Run Parametric

File › Run Parametric… makes a new drawing from a parametric drawing file (.piq), asking first for the values of its labelled variables: a box style's length, width and depth, its flap, its board, whether it has a lid. The file is then run with those values, so whatever it works out from them (points, lines, loops and choices) follows.

Choosing the drawing

The drawings listed are the .piq files in the Parametric folder of each Extensions folder, and in the folders in it: your own (File › Extensions › Open Extensions Folder, then make a folder called Parametric in it) and the app's. Each is listed by its folder and name (Packaging › Sleeve), so a folder groups a trade's drawings. A file of yours at the same place as one of the app's is listed instead of it. Under the list is a preview of the chosen drawing, run with its own values: for the app's own drawings, a photo-quality picture of what it makes in 3D (its flat drawing, if it makes nothing in 3D or only a thin flat sheet - not put together from parts, its longest size more than 50 times its thickness - as a rug, a pane of glass or a gasket, unless the design asks for 3D); for yours, the drawing it makes, or the same kind of picture once you have made their thumbnails. Then what the file says it is: the comment lines it starts with. Another file… opens any .piq file. Start from a product…, under them, goes to New from Product instead: from what you are packing, it chooses and sizes the fitment and the outer.

The drawing made can be changed in the same way afterwards: tick Run View in the Variables panel.

Recent designs

The designs you have run lately (up to ten, the last first) are offered first: while there are any, Designs chooses between Recent designs, a list of them, and All designs, every drawing in the library and Another file…; the preview and description follow the drawing chosen in the list shown. The list chosen last time is shown again (Recent designs to begin with). A design run from another file is listed by its file name; one that is no longer there is left out.

File › Recent Designs lists the same designs, each with its library picture if it has one: choose one to run it again, its values asked for as usual (without choosing the drawing first). The list is kept in the app's settings on this computer. Clear List, at the bottom of File › Recent Designs, forgets them all at once, without asking (the designs themselves are not touched): until you run another, Designs shows only All designs.

Pictures of your own designs

File › Extensions › Make Thumbnails… pictures your own designs as the app's are pictured: for each .piq file in the Parametric folder of your Extensions folder, and in the folders in it, a picture of what it makes in 3D (or of its flat drawing), saved beside it with the same name (Tray.webp beside Tray.piq). It works in the background, showing how far it has got; Cancel stops it, keeping the pictures already made. When it finishes it says how many it made, how many were already up to date, and which designs couldn't be pictured, and why.

The preview here and File › Recent Designs then show those pictures. A picture is used only while its design is as it was when the picture was made (each design's hash, and whether its picture is in 3D or of its flat drawing, are kept in thumbnails.json in the Parametric folder): once you change a design, its preview is its drawing again until you make the thumbnails again, which then pictures only the designs added or changed since.

A thin design that looks better made than flat (a coaster set, a sign blank) can ask to be pictured in 3D with a comment line of its own, // THUMBNAIL=3D; // THUMBNAIL=FLAT asks for its flat drawing. Being a comment, it changes nothing the design draws or exports.

Searching

Search, above the lists, keeps in them only the designs with every word you type in their name, their folder or their industry, in any order, as you type: lid box finds the boxes with a lid (Packaging › Archive box with lid flap, Laser cutting › Box with sliding lid …), sheet bracket the sheet-metal brackets. Capitals and accents don't matter (climatizacion finds Climatización), names are matched as the list shows them (your own folders and designs in whatever language you named them), and the industry by its name in the app's language as well as by its folder (in Spanish, chapa finds the Sheet metal designs). It searches the list shown, Recent designs or All designs; Another file… stays in the full list. When the list shown has no design the search finds, the description says so, and Next opens another file instead.

Packaging styles

In the Packaging folder. The app comes with these, each drawn on its inside length, width and depth (L, W, D), with a choice of material, T: its thickness is allowed for in the panels, flaps and slots, so the box made holds the size asked for. Corrugated styles offer E, B and C flute and EB and BC double wall; folding cartons offer boxboard from 0.35 mm to solid board, and F and E flute. Each prints the size of its blank.

Cut lines are on layer 0 (Cut), folds on layer 1 (Crease). A crease folds 90° in the 3D view unless it says how far (RULE FOLD=60, see element settings): the hexagonal, triangular, gable, gusset and pyramid styles' creases do. The 3D view folds a style up in a natural order (the walls, the flaps on them, then the panels that close it); where a style needs another, its creases say when they fold (RULE STEP=2), as the full overlap container's do. To change one, copy it to your own Parametric folder and edit it there.

Other industries

Parametric drawings from other trades, each in its industry's folder, sized by its material where the material changes the shape: a thickness and K-factor for a bend, a kerf for a laser, a seam allowance for a fabric, a pipe's outside diameter. Bends and folds are on layer 1, cut lines on layer 0; each prints what it makes.

Housings, rebates, grooves and other marking are on layer 8, as are centre lines and matching marks; what the laser cutting designs engrave is on the standard Engrave layer, and the vinyl decals' print areas on the Print layer (see Layers). Their figures (K-factors, kerfs, allowances, flange sizes, section and flange tables, building regulations) are typical starting points: check them against your own machines, materials and standards before making anything.

What is asked for

Every variable with a label (given with LABEL, or in its assignment: FLAP=25,"Glue flap"), in the order the file defines them. That includes L, W and D, the drawing's length, width and depth, which every drawing starts with, labelled. System variables (those starting with #) are not asked for. Each is shown with its label and, under it, its name, in a control that suits its value:

Each starts at the file's own value. A value you don't change stays as the file has it, an expression and all (CALC=FLAP*2 goes on following FLAP).

How it is run

Each variable you change has its first assignment in the file given your value instead; a choice keeps its list or dictionary and changes only the index (GRADE={"Light","Standard","Heavy"}[2]), so it is still a choice in the drawing made. L, W and D, which every drawing starts with, are set before the file starts too, in case it doesn't set them itself. The file itself is not changed: the drawing made is new and unsaved, and the values used are listed in the Interactive window.

Making one

Draw the drawing as usual, on variables: give the ones to ask for a label, write the choices as a list or a dictionary indexed by a fixed key, and use IF for parts that depend on a switch. Start the file with a comment saying what it is: it is shown when the file is chosen. Save it in the Parametric folder of your Extensions folder: File › Save to Library… does that, in the folder you choose (see Parts).

// A tray with glue flaps, and a lid if wanted
L=300
W=200
D=60
T={"E flute":1.5,"B flute":3}["B flute"],"Material"
FLAP=25,"Glue flap width"
GRADE={"Light","Standard","Heavy"}[1],"Board grade"
LID=FALSE,"With a lid"
P10=[L+T+FLAP,0]
LINE P1,P10
IF LID THEN BEGIN
    LINE P3,P2
END

Notes

• The text a TEXT element shows is written out in it, so a text variable can't change it; use text variables in expressions (CONCAT, PRINT, dictionary keys).

• Templates do the same in JavaScript, with a form of their own.

• File › Ask Claude… writes a parametric drawing from a description, in the same form.

• Automation scripts run the same designs without the app's window, with values from an order or a CSV file: runDesign("Packaging › Sleeve", { L: 200 }).

The library is on the website too: the Design Gallery shows every design, opens each in the web viewer to size it, and downloads it as DXF or PDF.

See also: Variables, LABEL, Templates.