(Wish) Constant color Codes in Help - share sample files

Rhino Teachers
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as @rajaa pointed out in this topic from @theoutside let s use this category more often…

How can we help and support you to teach Rhino?

in short:
(1) Make the help more consistent and (2) share the files.

in detail:

consistent color code

i like all those small animations / screen captures in the help, they explain many options in a very visual way.
@KelvinC this is your business ?

So I think it s very important for our visual structured brains to have nice pictures we can stuck or knowledge to. Based on this didactic approach I think it s good educational practice to use the given examples from the help - to introduce them to the students.

I am just preparing a lecture for UDT and rebuild all samples from _flow _flowAlongSrf and _cageEdit.
And somehow I have some wishes:
I would love to see a standard color code. The base curve/surface, the target curve / surface, the captive Object - it would be really nice if they always have the same color.

and i like color-codes that can somehow have a narrative. For example i like intersections to be red like blood.
for my other tutorials for UDT I use darkgreen like gras for the base geometry and blue like the sky for the target geometry…

in the help the base Line for _flow is red, the target curve is blue…
but to explain preserve structure a grey rectangle becomes blue trapezoid (preserve yes) or red (refit/refined).
we have text, flowers and boxes, tubes and rectangles …

I think there should be a limited amount of placeholder Geometry that is repeated in the overall help.
And maybe if a placeholder can not explain an option, a practical usage would be nice, for example the profile of a tyre.

but i think the file that i came up with shows the huge and unnescessary variaty of objects and colors…

image
image1990×1536 487 KB

share help samples

it would be nice to have a collection of files, that correspond to english command names and share the geometry used in the help.
(similar to the file I just did) (which would become 3 files, flow.3dm, flowAlongSrf.3dm, cageEdit.3dm)

it would be nice if all those samples use the same grid / size / unit system (mm)
so the teachers can also copy paste stuff corresponding to the lectures. …

I know it is nothing that is done fast - but would be nice to start it.
this might also be driven by the ART-workshops.

kind regards - Tom

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@Tom_P

this is your business ?

Yes, this is mine.

The images and videos were created at different times over the past 20 years, so their styles may vary. I tried to use the same color set for topic images and videos. I gave up because a set of colors might work for some cases and not for others. I use After Effects to create those short video clips. A clip could be a combination of many screenshots and recordings. Changing object colors in the current clips is not an easy task.

I’ve added “attach sample model” to my template for writing command-topics. I will add download links to the topics in the future. Collecting models in a single 3dm file would cause management issues when new commands are added to Rhino, but I think it’s a great idea for Rhino trainers to prepare models for their classes. Thanks.

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wow great… appreciate - thanks a lot.
would be nice to have a clear naming concept - something like

CmdSample_loft.3dm
CmdSample_patch.3dm
CmdSample_filletEdge.3dm

…
@KelvinC
EDIT:
i think this is mostly useful for complex commands with many options or a huge variety of object-types.
(but do we have simple commands ? ah yes: _point ;-D)

4

I added a note about file names to the topic template.

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