Driving Dimensions for Google SketchUp 1.1

Driving Dimensions for Google SketchUp 1.1 has come as a handy and useful plugin for Google SketchUp (a free, easy to learn 3D modeling program) with which you can easily modify any 2D and 3D models. Just add dimensions to the elements of your model and edit their values -- your geometry will be automatically updated to satisfy these dimensions. You can add as many dimensions as needed -- all of them will be satisfied simultaneously. Software supports all basic types of driving dimensions: edge length, arc/circle radius, distance between vertices/edges/ faces, and angle between edges/faces. Any number of driving dimensions can be resolved simultaneously to define the geometry of a model under design.

Driving dimensions can be set manually or automatically with the help of the original inferred dimensions mechanism. The parametric design available for all SketchUp users with Driving Dimensions plugin is history-free: any existing model can be easily modified independently of its design history. One of the key new features is the Inferred Dimensions functionality. After activation in the Options dialog it will automatically add inferred driving dimensions when using such built-in tools as Rectangle and Push/Pull. These inferred dimensions do not differ from ones created manually and can be easily edited or removed.

Users who create parametric models from scratch will save a lot of design time using the inferred dimensions mechanism. Driving Dimensions features a significant redesign of the GUI elements (icons, cursors, dialogs), which now look similar to the ones built in SketchUp. One of the new buttons added to the Driving Dimensions toolbar allows users to update the values of existing driving dimensions by remeasuring the corresponding geometric entities, while another new button opens the Options dialog, where Driving Dimensions creation and update modes can be switched. Driving Dimensions is based on LGS 3D 1.5 geometric solver that runs 30% faster on typical update scenarios than the previous version 1.4.

Enhancements:

• New look and feel (icons, cursors, message boxes, menus, "About" window)
• New types of driving dimensions (between an edge and a face, between two faces)
• Automatic generation of inferred dimensions for "Rectangle" and "Push/Pull" built-in SketchUp tools
• "Update Geometry" and "Update Dimensions Values" tools
•  Options dialog