to re-reference your data-structure as it was when it was baked in the previous step, the hassle of re selecting inputs disappears. You can think of each gh file as a node in your project graph as this paper describes.

I find breaking large projects up into multiple files makes maintenance,collaboration and re-use much easier.

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8

Thanks for all the valuable info.
I am aware that big GH definitions should be avoided and clean separation and organization is a must, but when you are searching for a solution the project gets messy, once found the path then you can rebuild and organize it.

9

If you have access to Rhino6, check out the Data Input and Data Output components (Params.Util panel). They allow you to store any number of data trees in separate files.

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10

For those of us who have to maintain compatibility with Rhino5, is there any way via Python/C# scripting for data trees to be serialized into a file and referenced from another Grasshopper definition?

I’ve been using data = clr.Serialize(param.VolatileData[0][0].Value)andparam.SetPersistentData(clr.Deserialize(data)) as an ad-hoc way of saving Grasshopper geometry into JSON files, where param is of type GH_PersistentParam\<T>

But of course this only works when the param tree has a single branch and leaf - when I attempt the above with the entire GH_Structure, it produces a not marked as Serializable error.

11

@dave_stasiuk’s Pack Data and Unpack Data from TreeSloth does this (if I recall correctly). Maybe have a look at those.

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12

Thanks David, I have Rhino6 at home, but work hasn’t upgraded yet :frowning: Will check it out when i get a chance, sounds like very powerful functionality.

13

in theory yes. If you own a copy of Grasshopper Professional you can at least colour the wires :wink:

Gh%20Pro
Gh%20Pro1366×724 126 KB

14

You mean the Corporate license?

ps. Wire colours can be editing by modifying the grasshopper_gui.xml file:

<item name="wire_default" type_name="gh_drawing_color" type_code="36">
  <ARGB>150;0;0;0</ARGB>
</item>
<item name="wire_empty" type_name="gh_drawing_color" type_code="36">
  <ARGB>180;255;60;0</ARGB>
</item>
<item name="wire_selected_a" type_name="gh_drawing_color" type_code="36">
  <ARGB>255;125;210;40</ARGB>
</item>
<item name="wire_selected_b" type_name="gh_drawing_color" type_code="36">
  <ARGB>50;0;0;0</ARGB>
</item>

wire_selected_a is the selected end of a wire, wire_selected_b is the unselected end of a wire (assuming the other end is selected). If neither end is selected then wire_default is used, unless the wire transports no data, in which case wire_empty is used.

Do note that even if you make wires invisible, they will still ‘be’ there and when you double click a relay may be inserted into seemingly empty space. I predict you will loathe not seeing wires within the hour. You can however make them very transparent.

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15

:hushed::thinking: Please explain, is this a thing? Since when? Is this based on Rhino License or a separate license?

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16

The ‘Corporate’ license refers to pirated copies of Rhino that appear on the forum once in a while… :skull_and_crossbones:
And, no, those definitely don’t have any added features.

17

Well, I thought someone would understand the joke…:

bcd642d2784aa0193a96ffc1e0bd86de6f24064eb
bcd642d2784aa0193a96ffc1e0bd86de6f24064eb.png1366×724 127 KB

@DavidRutten

how can you have multiple wire colours if you just have four xml entries?. How can you override wire appearance. That’s not possible with an unhacked grasshopper. You did not present any possibility to override them traditionally, so I modified it in areas not intended. I’m not sure if this already violates GH License agreements, but as long as I don’t share this, I’m not doing anything illegal

I’m basically just posting that its possible.

So no, I’m not referring to a pirated version of Rhino.

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18

Downloaded Telepathy but it does not show up
I see this message on the Rhino prompt:

Exception System.NotSupportedException:
Message: An attempt was made to load an assembly from a network location which would have caused the assembly to be sandboxed in previous versions of the .NET Framework

Not sure what to do here

19

rightclick onto the .gha/.dll and make sure its unblocked. Reopen Rhino/GH

20

I was just joking because cracked copies of Rhino show up as ‘Corporate’. It’s not a real type of license, we only have Commercial, Educational, and Trial (all have the same functionality, it’s only a legal difference).

Since @TomTom (h/cr)acked his Grasshopper I thought it would be more appropriate. To be clear, he’s doing nothing unethical, just unesthetical :slight_smile:

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