Recently I upped my efficiency significantly when I found out that I could set two excellent hotkeys for quickly toggling settings.
First is “only draw preview for selected objects”, I set it to alt+s. So much easier to isolate geometries quickly.
Second is Alt+f5 toggles solve mode and f5 refreshes (just like f5 refreshes a webpage), makes for much quicker editing of calc-intensive models by disabling and enabling the solver. That in combination with adding a data dam just downstream of where I’m working.
One thing I’ve been wondering is if there is a quicker way to disconnect a wire than click click click?
Another one I use quite a bit is ctl+a then ctl+q then select then ctl+q is select all >> hide all >> show selection. Similar benefit as the first, not quite as valuable but still very useful.
What other slick productivity shortcuts do you guys go to?
Oh I do have a wish which was to get out of any dialog box by tab once to ok, so tab then spacebar got out of dialog boxes instead of aim and click. I love tabbing around dialog boxes and hotkeys, so much quicker than point and clicks.
Greatest productivity advice from my side would be creating reusable logic.
Another would be to memorize what components do and simply assume as much as possible without even running a solution or the need to preview the steps in between.
I also advice to understand CAD modelling, coding and fundamental math. It just prevents you from creating workarounds.
Always work precise and with a clear structure, which starts with clear naming and ends with proper documentation. The more effort you invest in these extras, the better a large definition can be handled.
And last but not least, don’t try being the Lucky Luke of CAD. Nobody pays you for being fast. People want quality under a realistic time frame. If you need one hour, people pay you for one hour. And it’s unlikely you do something great in such a short time.
Mine is: don’t try do do everything with grasshopper.
Time-wise, sometime 30 seconds in rhino are better than scripting for 10 minutes to obtain the same thing. Once.
For example: often with selecting (List item) particular elements out of a big unpredictable list, or similar.
It’s faster to: bake, select on rhino, reference on gh and continue with the script.
Then if the script make sense and is reused often, of course, a proper algorithm can/should be done.
Yes, I’ve been doing this more and more, especially using curves manipulated in rhino as the basis for sweeps, lofts, and others in grasshopper.
So nice with grasshopper that you can so simply swap in a curve or brep into a complex algorithm and not lose control of the model, very not easy in conventional parametric CAD such as some software that rhymes with Captain Kirk’s.
Regarding disconnect, are you saying control key and click both nodes? Is still multiple precise clicks at different locations on the screen, exact kind of thing my lazy, I mean efficient, CAD workflow mind sweats over. Kind of wish it worked like trim in other software where dragging the cursor over the wire deletes it, if the proper hotkey is simultaneously applied, but that may be too difficult with the way the software represents the wires, I don’t know. Maybe it could be click the wire or connection and hit delete, that would be only one precise click at least, and it already recognizes clicking the wire, because you can add a relay that way.
