Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Usage
  • BIMSurfer
  • Objects
    • Selecting and deselecting objects
    • Showing and hiding objects
    • Changing color and transparency of objects
  • Camera
    • Controlling the camera
    • Fitting objects in view
  • Resetting
    • Camera
    • Objects

Introduction

BIMSurfer2 is a WebGL-based IFC model viewer for BIMServer and IfcOpenShell built on xeogl, ThreeJS and SVG.

Versions

Over time there have been various versions of BIMsurfer. You are now looking at the v2 version of BIMSurfer.

BIMSufer	Model loader	Technologies used
v1	BIMServer	XeoEngine
v2	IfcOpenShell/glTF, BIMServer	ThreeJS, xeogl, SVG
v3	BIMServer	Custom webgl2

Visit BIMSurfer3 here https://github.com/opensourceBIM/BIMsurfer/

Selecting which version of BIMSurfer to use

Usage of v1 is not recommended in new projects, because of the dependency on outdated libraries and lack of a stable API. Choose v3 for highest performance, but note that is webgl2 only, which is not universally supported (54% at the time of writing source). v2 can be used solely on static files generated by IfcOpenShell and is entirely built around open standards such as glTF. v3 has an interesting set of additional features such as partial support for 3D Tiles, measurements and up to 6 section planes.

Usage

BIMSurfer

Creating a BIMSurfer:

var bimSurfer = new BimSurfer({
    domNode: "viewerContainer"
});

Loading a model from BIMServer:

bimSurfer.load({
        bimserver: ADDRESS,
        username: USERNAME,
        password: PASSWORD,
        poid: 131073,
        roid: 65539,
        schema: "ifc2x3tc1" // < TODO: Deduce automatically
    })
        .then(function (model) {
        
                // Model is now loaded and rendering.
                // The following sections show what you can do with BIMSurfer at this point.
                //...
            });

Generate a random test model if you want to test BIMSurfer without loading anything from BIMServer:

bimSurfer.loadRandom();

The following usage examples in this guide will refer to objects from the generated test model.

Objects

Selecting and deselecting objects

Selecting four objects:

bimSurfer.setSelection({ids: ["object3", "object2", "object4", "object6"], selected: true });

then querying which objects are selected:

bimSurfer.getSelection()

The result shows that those four objects are currently selected:

["object3", "object2", "object4", "object6"]

If we then deselect two objects, then query the selection again:

bimSurfer.setSelection({ids: ["object3", "object6"], selected: false });
bimSurfer.getSelection()

The result shows that only two objects are now selected:

["object2", "object4"]  

Subscribing to selection updates:

bimSurfer.on("selection-changed", 
    function() {
         var selected = bimSurfer.getSelection();
         console.log("selection = " + JSON.stringify(selected));
    });

Showing and hiding objects

Hiding three objects by ID:

bimSurfer.setVisibility({ids: ["object3", "object1", "object6"], visible: false });

Setting two objects visible by ID:

bimSurfer.setVisibility({ids: ["object1", "object6"], visible: true });

Hiding all objects of IFC types "IfcSlab" and "IfcWall":

bimSurfer.setVisibility({types: ["IfcSlab", "IfcWall"], visible: false });

Changing color and transparency of objects

Making two objects pink:

bimSurfer.setColor({ids: ["object3", "object6"], color: [1, 0, 1] })

An optional fourth element may be specified in the color to set opacity:

bimSurfer.setColor({ids: ["object3", "object6"], color: [1, 0, 1, 0.5] })

Camera

Controlling the camera

Setting the camera position:

bimSurfer.setCamera({ 
    eye: [-20,0,20],
    target: [0,10,0],
    up: [0,1,0]
});

Then "target" will then be the position we'll orbit about with the mouse or arrow keys (until we double-click an object to select a different orbit position).

Setting the camera projection to orthographic:

bimSurfer.setCamera({ 
    type:"ortho"
});

Setting the view volume size for orthographic, switching to orthographic projection first if necessary:

bimSurfer.setCamera({ 
    type:"ortho", 
    scale: 100
});

This uses the same technique as Blender, where the scale argument relates to the "real world" size of the model, meaning that if you set scale to 100, then your view would at most encompass an element of 100 units size.

Setting the camera projection to perspective:

bimSurfer.setCamera({ 
    type:"persp"
});

Setting the FOV on Y-axis for perspective, switching to perspective projection first if necessary:

bimSurfer.setCamera({ 
    type:"persp", 
    fovy: 65
});

Querying camera state:

var camera = bimSurfer.getCamera();

The returned value would be:

{
    "type": "persp",
    "eye": [-20,0,20],
    "target": [0,10,0],
    "up": [0,1,0],
    "fovy": 65
}

Subscribing to camera updates:

bimSurfer.on("camera-changed", 
    function() {
         var camera = bimSurfer.getCamera();
         console.log(JSON.stringify(camera));
    });

Fitting objects in view

Flying the camera to fit the specified objects in view:

bimSurfer.viewFit({ ids: ["object3", "object1", "object6"], animate: true });

Jumping the camera to fit the specified objects in view:

bimSurfer.viewFit({ids: ["object1", "object6"], animate: false });

Flying to fit all objects in view:

bimSurfer.viewFit({ animate: true });

Jumping to fit all objects in view:

bimSurfer.viewFit({ animate: false });

Resetting

Camera

Resetting the camera to initial position:

bimSurfer.reset({ cameraPosition: true });

Objects

Resetting all objects to initial visibilities:

bimSurfer.reset({ visibility: true });

Resetting two objects to their initial visibilities:

bimSurfer.reset({ ids: ["object3", "object6"], visibility: true });

Resetting all objects to their initial colors:

bimSurfer.reset({ elementColors: true });

Resetting two objects to their initial colors:

bimSurfer.reset({ ids: ["object3", "object6"], elementColors: true });

Deselecting all objects:

bimSurfer.reset({ selectionState: true });

Acknowledgements

BIM Surfer is licensed under the MIT License.

Copyright 2020 BIM Surfer contributors

For this version thanks to TNO and Bimforce and developed by @aothms @rubendel @xeolabs and @johltn