CREO2URDF – Export stl meshes of twolinks asm

[Nicogene]

Task description

We should extend creo2urdf in order to export the stls files of the meshes of twolinks assembly.

Definition of done

The PR that add this feature is merged.

[Nicogene]

I started working here: #12

Right now I have managed to export the stl of the entire asm

I used pfcSTLBinaryExportInstructions but there is also pfcShrinkwrapSTLInstructions for exporting it.

@fiorisi @salvi-mattia @Mick3Lozzo what is the difference between "export a part or assembly to a binary STL file" and "export a shrinkwrap STL file" ?

Maybe before starting the course (20-31 March) @mfussi66 and I could have a chat with you for understanding what composed our simulation model cad in order to have the right questions to do to the instructor.

[Mick3Lozzo]

what is the difference between "export a part or assembly to a binary STL file" and "export a shrinkwrap STL file"?

@Nicogene I think that the second one is an ASCII file. The two formats contain the same information about the model, but the binary format is much more compact, so it will produce smaller files from the same part and it is better for 3D printing.

@fiorisi @salvi-mattia 🤔??

[Nicogene]

Today I tried to navigate the asm

creo2urdf/src/creo2urdf/src/Creo2Urdf.cpp

Lines 125 to 139 in 9c2f188

	if (model_ptr->GetType() == pfcMDL_ASSEMBLY) {
	auto assembly_ptr = pfcAssembly::cast(model_ptr);
	auto items_ptr = assembly_ptr->ListFeaturesByType(pfcFEATTYPE_COMPONENT);//pfcITEM_SIMPREP);
	if (items_ptr) {
	message.clear();
	message << "Number of Items found is " << items_ptr->getarraysize() << "\n";
	for (int i = 0; i < items_ptr->getarraysize(); ++i) {
	auto item_ptr = items_ptr->get(i);
	message<<" "<<item_ptr->GetName()<<" ";
	}
	printToMessageWindow(session_ptr, message);
	}
	}

Unfortunately I didn't manage to get the parts that compose the assembly, this is the output

Note that the two nil at the end seems to be

[fiorisi]

what is the difference between "export a part or assembly to a binary STL file" and "export a shrinkwrap STL file"?

@Nicogene I think that the second one is an ASCII file. The two formats contain the same information about the model, but the binary format is much more compact, so it will produce smaller files from the same part and it is better for 3D printing.

@fiorisi @salvi-mattia 🤔??

Sorry for the late answer. Another difference could be the following.

• "export a part or assembly to a binary STL file" -> generates an STL file of the part, or in case of assembly generates an STL file for each part of the assembly
• "export a shrinkwrap STL file" -> in case of assembly generates an STL file that is the shrinkwrap of the assembly

I will investigate further though.

[Nicogene]

Thanks to the course on Toolkit we are following @mfussi66 and me, today I was able to:

• Disable of the button if no assembly/parts are in the session
• Export of the stl meshes of all the parts in the session

See c5a3e3b (#12)

[salvi-mattia]

please note that in creo language "in session" means every parts it is in RAM so it includes all the opened parts we have at that moment.
as we saw with @mfussi66 it's hopeful to make a test.
the old, mathweb, pulsantone created the mash of the parts in the window, not in session.

not a big problem but something to know