@scottd please listen to this. editing blocks is currently cumbersome. I build glazing facade fab models using a gh to rh with a nested blocks workflow. Passing models out for hand modeling is tricky because of the need to balance between when to block and when to group. We use them to help with quality control so only elements within certain “groups“ have the possibility of being edited in any given moment.
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‘interesting’ Rhino is compared to sketchup (or blender), never CREO or similar
So considering your GH/RH nested block workflow, what would make it less cumbersome? I could make up some reasons, but your perspective would be better.
Yeah, I can see both of those issues being a nice addition to what we have.
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Oh my god, this is perfect! Exactly what I always wanted, thank you! I often use groups rather than blocks because:
(a) Making a group is much easier to set up than a block and it’s also a standard functionality across pretty much any 2D/3D graphical software, and
(b) I often need to be able to adjust the overall dimensions/shape via sub-object selection across multiple objects. With blocks and nested blocks, this is, as far as I’m aware, impossible. With groups, easy.
I only use blocks for parts where I need several identical instances of them and know I won’t need to change their shape “from the outside”. And also for parts I link to from external files. For unique assemblies of objects, blocks are just too cumbersome. Groups combined with this plugin (whose functionality absolutely needs to become native) is just a much better solution for these cases.
Hi Kyuubimode -
I’ve added that comment to RH-1045 Global group selection controllable
-wim
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I think the low price and permanent licenses is the one of the most important things for many Rhino users. No history and no parametric driven sketching is really annoying. I started my career with Autodesk Mechanical Desktop 25years ago and we made 3D modeling then like this, it is really no needed to do things this hard and time consuming anymore. Sorry if this thruth hurts somebody, but thats how it goes. We live in 2025 now.
I’d say that’s a slightly different request, although probably a superior one to the global group selection toggle initially requested, so makes sense to go that way instead.
I installed the mentioned script yesterday and immediately started using it in a completely natural way in existing projects. It speeds up my workflow so much, at least on this kind of projects I’m currently working on. IIRC groups worked the same way in 3ds Max, including the “partial bounding box” appearing when entering a group. Luckily, I don’t need to use that piece of s…oftware anymore but if there was one feature I was missing from it, it was this.
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Rhino is a fraction of the cost compared to a parametric modeler. I don’t think it would be fair to the current user base to force them to pay more when they may not want or need a parametric modeler. Of course, Rhino has some parametric functionality through grasshopper, but I’m sure you would want the the built in functionality, rather than having to program it through grasshopper.
Parametric isn’t always better. It solely depends on what kind of work you do. I can tell you that most of the stuff I do in Rhino would take like at least 5 times more time in a parametric CAD and it would negatively affect my design process and quickly sketching out multiple solutions and adjusting them over and over. Even if you parametrize everything, making changes can become equally or even more painful; once you change something deep enough, the whole tree often completely breaks and you spend ages fixing it. Meanwhile in Rhino with clever sub-object editing, you can often make adjustments really easily. But again, this depends heavily on the work.
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Yeah, we did note this. It is allowing Group editing like Block editing with a double click.
Yes, for artists with a paintbrush on hand it might be ok, but for me as a mechanical engineer…NoGo.
Yea this has been asked multiple times over the years a simple open group and close groups never got looked at by McNeel. I used to use max and I requested this, Pascal wrote a script but it didn’t work as well as the 3dsmax version.
There is history but typical of McNeel they didn’t fortify it and make it that much better, nor take user advice and requests on how or why it should be made better and rhino had constraints that they removed in the last V8 wip.
Then McNeel could have implemented simple parametric objects but they don’t, even though some of the tab features are a step in the right direction like the piping, thickness shelling tab in properties. Why not take this and turn this into parametric objects. It’s such a disconnect maybe they just don’t have the manpower or think that monetarily its not worth it for them. Freecad is parametric and rhino had constraints that they removed in the last V8 wip. If freecad which is free can do parametric why can’t rhino begin to add more parametricity?
RM
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Yeah, mechanical engineering, at least in the most classical sense (ie. no industrial design with artistic overlap, just plain functional parts), is not something you’d want to use Rhino for. But I don’t think Rhino ever tried to replace other CADs in this field. So you’re really comparing apples and oranges in my view.
That said, I agree that some parametricity and/or better history, eg. something akin to Blender’s Modifiers would be welcome (as @3dsynergy rightly points out, Rhino partially has it but it’s only “for looks”).
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Mechanical engineer here chiming in to say that I disagree with the notion that Rhino has no use in this field. When I first started using Rhino, getting accustomed to a non-Parametric workflow took time, but today I find the history based modelling paradigm frustrating. Almost like I’m modelling in a straight-jacket
Parametric modelling has it’s obvious benefits, but since I recently started reusing a parametric modeller, I’ve also been reminded of the absolute headaches it can cause. Somebody also once challenged me with “how many models have you ever made that actually needed to be parametric, anyway?” and to my own amusement, I realised that the majority of them probably didn’t need it after all
Honestly, the biggest thing I miss from the more classical CAD programs is the engineering drawing capabilities. I don’t dislike Rhino layouts, but for making manufacturing drawings, there are better CAD packages out there for sure
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I wasn’t trying to say that it has no use in it (Edit: ok, I did kinda say it tbh*), just that it isn’t trying to replace parametric CADs, so complaining that Rhino doesn’t have those capabilities is like complaining that Adobe Illustrator isn’t good for photo editing.
I absolutely agree about the drawing capabilities. While I don’t do what you’d typically call mechanical engineering, I absolutely do need to prepare documentation for manufacturing (luckily usually pretty simple one and usually for in-house use only) and while Rhino 8 made big progress, there’s still a lot that’s not ideal or missing entirely. But getting a different CAD program just for this purpose when Rhino is the perfect tool for the rest of the job makes no sense.
*Edit2: In my experience, Rhino was usually used in the initial design phase and once the shape was approved, it moved from a designer to an engineer and from Rhino to SolidWorks/Inventor/whatever. Great to hear that you made Rhino work for mechanical engineering all the way through.
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Problem is that some companies are buying the softwares like this and then they are waiting the designer to make some easily mofiafiable models with it…sorry, no can do. Making it modifiable takes a huge amount of working hours, if I need to parametrize something on Grasshoppper. We just dont have time for that kind of flowchart work. One huge grasshopper flowchart model can be made in 1-2minutes in parametric CAD.
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Agree, that’s not a good use case for Rhino/Grasshopper. GH is great for procedural/generative design (eg. what architects like to do) or for parametric functions that you’d use over and over again. But for simple parametrization of mechanical parts, especially for one-time use, while possible, makes of course no sense, given the time it takes to set up.
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- Can Blocks in new WIP that have been scaled 1D be edited without having to reset their scale?
- In AutoCAD there are two ways to edit blocks. Maybe this can be implemented with a right vs left click or something. In AutoCAD, if you double click on the block, it isolates it and you are editing the block definition in isolation. The second way is If you right click and press “Edit Block in place" you see the block in the context of everything else.
- Both in SketchUp and AutoCAD: Dynamic Blocks. AutoCaD one is very limited but used extensively for things like doors, staircases, and annotations.
I believe todays WIP version does have the 1:1 scale blocks on export now.