DesignScript
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Here's a fun one to finish up the week. And no, it isn't a belated April Fool's gag. 😉 I should probably say right away that you won't be printing money after reading this blog post, but you might know more about some of the security measures used by those who do. A couple of weeks ago, I received an email from Doug Bell at PaperMoneyWorld.net: I have tried your Spiro for AutoCAD and I enjoy it very much. I would like to challenge you to another function I would like to see that is related to the spirograph. I'd…
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After introducing the work down by Carlos Paris on using AutoCAD to hunt prime numbers, we then looked at some DesignScript code that essentially recreates the core geometry Carlos used to visualize prime numbers. In this post, we'll create some .NET code that iterates through the visualization, gathering primes and tagging them with rays to make them easily locatable. Now use AutoCAD as a graphical hash-table in this way is not the way you're going to discover a billion-digit prime number, but the approach is interesting because it adds useful information to the primes visualization and also shows some potentially…
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In the last post we looked at some amazing visualizations of prime numbers created by Carlos Paris. I also mentioned I'd try my hand at replicating the basic visualization using DesignScript: it's a good fit for solving this kind of problem (we want to create lots of repeated geometry based on the results of mathematical expressions). Incidentally, some readers of this blog have expressed an interest in learning more about DesignScript. I've roped in Robert Aish and Luke Church to share some of their insights into the design of – and uses for – the language, and so they'll be…
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Since mentioning my earlier involvement with DesignScript, I've been meaning to follow up with a quick post on why this programming language is different to the others people are currently using with AutoCAD. Hence the title of the post, which stands for "Yet Another Scripting Language?", inspired by two acronyms, Yacc and YAG (this is a subject-line often used by long-time Autodeskers leaving the company and stands for "Yet Another Gone"… I'm not sure if this term is used in the outside world – a quick Google would indicate not, but then you never know). Anyway, back to the question:…
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I'm really excited about this. A new programming language and environment for AutoCAD is now available for download on Autodesk Labs (and here's the announcement on Scott's blog, in case, and you should also be aware of this login/download issue – something I just ran into myself). Way back when, I helped integrate the initial incarnation of DesignScript – although at the time we were using its working name, D# – inside AutoCAD. The father of the language, Robert Aish, was put in touch with me on October 17th 2008 and by the time I headed for Las Vegas on…