On this page:
4.1 Visualization
4.1.1 ruckus-3d
4.1.2 ruckus-2d
4.2 Export
4.2.1 ruckus-export-surface
4.2.2 ruckus-export-outline
7.7

4 The Ruckus Tools

Ruckus is primarily driven from the command-line. Here are the command-line tools.

This page will summarize command options used with the tools, but for up-to-date and comprehensive information, run the tool with the --help switch, e.g.

ruckus-3d --help

4.1 Visualization

4.1.1 ruckus-3d

Displays a design using GPU-accelerated ray-tracing. Typical invocation:

ruckus-3d path/to/my/design.rkt

Drag the design to rotate it around the origin. The mouse wheel or scroll gesture zooms in and out.

Useful keystrokes include:

4.1.2 ruckus-2d

Displays a 2D design, or the intersection of a 3D design with the XY plane. Typical invocation:

ruckus-2d path/to/my/design.rkt

The mouse wheel or scroll gesture zooms in and out.

Useful keystrokes include:

4.2 Export

4.2.1 ruckus-export-surface

Exports the surface of a design by triangulation (STL format). Typical invocation:

ruckus-export-surface path/to/my/design.rkt path/to/output.stl

Ruckus’s variant of the Marching Cubes / Tetrahedra algorithms mean that this tool takes time proportional to the number of triangles emitted. Reducing the triangulation quantum (below) by half increases processing time by around 4x.

If a design manages to violate the Lipschitz criterion, there may be holes in the exported surface mesh. This is a bug. You can work around it by disabling Lipschitz gradient descent in the exporter (--brute).

STL files can be interpreted in a variety of real-world units (such as millimeters), depending on the tools used and their configuration. Ruckus has no particular opinion on this; exported STL files are in your design units, whatever those may be. For dimensional accuracy you will need to ensure that the tools consuming your STL files are configured to match your design.

Command line options (check --help for complete list):

4.2.2 ruckus-export-outline

Exports the outline of a 2D design, or of the intersection of a 3D design with the XY plane, in SVG format. Typical invocation:

ruckus-export-outline path/to/my/design.rkt path/to/output.svg

The output is intended for tool path planning, such as laser cutting, and so cosmetic attributes like color and fill are not included.

Ruckus’s variant of the Marching Squares algorithm mean that this tool takes time proportional to the number of outline segments emitted. Reducing the segment quantum (below) by half increases processing time by around 2x.

SVG files can measure their contents in real-world units. By default, SVG files emitted by ruckus-export-outline assume that one design unit is one millimeter. To override this, use one of the command line options listed below.

Command line options (check --help for complete list):