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script-sync

What is it? Script-sync plug-in to run C# and Python (IronPython or CPython) scripts directly from VSCode into Rhino and Grasshopper. This project is a research utility from the IBOIS lab at EPFL. It was developed and currently maintained by Andrea Settimi.

Why Script-sync? Although Rhino8 has a wonderful IDE, we often miss the nice extensions and functions of a full-fledged IDE like VSCode. Script-sync allows you to run your scripts directly from VSCode, while keeping the Rhino/Grasshopper environment open. This is particularly useful if you have AI-assisted (e.g. GithubCoPilot) code completion.

You can execute the folloing languages from VSCode with script-sync:

CPython IronPython C#
Rhino ✅ ✅ ✅
Grasshopper ✅ ❌ ❌

Script-sync in Rhino

Script-sync in Grasshopper

Installation

🦏/🦗 Rhino/Grasshopper: Install script-sync rhino from food4rhino or the packageManager in Rhino (name: "script-sync"). For Grasshopper you might want to get rid of the old version of the plugin before installing the new one. Just right-click on the old icon and click delete.

👩‍💻 VScode: Install script-syncVSCode extension from the VSCode extension marketplace (name: "script-sync")

How to use

🦏 Rhino: To start script-sync in RhinoV8, run the command ScriptSyncStart in RhinoV8. This will start a server that listens to commands from VSCode. To close script-sync in RhinoV8, run the command ScriptSyncStop in RhinoV8.

🦗 Grasshopper: To start script-sync in Grasshopper, add the component script-sync:

  • select_file: click to open a file explorer and connect a script,
  • package_2_reload: this can be empty in 90% of the cases, but if you develop a custom pypi package, (installed with editable pip mode) you can add the name of the package you are developing here to track the changes in its modules. Otherwise leave it empty.
  • x: classical input parameter, you can add more,
  • stdout: all errors and print() is deviated here,
  • a: classical output parameter, you can add more.

Tip

script-sync automatically converts lists and nested lists to Grasshopper data trees. Just return the python list as value. It also supports the ghpythonlib.treehelpers module. Example:

  # option 1
  py_nlist = [
      [[1, 2], [3, 4]],
      [[5, 6], [7, 8]]
  ]

  # options 2
  import ghpythonlib.treehelpers as th
  gh_tree = th.list_to_tree(py_nlist)

  o_as_nlist = py_nlist
  o_as_tree = gh_tree

👩‍💻 VScode: Open a script in VSCode and run it in RhinoV8 by pressing F4 to run in Rhino or shift+F4 for Grasshopper. For Python files, add a shebang to the first line of the file to specify the interpreter to use, e.g.:

  • #! python3 to interpret it with CPython
  • ⚠️ #! python2 to interpret it with IronPython (only in Rhino)

Tip

If you want your script-sync VSCode extension to automatically update, you should thick the autoinstall box in the vscode extension page.

Caution

If you use modules like pickle to (de)serialize objects script-sync might causes problems because we reload all the modules at every file save. This can interfere with pickle thinking that a class is instanciated multiple times.

Requirements

The plug-in needs to be installed on RhinoV8, Grasshopper and VSCode

Issues

For bugs open an issue on the GitHub repo.

Contribution

All contributions are welcome. Have a look at the contribution guidelines.

References

There are a lot of plug-ins that allow to run Python in Rhino. Among them, CodeListener was working until RhinoV8 and it was a source of inspiration for this project.

For code maintainers

Packages are published (.yak and .vsix) automatically when a GitHub release is created.