Setting up Rhino

Once Rhino is installed on your computer, some actions are required before doing anything. We will go through these actions step by step in this setup documentation.

Note

This documentation has been written with Rhino 7 for macOS. Some paths and commands might differ in Rhino for Windows.

Installfest

Steps to install all the required elements:

1. Install Rhino
2. Install VisualArq
3. Install Speckle
4. Optional: install VRay for Rhino
5. Install Arial Narrow font
6. Then, in Rhino options:
   1. Add keyboard shortcuts
   2. Set background color: RGB(64,64,64)
   3. Download scripts
   4. Install plugins (optional)
      1. SafeLayout
      2. Ladybug Tools
   5. Add aliases
   6. Remove creation of .bak files.

Keyboard shortcuts

Note

Using keyboard shortcuts is a game changer when it comes to productivity and efficiency in Rhino. Learning keyboard shortcuts and knowing them will greatly enhance your experience with Rhino.

Adding a keyboard shortcut

To add custom keyboard shortcuts, go in the upper bar and click Rhino 7 > Commands > Customize.

A new window opens: in the upper bar of this window, you can navigate through tool palette sets. If there is only the default one, you have to duplicate it in order to modify it. You will be prompted a name when duplicating.

One you have selected the tool palette set of your choice, you can modify the keyboard shortcuts by clicking Keyboard Shortcuts in the upper bar.

To add a shortcut, search for a command, for example Move, in the search bar in the bottom left corner of the window. Find the right tool you want to add a shortcut to, and click on it. Informations about this tool are displayed on the right side.

You can then add a shortcut for this specific tool by clicking in the Keyboard shortcut field, and then directly pressing the keys you want to use, for example ⌘E. It is automatically added in the field.

Repeat the action for every tool you want to add a shortcut to. Beware of conflicts you might create when adding keyboard shortcuts. A message is displayed when two shortcuts are in conflict. It is better to solve these conflicts before starting working.

Keyboard shortcuts list

Here is a list of the keyboard shortcuts used at MLAV.LAND.

Shortcut	Command
F1	!_Hide
F2	!_ShowSelected
F3	!_Isolate
F4	!_Unisolate
F8	!_SolidPtOn
F9	!_HideInDetail
F10	! _PointsOn
F11	!_SelSameBlocks
F12	!_vaSelSameStyle
Ctrl + A or ⌘A	'_SelAll
Ctrl + B or ⌘B	! _BooleanDifference
Ctrl + C or ⌘C	'_CopyToClipboard
Ctrl + D or ⌘D	!_Mirror
Ctrl + E or ⌘E	!_Move
Ctrl + F or ⌘F	!_Rotate
Ctrl + G or ⌘G	!_Group
Ctrl + H or ⌘H	!_Hatch
Ctrl + I or ⌘I	!_Scale1D
Ctrl + J or ⌘J	!_Join
Ctrl + K or ⌘K	!_SelLast
Ctrl + L or ⌘L	!_Lock
Ctrl + M or ⌘M	'_MaxViewport
Ctrl + N or ⌘N	!_New
Ctrl + O or ⌘O	!_Open
Ctrl + P or ⌘P	!_Print
Ctrl + Q or ⌘Q	'_exit
Ctrl + R or ⌘R	!_Copy
Ctrl + S or ⌘S	!_Save
Ctrl + T or ⌘T	!_Trim
Ctrl + U or ⌘U	!_BooleanUnion
Ctrl + V or ⌘V	'_Paste
Ctrl + W or ⌘W	!_MatchProperties
Ctrl + X or ⌘X	'_Cut
Ctrl + Y or ⌘Y	!_Redo
Ctrl + Z or ⌘Z	_Undo
Ctrl + Shift + A	!_SelClippingPlane
Ctrl + Shift + E	!_DisableClippingPlane
Ctrl + Shift + X	!_MergeAllCoplanarFaces
Ctrl + Shift + Z	!_EnableClippingPlane
Ctrl + Alt + A	_noecho '_ProjectOsnap _Toggle

Aliases

Note

Aliases are another way of quickly accessing commands. We are mainly using aliases to speed up the use of multiple commands at once.

Adding aliases

To add custom aliases, go in the upper bar and click Rhino 7 > Preferences. Alternatively, you can press ⌘,. In the Preferences window that opens, click on Aliases. A list appears with a column named Alias and another named Command macro.

To add an alias, click the + button on the bottom left corner. A new row is created in the table, and you can fill it with your own alias.

Aliases list

Here is a list of the aliases used at MLAV.LAND.

Alias	Command macro	Description
AR	!_Move 0,0,0 0,10000,0 _Move 0,0,0 0,-10000,0	Aller-retour moves an object far away and brings it bak to its position. This is a trick to bring it to its normal z-position.
WCS	'_SetView _World _Top	Sets the view back to its original orientation. North is considered up when in this position.
EST	_WCS _TiltView _a -90	Tilts the view to -90°. East is considered up when in this position.
OUEST	_WCS _TiltView _a 90	Tilts the view to 90°. West is considered up when in this position.
NORD	_WCS _TiltView _a 180	Tilts the view to 180°. South is considered up when in this position.
DLT	_PrintDisplay _s Toggle _c Display _t 150 _Enter	Display Line Thickness displays the elements as they will look like when printed (line thickness and color).

Block tools

Note

Working with blocks is important to reduce the file size and speed up your workflow. A complete guide of working with blocks in Rhino is available here.

A few tools are missing to properly work with blocks in Rhino. Fortunately, Ejnar Brendsdal has developed a plugin that brings us more control over blocks.

His plugin is available here, and contains an installer for Rhino for Windows.

Installing on macOS

Since a macOS installer isn’t provided in the repository, we will be using the python scripts directly, and create aliases to refer to them and easily access them.

First, download the scripts here. To download, click on the green button <> Code, and choose Download ZIP. You will get a zipped folder that contains a folder named scripts.

Place this scripts folder in a directory that you won’t move. It is important not to move it afterwards, since it will break the path that we will write in the alias.

Once this is done, you can go back to Rhino and open the Aliases window to add new aliases. Here are the three aliases that we are going to add.

Alias	Command macro	Description
MakeUnique	!_-RunPythonScript "pathToFile/MakeUnique.py"	Makes the block unique. This command creates a new instance of the block.
SelSameBlocks	!_-RunPythonScript "pathToFile/SelSameBlocks.py"	Selects the same instances of the block.
ResetBlockScale	!_-RunPythonScript "pathToFile/ResetBlockScale.py"	Resets the block scale to its original proportions. Useful when the block has been non-uniformly scaled and cannot be edited anymore.
In the table above, the text written in red has to be completed according to the path where your files are stored. To get this path easily, navigate to your scripts file, right-click on one of them and click on Get infos. In the general infos, select the path and copy it. You can then paste it in your alias command macro.