Topics covered in this section are listed below:

What Can I Do in Edificio?

The Edificio editor is designed for use with BRL-CAD models of buildings and facilities. It has several modes for differing tasks, such as editing the geometry or components of buildings.

You must begin any editing work on an existing facility, but from there you may delete and add buildings from other facilities in any combination desired. Buildings can be moved in any direction, including changing their elevations. While moves in the cardinal directions are performed by selecting a building and dragging it with the mouse, the elevation is changed in the property table.

Buildings by default are shown from an overhead view. However it is possible to "look into" the building on a floor by floor basis by using the floor level slider. It is also possible to zoom in or out for a better view of a floor or a facility. If you don't see the particular part of the facility you wish to in the current view, you can quickly scroll over to it using the navigator panel.

Many building models have critical components inside which can be moved and manipulated in various ways in edit mode. These show up in red inside the building. Additional information about the components can be found in the critical component window.

You can also create several simple buildings from scratch to add to your facilities. These buildings have various options for customization as well such as size and number of floors. The information about these tools can be found in the section on creating buildings from scratch.

Program Modes

After launching Edificio, the program will be running in one of several modes. The modes are chosen based on the way the program is launched from VISAC. The following modes are available:

Edit Mode: This is the most powerful mode in Edificio, allowing you to customize many aspects of a model, bring in new buildings, and copies of the same building. The user can also copy or delete components and paste them on different floors.

View Mode: This is primarily useful to view a facility design, or floor layouts. Critical components can also be seen in this mode. No changes are allowed by the user in this mode.

Blast Mode: This mode is similar to view mode in that no changes are allowed by the user. However this mode also allows one to place a blast inside or outside of a building. The user can specify the size of the blast and the elevation. This data can be returned to VISAC for more detailed results.

Cross-Hair Mode: Similar to blast mode except that the size of the blast is not determined in Edificio. Again the results will be returned to VISAC for more detailed information.

Bringing in New Buildings

Edificio is always launched with a facility present. If you desire to import new buildings you must be in edit mode, you can do this in two ways. The first will allow you to bring in buildings from the same facility. This is accomplished by selecting a type of building from the drop down menu 'type of building' in the preview panel on the left side of the window as shown below:

Once you have chosen the desired building type, you will see a small thumb nail of the building in the preview panel. Now a double-click anywhere in the building canvas area will place that building into your project. Of course the building can be moved after the initial placement to the desired location. If you bring in multiple copies of the same type of building, the building and all of its objects will have an '_2' attached to their names. Please note that the number may vary based on how many copies of the building you have present.

If you wish to bring in buildings from a different facility than the current one in the preview panel, simply access the facility type menu from the menu bar. Here you will see a list of possible facilities to choose from. Those above the separator are library facilities, and those below are user-created facilities. Choosing one of these options will reset the preview panel to display the different types of buildings present in that facility.

Selecting/Deselecting Buildings

To select a building, simply left click on it. You cannot be in floor view to select a building. If you are in floor view, return the floor view to zero by moving the floor view slider or by closing the critical component window. You will know the building has been selected because it will be outlined with dashed lines.

It is possible to select multiple buildings at the same time as well. This is useful for dragging several buildings together to a new location, without losing their original configuration. To do this, simply left click near the buildings you want to select and drag the mouse. A box will appear and any buildings which are touching this box when you release the mouse button will be selected. All of the buildings selected will now be surrounded by a box with dashed lines. Left clicking on any of these buildings will select the entire group now, and you simply drag the buildings together to the new location and release the mouse button.

Once a single building is selected, information about that building will appear in the property table . Selecting multiple buildings will not cause this information to appear.

To deselect a building or buildings, simply left-click on an empty area in the canvas.

Moving Buildings

Moving buildings is quite simple in Edificio. Simply left-click on the desired building and drag it where you wish. You will know the building is selected when its out-line is marked with black dashed lines. Moving the building to the edges of the screen will increase the size of your facility area and you may not be able to see other buildings as they move off the screen. If you wish to return to the other buildings, try scrolling or using the zoom or center buttons on the tool bar.

You cannot move buildings while looking at the floor view . If you are in floor view, return the floor view to zero by moving the floor view slider or by closing the critical component window

Deleting Buildings

There are three ways to delete buildings. To delete a single building from a facility, simply right click on that building. This will not remove the building from the facility until you save the project. You can also select the building with a left click and choose the delete option from the menu bar to achieve the same result.

The other way to delete buildings is through the clear button. This will delete all buildings from the project instead of just one.