This tool has 3 main features, it works as a command line tool on a single .scad file or a directory containing .scad files and does the following things to them in the given order:
It reformats the file using openscad-format.
This is the main feature, you can export multiple files from one file to STL's.
Did you ever hat a single .scad file with a bunch of objects belonging to a single project and you wanted to export them all to STL's? Well this tool does that for you.
It does this by looking for a special comment in the file, it looks like this:
/***exporter
// generich export options like:
$fn=64;
***box
!box();
***lid
!lid();
***handle
!handle();
**/
Imagine a file Lunchbox.scad that has 3 modules that produces the 3 parts of the box, the box itself, the lid and the handle, and the above code, which ist just a comment to openscad.
The comment above tells the tool to export 4 files, containing the whole file itself as a copy, but the comment above is altered.
The first file is named Lunchbox-export.scad.
Instead of the comment above it contains the following:
$fn=64;
The Second file is named Lunchbox-export-box.scad.
Instead of the comment above it contains the following:
$fn=64;
!box();
The Third file is named Lunchbox-export-lid.scad.
Instead of the comment above it contains the following:
$fn=64;
!lid();
The Fourth file is named Lunchbox-export-handle.scad.
Instead of the comment above it contains the following:
$fn=64;
!handle();
To clarify:
within the comment, every line starting with *** starts a variant-file. text before the first variant is global and will be added to every variant-file and the non-variant export.
Variants don't need do follow the !modulename(); pattern. you might just want to set or overwrite variables.
You don't need to use variants at all, you can just ode the global export to have debug things turned off.
This is the last step, it exports all .scad files in the given directory to .stl files.
naming convention is: its the same name, but with .stl instead of .scad.
This also works with the exported files from the previous step.
While exporting to a .stl the variable $export is set to 1. This can be used to overwrite things like $fn.
just run openscad-converter to have it do it's thing on the current directory.
You might want to specify a directory either by giving a parameter or by setting an ENV-var OPENSCAD_CONVERTER_DIR
- openscad-format
- openscad
- a php-cli interpreter
- a bash shell
- some basic shell tools that you propperly already have installed:
findrealpathxargs