General HydroStatics
Ship Stability Software
Command of the Week
(New or interesting aspects of GHS that you may not know about)

ENTER PMX /DIRECT


The commonly used command ENTER PM enters Part Maker, which then processes command lines until QUIT PM is encountered.

But there is more that goes on behind the scene. Actually GHS collects the lines and passes them to Part Maker in a separate file. While doing so it converts macro executions to commands, so Part Maker does not process the macros directly. Hence there are severe limitations.

ENTER PM /DIRECT avoids these limitations by passing the command lines to Part Maker without doing anything to them. That means macro definitions and executions proceed normally within the Part Maker environment.

To make the best use of the Part Maker environment, use the "extended" version called PMX. Here is an example:

macro ring
.cyl (n,1) 1, "column"
.cyl0 "base", 0,  v1, 2*r+d
.cyl0 "deck" , v2, v2+v1, 2*(r+d)
.cyl0 "tower" , v2+v1, v2*2, r*2/3
.render
 /

The ability to use expressions in macro parameters makes programming in PMX concise and elegant. Variable evaluations are automatic.

This macro is the heart of a relatively short run file that creates the following object:



To see the complete run file click here.

To further demonstrate the power of macros, the following object was generated, consisting of 1,692 shapes using a series of PMX commands that is far fewer than that!



To see the complete run file click here.

Before using PMX, please consult the PMX Features bulletin.

Questions, comments, or requests?
Contact Creative Systems, Inc.

support@ghsport.com

USA phone: 360-385-6212 Fax: 360-385-6213
Office hours: 7:00 am - 4:00 pm Pacific Time, Monday - Friday

Mailing address:
PO Box 1910
Port Townsend, WA 98368 USA

www.ghsport.com

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