Anirudh Sharma

My thoughts were triggered after I read the Bill Buxton argument . We must focus on streamlining the interaction. by number of gestures minimum , using them only when they're required and naturally usable .-> Simpler and better SketchUp design and modeling experience. This implies that we should using Multitouch in only one thing-> Camera motions in Sketchup i.e. Zoom, PAN and Orbit There are two modes I am thinking about- MODE 1 Camera= Initialized using a Button1 from a new SketchUp MT Toolbar 1. Zoom -Drag apart two fingers/MT cursors 2. Orbit- Keep two fingers constant and move third vertically to the axis of the two. X X O ^ 3. Pan- Drag in any direction with single finger O-> MODE 2 Drawing= Initalized using Button2 from SketchUp MT toolbar - SketchUp ' s drawing interface is meant to be exploited using single touch(mouse) so we plan not messing around with that - Therefore we're drawing with the help of mouse emulation and it...

Finally I am dumping the SkSockets approach with our plugin. Though it showed some initial success the if the SKSocket was buffering and finally flushed the data all at once. Which won't work for this as we need constant refresh of data. 1 - started osc.exe - set it for small screen size and low framerate. 2 - used toxy_win UDP to TCP proxy server (gave a link) 3 - Start the tuioconn.rb code in SU. This made SketchUp's screen turn white for long, and random messages(which i didn't log sadly), but i couldnt get it done twice again. Maybe it is the SU Socket is waiting on something like 2 newlines as a signal to flush, but with osc you never get 2 in a row because its a stream of messages. The one time it did work, it must have hit the Socket limit set in SU. and then flushed everything it had been buffering. So for this week I am dumping this approach finally, and keeping the writing TUIO to text file in the background . Moving on with the next big thing is the DLL integrat...

Simultaneously I had a word with patali, regarding pyGE if something similar will work with Google SketchUp. We can go with an external script, that will sends TUIO using win32com directly http://code.google.com/p/pymt/source/browse/examples/kaswy/PyGE_touch.py like passing commands. That's how the Google Earth is controlled via python and we can make these commands user defined 1. We run an external script and this script launches the Google SketchUp 2. Takes in the TUIO, processes gestures and talks to SketchUp But we will resort to this option if all else fails, after trying this successfully I'll come back to usual TUIO implementation within SketchUp. Started to try if that works out with Sketchup. The only difference being that Google Earth comes with a direct WIN32 COM interface and SketchUp doesn't. But we might be able to add that support via a DLL.

For the past 4 days I was working with my GSoC project and so far I've been able to do the following except my to successfully let Google SketchUp talk to TUIO. Setup the iconset, the UI -that'd enable the enabling and disabling of the extension from SketchUp's toolbar. Two operation modes for the plugin SketchUp, B1 -Control Navigation B2 -Enable Drawing/Sketching Trying with TUIO data into SketchUp.

1. Code Repository setup at Google Code 2. Recently I tried out Colin Harris's Ruby TUIO client from , it took me a little longer time (more than expected) to figure out if its working since I was using Adobe Air based SimTouch.air and socketserver executable to do my tests- which didnt work with our Ruby Client. Though later it responded perfectly with ReactiVision TUIO Simulator 1.4 . I could print the TUIO messages :-) 3. Yet to figure out how we're going to implement the Ruby Client within GoogleSU's interface, I am doing my experiments around Google SU right now. Since I am a bit n00bish with the Ruby API's application with networking, for now not very sure how it'll be loaded INTO the GoogleSketchUp , though i've to try :-) 4. For now I am wondering if we should really go on and apply multitouch to drawing in Google SketchUp , since Sketchup alredy allows to draw using Single Touch. Ofcourse the Multitouch gestures can be technically implemented here,...

After falcon4ever and tito's hint I was keeping my fingers crossed. Phew ! at 12:30 AM IST 22 April dot, the results for Google Summer of Code -2009 were announced. Sudhanshu broke me the news on call, I was in ! It was one of the best moments of my life- the feeling within was a mix of several emotions- The mood was upbeat, yet I had in mind the upcoming summer ahead. Being selected is just the beginning, the real groundwork starts now. I proposed my own idea " A Multitouch extension Module for Google SketchUp" . Its going to be mentored by Pawel Solyga . I hope to make it something that Google SketchUp lovers would love to see on their Multitouch tables. Its a challenge ahead , and I am looking forward to it. So summer 2009 - Lotsa hacking and Ruby Programming. As many as three students were selected from my college. Shreekant and Abhinav made it to Sahana and XIPH respectively. And yeah Mangalore ! Sharath Patali for the good NUIPaint was also in. Great to see a good ...

Proposed an Idea for Google Summer of Code to port Google SketchUp to Multitouch . Users would be able to do 3D modeling with Simple and intuitive gestures. An Extension Module that would allow Google SketchUp to receive TUIO and hence allow manipulations via Multitouch gestures. Abstract Lack of a CAD software that could be used via Multitouch has been the motivating factor behind this proposal. Eversince I used the Sketches application on iPhone –which enables 2D drawing using Multitouch, I felt like doing something similar on my FTIR setup. Adding multitouch ability to an easy to use CAD/modeling software - Google SketchUp would not only make the design process intuitive but also add a lot to the usability factor. The reason behind choosing Google SketchUp and not start developing something from scratch is due to its easy to start UI. By experience I’ve felt that Google SketchUp is one of the easiest and widely used surface modeling tools around- what’s impressive about it - its pat...

yoo ! Google Summer of Code list was announced yesterday , and its great to see NUIGroup on it. Well i'll be going with my own idea this time. Have been playing around and exploring with the RUBY API and C++ SDK that comes with Google Sketchup. Let's see how it goes, I just posted a request for ideas and suggestions on NUIGroup at http://nuigroup.com/forums/viewthread/4801/ ..