I finally got around to updating my Ruby Code Editor to version 3.0. There are quite a few upgrades including: better environment stability (editor, scrolling, results, etc.), code completion for SketchUp classes and methods and a variety of other minor updates (including the fact that it now remembers the last file).
The following video gives a brief overview of the current version:
http://youtu.be/yGWs9p2WZsg
As always, you can get this editor from my website (and look at the more detailed changelog or leave comments) at:
http://www.alexschreyer.net/projects/sketchup-ruby-code-editor/
For more on what you can do with this tool, check out Chapter 6 in my book "Architectural Design with SketchUp"....
As you saw in example 4.6 in the book, unfolding a developable surface in SketchUp is very easy using the Unfold plugin. What do you do then, if you have a doubly-curved shape, such as the one shown above (from chapter 6)? Obviously, you can't just "flatten" it without distorting it (take the Mercator projection of world maps for an example of how unwrapping a sphere can lead to significant distortions). In this case, it might be a good strategy to unfold the surface in strips using the same technique described in example 4.6. This gives you the ability to cut the surface into separate parts that can then be assembled using gluing, welding etc. The image below illustrates how this looks after flattening.
As you may have noticed, I also added some glue tabs using the Glue Tabs plugin (see chapter 4 for details). In order to make this work, you may need to turn on hidden geometry display (in...
