Brickshelver Development Release

Brickshelver is a small utility I have written to simplify the process of uploading files to Brickshelf, a popular site for LEGO hobbyists.

When you start Brickshelver, you log in using your Brickshelf account. Brickshelver maintains a list of your Brickshelf folders, but it takes a few moments to conduct this inventory. You can skip this step after the first run for faster logins, but in this case Brickshelver will not be aware of any new folders created via the regular web interface.

You can add files to the list of files to upload by clicking the “+” button or by dragging them to Brickshelver’s Dock icon. The files will all be uploaded to the indicated folder, which can be an existing folder or a new folder created with Brickshelver.

Clicking “Upload” will automatically zip the files and upload them to Brickshelf, creating a new folder if necessary. Upload status is reported in the space to the left of the “Upload” button.

Important Notes

This release consists of a stand-alone application for Mac OS X. This application exhibits many inconsistent or unconventional behaviors, as Brickshelver is actually a Tcl/Tk script bundled in a generic application wrapper. There are a large number of issues that need to be addressed and features that need to be improved, including but not limited to:

• Quit via File→Close or by closing the window, but not via Brickshelver→Quit
• Can’t drag files into the actual window
• Localization
• Layout and appearance quirks
• File type validation
• Cross platform support (specifically, zip and preferences mechanisms)
• Full paths look dopey in file list

I am content with Brickshelver in its current state, but I caution others that it is alpha quality software. Further development depends on the reaction to this release; how to proceed is clear, but I am eager to work on other projects instead.

Download Brickshelver Development Release 2.6MB .tar.gz

Your folder inventory and account information (including unencrypted Brickshelf password) are stored on your computer in ~/Library/Preferences/net.anoved.brickshelver.plist. The format of this file may change in any future releases.

Posted on Monday, August 6th, 2007.

LDLink

Note: LDLink has been superseded by LDMerge.

LDLink is a utility that can reversibly combine separate LDraw part libraries by creating symbolic links to the contents of one directory structure in another. Alternate libraries can be used to manage unofficial LDraw parts; support for this concept is present to varying degrees in some LDraw programs. This utility is intended to facilitate other tools, such as L3P, which do not readily support parallel part libraries.

Download ldlink 1.0 (5k Tcl script)

Install the script as ldlink and make it executable with chmod +x ldlink.

Usage: ldlink merge|unmerge [-src LDRAWDIR] [-dst LDRAWDIR]
       On merge, links to src files are created in dst.
       On unmerge, links named after src files are removed from dst.
       Conflicts with normal files in dst are skipped and reported.
       Default dst is LDRAWDIR environment variable.
       Default src is dst/Unofficial.

To merge unofficial parts downloaded by LDView with the rest of your part library, the following command may be sufficient:

ldlink merge

If the environment variable LDRAWDIR is not defined — or if you would like to override its value — use the dst option to specify the destination where the merge should occur. Likewise, the src option may be used to merge parts from a source other than the destination’s Unofficial subdirectory:

ldlink merge -src /Custom/LDraw -dst /Standard/LDraw

To reverse a merge, reissue the command using unmerge instead of merge:

ldlink unmerge
ldlink unmerge -src /Custom/LDraw -dst /Standard/LDraw

LDLink reports how many links it created or removed.

Posted on Tuesday, July 10th, 2007.