conditional colors based on dimensions

luke_jaeger100

I'm designing a tab-and-slot assembly to be laser-cut out of several different thicknesses of sheet material.
During the design phase I need to be able to change the thicknesses on the fly, so I've set up variables for the thickness dimensions.
Wouldn't it be awesome if the parts could have a color applied procedurally, based on their thickness? Then I could see at a glance which parts were made from which material.

lougallo

@luke_jaeger100 although this is a neat idea, it is not a workflow that would be used my a vast majority of users.  With that being said, it seems you want to add some automation based on a set of rules.  For example like a rule that would state when any sheetmetal part has a thickness of X change the part(s) to this RGB.  thoughts?

lemon1324

I know this can't be done with FeatureScript, but is the Onshape API set up in such a way that it would be possible to write this type of utility to run automatically on rebuilds?  If so I might take a look when I get a chance.

luke_jaeger100

lougallo said:

@luke_jaeger100 although this is a neat idea, it is not a workflow that would be used my a vast majority of users.  With that being said, it seems you want to add some automation based on a set of rules.  For example like a rule that would state when any sheetmetal part has a thickness of X change the part(s) to this RGB.  thoughts?

That would be great, is it possible with current version?

owen_sparks

Forgive me butting in but I'd love to be able to set an RGB using featurescript.

Cheers, Owen S.

luke_jaeger100

owen_sparks said:

Forgive me butting in but I'd love to be able to set an RGB using featurescript.

Cheers, Owen S.

all is forgiven

PeteYodis

luke_jaeger100 said:

IThen I could see at a glance which parts were made from which material.

@luke_jaeger100 Can you tell us why this is important to you?  What would you be doing with this information?  

luke_jaeger100

PeteYodis said:

luke_jaeger100 said:

IThen I could see at a glance which parts were made from which material.

@luke_jaeger100 Can you tell us why this is important to you?  What would you be doing with this information?  

I'm making tab-and-slot 3D assemblies from laser-cut sheet material. They might be built from multiple types or thicknesses of material (eg 1/4" luan, 1/8" cardboard, etc). When it's time to send it to the laser cutter, I need to gang up all the parts of each thickness on the appropriate sheet(s).  I suppose the very best thing would be some kind of workflow to do this automatically, but conditional colors would at least make it easier to separate them by hand.

hans_van_de_burgt

Well I have the same issue. Now I exported my documents in DXF, and change the color of the lines in Autocad. I would be better if this could be possible in Onshape.

PeteYodis

@luke_jaeger100 Are your purposes here solely for layout of cutting all the parts with your laser cutter, material estimation needs, or both?

PeteYodis

@luke_jaeger100 @hans_van_de_burgt You might want to take a look at this one:  https://forum.onshape.com/discussion/comment/30237

luke_jaeger100

PeteYodis said:

@luke_jaeger100 Are your purposes here solely for layout of cutting all the parts with your laser cutter, material estimation needs, or both?

I was thinking ease of layout, but material estimation would be nice.