navis plug-in

[pmze]

I I'm going to detect and measure (quantitatively) the severity of spatail conflicts between project activities.
For this objective, I'm going to create a plug-in for naviswork. My expectations by this plug-in are

1. Assign a required space for each activity ( it's related 3D component)
-This required space must be entered by the user for each component-
2. Show the required space of each activity ( it's related 3D component)
3. Detect and show the interference space between the required spaces of two or more components which have time overlap
4. Measure the interference size
5. Give quantitative outputs ( duration of time overlap and interference size ) for further calculation
6. Get the result of calculation as the input to visualy show the severity of interferences (for example by color )

I want to know if Naviswork's API has this capability to create such plug-in ?

i would be thankful if you could help me .

[xiaodong_liang]

Hi,

1. Assign a required space for each activity ( it's related 3D component)
-This required space must be entered by the user for each component-

   [Xiaodong] I am not clear on what 'space' refers to. but I 'd like to mention rangebox of the component. API allows you to access boundingbox (BoundingBOX3D) of the object. the blog is a demo usage 

http://adndevblog.typepad.com/aec/2012/05/search-model-items-within-a-volume-and-apply-transformatio...

so, in theory, you can 'extend' the box for algorism. e.g. assume the box of the object is  (0,0,0) - (10,10,10), you can create a box bigger than this say (-10,-10,-10) - (20,20,20) thus in algorism, there is 'space' between the new box and the object's box. 

2. Show the required space of each activity ( it's related 3D component)

    [Xiaodong]  you can display 3D transient geometries by API. The blog below is a demo on displaying the box of an object.

   http://adndevblog.typepad.com/aec/2013/06/navisworks-2014-api-new-feature-toolplugin.html

    
3. Detect and show the interference space between the required spaces of two or more components which have time overlap

     [Xiaodong]  Clash API can only detect the interference of model objects. It cannot detect the interference  of transient 3D objects, or the 'space' mentioned in #1. 

The only possible way is to create the real model ( e.g.in #1, the new box) by NWCreate API, then append this box model to the current model. do clash test. Since you require the 'space' for all components, this means you will have create boxes for them.

http://adndevblog.typepad.com/aec/2013/07/get-started-with-nwcreate-part-1.html

4. Measure the interference size

     [Xiaodong]  API of Clash (ClashResult)can only tell you center and boundingbox of the clash. I do not see a way to know the exact interference body.

5. Give quantitative outputs ( duration of time overlap and interference size ) for further calculation

     [Xiaodong]  it looks this is not related with Navisworks API. you just want to write out some information?

6. Get the result of calculation as the input to visualy show the severity of interferences (for example by color )

      [Xiaodong] API allows to override the color of the objects, but same to #4, no way to get the exact interference body,