Free Doors Update

[bruce_clark]

Dear Free Doors Users:

I have finally updated the Free Doors website to include the latest Free Doors 4.0U Beta installer. This includes the latest Doors.EXE from Mike Richards, the new Cutters Editor (taking into account the feedback that I got from the early alpha testers) and the UNIVERSAL version of Free Doors. Free Doors now exports ShopBot code, G-Code, and DXF format.

The website address is:

http://home.centurytel.net/bwclark/

I have also updated the "Getting Started Tutorial" to include how to use the Cutters Editor. So, please read that FIRST! Also, I am including the updated portion of the FreeDoors_ReadMe.TXT file, which included some more indepth information about the Cutters Editor.

Thanks,

Bruce Clark


---------------------------------------------------------------
First off, I would like to thank Michael Richards for making his cabinet door software available to everyone. THANK YOU!

---------------------------------------------------------------
What's New? [04-30-2007 Version 4.0U]

It has been a while, but the wait should be worth it. There are some major changes to Free Doors. First off, Free Doors now supports G-Code and DXF file exporting. G-Code opens up Free Doors to be usable by a lot more CNC router machines. The DXF option allows you to open up the cabinet door paths in a CAD/CAM program for further embellishement such as V-Carving (we like VCarvePro by Vetric www.Vectric.com (http://www.Vectric.com)) or 3D carvings.

Since you have a choice if 3 types of output, you are also offered a choice of "Previewers". The ShopBot previewer we recommend is the ShopBot control software. This portion of the program has stayed the same--it opens up the ShopBot control software in the preview mode. For the G-Code, if you are a MACH controller user, use your Mach software (www.artsoftcontrols.com (http://www.artsoftcontrols.com)) or, as we recommend, NCPlot 1.1. It is FREE and it integrates very nicely with the FreeDoor's preview. It is available here: http://www.ncplot.com/ncplotfree/ncplotfree.htm . As for the DXF, any CAD/CAM program that can accept a command line file name, can be used to preview the DXF output. If not, just select something like Notepad.exe. With the way the program is currently implemented, you need to have a program selected. It does not matter which, but something.

The choice of cutters for Free Doors was a major sticking point with a lot of people. Mike's original tools, while commonly available, where not that common to a lot of users. Also, tool depths, tabs, and sizes were a big "trial and error" in getting the settings correct. This has been made a lot easier with the new plug-in called "Cutters Editor". This CUTTERS.CSV editor allows you to "preview" what the groove between the panel and the stiles and rails will look like without being at your machine. You can experiment with different size cutters, tool types and depths. When finished, you can save your tool set (tool selections and all) for a later recall. This also allows for different tool settings for different jobs (make a copy of your new tool set and then copy--or save--the tool set as CUTTERS.CSV so that Mike's DOORS.EXE can find it).

Also, if you want to preview what a special tool's cutting profile will look like, you can create it (if it does not currently exist) with any CAD or drawing program that can export DXF files. To make a custom tool profile, you need to draw it at true to life size AND the cutting point or tip must be at 0,0. Otherwise, the tool will be draw off location in the preview. For a better explanation, please open one of the provided DXF tool profiles in your CAD/CAM/drawing program. The V-Bit tool is the best example.

Lastly, Mike has updated his doors.EXE program to 7.14b. This has a few enhancements and some cleaned up code.

This release is BETA but we feel it should be stable enough for production work, if that is what you are using it for.

[bruce_clark]

Opps.

Paul Neilsen was kind enough to point out that the ShopBot preview was not working. It turns out that some code was commented out while I was working on the G-code and DXF previews and I forgot to uncomment it. I assumed that the ShopBot portion had not changed and did not test it out--a big NO NO!

The upside is that there is a new version on the Website, FreeDoors 4.01U. So, if you got the latest, please get this new one.

The website address is:

http://home.centurytel.net/bwclark/


Thanks,

Bruce

[bruce_clark]

Dear Free Door Users:

There is a new tutorial on the Free Doors website on how to actually USE Free Doors to cut cabinet doors.

Between the two tutorials, you should be able to go from knowing nothing about cabinet doors to making your very own set.

Again, the website address is:
http://home.centurytel.net/bwclark/


Thanks,

Bruce

[myxpykalix]

Bruce and Michael,

I know how much work just the tutorial is to put together, let alone the FREE program. So I wanted to at least say THANKS for all the efforts.

[richards]

Jack (and many others),

Thanks for for saying thanks. Many of you have written me personally, with tales and descriptions of what you have built. In the world of free software, that is considered a payday. I hope that everyone who has downloaded the program has also personally thanked Bruce Clark. It was his efforts that made the program usable. Had he NOT volunteered countless hours to write a GUI frontend for the program, an excellent tutorial, the extremely valuable Cutter Editor program, and, just this week, an excellent how-to tutorial, no one would have ever been able to cut a door - except me. (Some of you have written and asked if you could use a certain size cove cutter with a certain sized groove cutter. Before responding, I would sometimes go to AutoCAD LT and draw the cutters so that I could visually see whether the cove cutter would nick the V-cut. Bruce, on his own initiative, wrote the Cutter Editor program that does that, and much more.)

Every once in a while, just to remind myself of what if would have been like without Bruce's program, I create a doors.csv file from scratch, just using the spreadsheet and then run doors.exe from the command line. Let me tell you all, it's not any fun.

So, if you haven't sent Bruce an email, get on it! He's a great guy.

-Mike

[jseiler]

I like this software a whole lot. I've not cut anything with it, just getting my feet wet. There is one upgrade that would be great and I suspect it would be relatively easy. It would be nice if on the preview it showed your material size as a colored box or something. The software is set up for 4x8 and you can select different material sizes, but I have a small machine (32x32) and its hard to tell without reading the spreadsheet if I've gone outside my limits. With a highlighted material box on the preview, I could easily see if i've stepped outside the cutting area.

I think I've found a bug in the nesting, but that might be my lack of experience with the program. It seems like if I lay down a few doors that mostly fill my material area, then add another, it wants to place that one on top of the other ones, even if I hit nest again. That might be my bad, not sure yet. If I can get it to repeat reliably, I might have something you guy can work with.

thanks again for a great program,
John

[richards]

John,

Thanks for the feedback. I think that you've found a genuine bug. When I generated four doors, each 15 X 24 and then selected a 32 X 32 sheet of material, the program allowed four doors to be nested, even though only two doors would completely fit within that size of material.

If you 'generate' the doors and then 'preview' the doors (with the table limits set to the size of material that you're going to use on your machine), you'll get an 'out of bounds' error in SB3. If you over-ride that error, the simulator will show which door(s) need to be deleted.

The 'work-around' for this bug is to set the table size to the size of the material that you're going to use and then 'generate' the SBP files and finally 'preview' the SBP files. If they display properly on the SB3 simulator, then the files should cut properly.

Thanks again for the feedback.

-Mike

[anthony]

Bruce,

I have just got my SBot and have not even downloaded free doors yet but plan to this week. I want to Thank you for letting everyone use your free doors software. If more people were like you thier would files for almost anything needed to be done. Thank you again for sharing so grasiously.

Anthony

[bruce_clark]

John,

Also, a work around for the nesting not fixing the door on door situation. Press the "Recalculate ALL Offsets" and then press the "Nest Doors". That should take care of things.

As for doing the cutting area versus changing the material dimensions, yea maybe. You can change the material size to 32x32 and while your doors will appear twice as wide as they would in real life, it will nest and draw correctly.

Anyways, there is going to be a fundamental reworking of the Free Doors program in the future. Right now, the program is a major screen hog and running it at 1024x768, you get part of the window cut off. So, I plan on redoing it. Eventually....

Hope this helps,

Bruce

[bruce_clark]

Anthony (all everybody else):

Glad I can help people out. I enjoy programming (though some times it seems like work) and glad that I can give back to the ShopBot community. It helped me out a LOT nine years ago when I started.

Now, I have to be honest. Not all of my work is Free and I am not totally altruistic. There _MAY_ come a day when Free Doors becomes something other than "Free". I don't know if or when that will happen, but Mike and I have talked a little about it.

The big problem is that the project has grown so much from its original inception. It was a small program that made CSV files for Mike's Doors.exe program. Now, it does much more and it has grown so much that it is becoming a major undertaking just to keep the project current.

So, that leads to two options. One is to let the project stagnate (something I am personally against) or find a way to make it worth my while to keep spending the time to make sure things are the latest and greatest.

My current hope is to find a CNC router manufacturer(s) (ShopBot and/or others) who would like a Router Manufacturer branded version that they would include with their machines. Similar to what most router manufactures do now (such as ShopBot) by including design software with each machine. We are just looking for a modest licensing fee, not a per copy fee. This would have the benefit of keep development current and new features added (Mike and I would be getting compensation for our time) and users would get a "Free to them" version of the program.

Anyways, that is the idea for now. Like I keep saying, "Get it while you can".

Bruce

[richards]

Bruce,
We need to talk. My intention was to allow totally free use of the software to the Shopbot community, but possibly charge for those using non-sbp code.

Your G-code generator and DXF generator are great extensions to the program that will enable router operators outside the Shopbot community to cut MDF doors, so there is possibly a fairly nice market outside the Shopbot community waiting to be tapped - no pun intended (Mach G-code uses .tap files).

Your recent additions to FreeDoors have been outstanding, and worth a lot. I know that they've taken a lot of time and effort, and in the programming world, time and effort can't be reclaimed. Once they're gone, they're gone forever.

My problem is that once software has been released under the OpenSource License for no-cost use by a particular sector of the public (Shopbot users), it would be difficult to modify the terms of that license after-the-fact. Of course, as is explicitly explained in the licensing terms that have to be accepted before your FreeDoors program can be installed, only the doors.exe program and the associated source programs that I wrote are distributed under the OpenSource no-charge license. The FreeDoors software that you wrote was not offered under those terms.

Anyway, maybe something can be worked out to everyone's satisfaction.

-Mike

p.s. I found the bug in the nesting software that we talked about this morning. It's just a little thing that should have been squashed in just a few minutes, but refuses to die. As usual, fixing one thing must have broken another thing - but the evening is young . . .

[handh]

Bruce & Mike,

I think what you have done to help fellow Shopbotters is great. I don't think that you should let your project become stagnate. I think that it would be great for Shopbot to include something like this but personally I would rather that a indivual as yourself continue working on the software and adding new features as you see fit as well as input from others.

I think that the both of you should be compensated for your work, I just hope that you will try and keep it resonable and not like other software that I have purchased in the past. Most people are probally using the program to just make doors for hobby work and I'm sure that it would be hard to justify a major software purchase.

It takes a lot of work to do things like this along with your regular work. Also charging a software fee would probally give you both greater desire to work on the software to add features and improve it. Send me your address or if you have a paypal account I will send you a donation.

Thanks, and I just cut out my first job this past weekend and didn't have a glitch, everything machined as planned. I do have a few questions about using different cutters and I will email you with the details when I get a chance.

Thanks,
Jeff

[richards]

Jeff,

It's good to read that you've had success with the programs. Bruce has done a fantastic job. His skill in writing code is simply phenomenal.

Just like everyone else, I do some things for free, either because no one wants to pay me to do the things that I enjoy doing, or because the market is too small to justify charging for the time and effort expended, or because it's a good day and there's nothing else that I would rather do.

Just like the rest of the Shopbot community, most of us design parts for free for family and friends, for nearby schools and churches, and mostly for the little boys and girls that timidly ask if we would ever had a little extra time to make them a rocking horse. It's just the nature of being human. We all have bills to pay, so we have to charge money for something or we won't be in a position to give of ourselves. But, in my book, the best part of life is seeing the sparkle in someone's eyes - especially the children - when they receive something unexpected.

A while back there was a movie, "Pay It Forward" - if I remember correctly. That movie had a great message. I really believe that everyone is in the position to do something everyday to lift someone else's burden just a little bit. It doesn't really matter what we do as long as we do something.

Bruce has done more than 'just a little bit'. He's put untold hours into the project. (You should see the time stamps on his emails. I often get up at 3:00 or 4:00 a.m. to service my customers' computers and many times there's an email waiting for me from Bruce showing that he just finished a few minutes before I got up.) Doing everything pro bonno publico is noble, but it can't go on forever unless other projects make up the difference. But, until a solution is found, we can all 'Pay It Forward', using whatever gifts and talents God has given us.

[bruce_clark]

Jeff,

One thing. Have you had a chance to read the new tutorial on Free Doors? Actually, have you had a chance to read both, since both were updated with the recent release?

If so, let me know about your tooling question because I tried to be clear about using different tooling in those tutorials. If there was confusion, then I need to revise the tutorials.

As for payment, don't worry about it. This version is "FREE", hence the name Free Doors. I really do appriciate the offer. Version 4 will remain free. I cannot say the same for Version 5.

The point I am trying to get across is that this project has grown from a simple program to quite a large project. I just need something to keep the motivation and enthusiam up.

Mike, as for the OSI issue, I think that version 5 of the Cabinet Door software will not use any OSI software.

I hope this clears thing up a little.

Bruce

[butch]

I have worked with your program - just wanted to say thanks

[bruce_clark]

Butch,

Glad that you were able to use the program. Were the tutorials helpful in getting you started?

Thanks,

Bruce

[butch]

Bruce,
Yes it was. I followed your tutorial and went through the example you have. After that I understood what input made what change to the program. After that, I made some changes and rebuilt some doors just to see what changed, then nested them into a panel.
Thanks - you taught a beginner how the doors are built. I have bid a computer desk made from MDF and I want to use your program to see how it builds it. Should be fun. Now I just need to get the bid.

- Butch

[bruce_clark]

Butch,

One last request, since you went through the tutorials. What information would YOU like that was missed or left out?

The tutorials are squarely aimed at the first time user/builder of cabinet doors and I would like to make improvements so that the process is easy as possible.

I don't want to assume too much about the user's knowledge and at the same time I don't want to be overly pedantical either. So, I am trying to strike a balance, but I KNOW how the process and so a little feedback from someone new is a great way of verifying that the balance is correct.

Thanks for taking the time to learn the software.

Bruce

[handh]

Bruce,

I have a question about the nesting. If you have more doors than 1 sheet were do they go, I don't see a way to view another sheet. Are you only able to do 1 sheet at a time.

Thanks,
Jeff

[bruce_clark]

Jeff,

Correct. Right now, Mike and I are debating what the program should do with doors that do not fit on the sheet/machine.

With the current implementation, Free Doors and Mike's Doors and Nest program will only handle one sheet. We have discussed making both programs handle multiple sheets, but that is another version away.

What I suggest right now, is to create ALL your doors on one sheet. Nest the parts and save that file as something other than DOORS.CSV (like ALLMYDOORS.CSV). Now delete the doors that did not fit on the sheet and save THAT file as DOORS.CSV. Cut those files and then load up the "ALLMYDOORS.CSV" file (or what ever you have called it) and delete the doors that you have already cut (the ones showing in the Material Layout sheet). Now press the Recalculate ALL offsets button and then the Nest button. Now save this file as DOORS.CSV and cut that file.

Yes, it is a pain to cut multiple sheets of doors, but I promise, it is still quicker than doing it with CAD!

Hope this helps,

Bruce

[handh]

Bruce,

Thanks for the response, I thought maybe I was missing something.

Ok on a different note, when I open up to edit the cutters csv file, and lets say that I edit the file and save a version of it so that I can recall it later. If I name by another name other than cutters.csv when I go and create shopbot cutting files I get a error message. Do I have to name it cutters.csv and if I do are there any way to save a door cutter design so that I can bring it back up again and not have to re-enter the cutters. This way I can have multiple door cutting designs.

Thanks,
Jeff

[bruce_clark]

Jeff,

You have to save the file twice. Once with a descriptive name such as MYCUTTERS.CSV or MYBOSCHCUTTERS.CSV and then again CUTTERS.CSV for Mike's Doors program to find.

So, to answer your question, YES you can have multiple cutters for different door styles, you just need to rename a copy of that file "CUTTERS.CSV" before you press the "Generate Door Files" button.

Again, I think the next version will work a little different--or at least it will let you choose, via a windows open dialog, which cutters file you want to use to generating the cut files.

Thanks and keep asking questions. It means that someone is using the program!

Bruce

[handh]

Thanks,

[paul60]

Can anyone tell me if you can now add multiple
panels to doors?
i make mdf door from about 12 inches to over six feet high. and a 6ft door looks better balance
using two or more panels.
also can you export the files you make on free doors
as a dxf file ?
i use vcarve pro to do all my tool paths and very happy with it. i also do my nesting with turbocad. once i can export my door files from free doors the rest is easy for me.
what i like about free doors is how easy it is to setup and change the the door dimensitions.
thats a very big help.
i also want to thank everyone who had a path in
making free doors available .
thanks paul

[bruce_clark]

Paul,

There is no "direct" way to make multipanel doors. You can "fool" the software into making multi panel doors and I think Mike posted instructions here or in one of his "readme" files.

When I get some time, I plan on doing a Wainscott "plug in" for Free Doors that will basically let you do multi panel doors (or a Wainscott).

To answer your second question, yes, the new version (4.0) you can export your doors as DXF and add further embellishments.

Glad you like it and I am happy it works well for you.

Bruce

[richards]

Here is the 'basic' way to make multi-panel doors that I've emailed to a few users:

The door program has no provisions for making multi-panel doors; however, you can fool it by laying out two separate door files. In the first file, lay out the doors so that the panels are exactly where you want them to be. Generate the SBP files and then cut everything except the perimeter. In the second file, lay out one door so that the perimeter is exactly where you want it to be. Generate the SBP files and then cut only the perimeter. It will require some small effort on your part, but it will allow you to make multi-panel doors.

[paul60]

Thanks mike for the information i will it a try.
Bruce. can you tell me how i go about saving the door file i made as a dxf file?
thanks paul

[bruce_clark]

Paul,

Are you using the latest V.4 Free Doors? If not, get it from the website:
http://home.centurytel.net/bwclark/

Now, on the very bottom of the screen (if you are running 1024x768, you may have to move the window up a little to see--this will be fixed in the next update) you will see a box called "Output Options". Click the "DXF Format" radio button and then press the "Generate Door Files". You will now have 6 DXF files in the Doors/JOBS folder.

Hope this help,

Bruce

[butch]

Bruce

It's been a couple of days, and of course its not the same as going through the first time, but here is my input.
The only place that I can remember any problems is understanding the offset.
Not in the toutorial but in the program, if you change the color of the input cells, that might help explain the required inputs.
Renaming the 'Add to list' to "add door to view of cutout" or better explaination in the tutorial, as well as the 'update' button.
Explain the difference between 'Recalculate..', 'Nest..', and 'Redraw' would help.

Personal preference, I line up input screens - the input on top and the door parameters below might make it some what easier to follow. But that is the personal way I make input screens.

Again, I didn't find much wrong or that I would change. Just trying to remember where I had to backup and re read, to understand what the input should be.

I like the new tutorial you have added. That cleared up a lot of what I was trying to figure out.

Hope that helps a little.
Well done job in my opinion. I know how hard it is to make input screens so someone else can understand what 'I' am trying to do.
If I come up with any thing new I will pass it along.

Thanks
Butch
You get an atta-boy for this!

[bruce_clark]

Butch,

Thanks for the compliment.

Yes, the program could use a LOT of cleanup. It started out as a very simply program and has grown and grown. It is due for a rewrite/update because it is getting harder to add features and still maintain the code.

As per the offsets, that is something that is kinda confusing, I agree. It is autocalculated when you are laying out the doors, and I figured I could _almost_ not display that, but everyonce in a while that information is useful. With that said, I will look into seeing if I can make that a little clearer in the tutorial.

Good idea about coloring the field in the "list view". Yes, the "Add to List" could probably be relabled. Again, in the first version, all you were doing was creating a CSV file and really you were just building a "list of doors". Well, that has changed and it probably does need some updating as well.

As for the alignment issue of the add/Delete/Update buttons, I was also trying to "follow the flow" from the user's input. As you enter all the data, you end up on the right side of the screen when you are done. I figured that was the best place to put those buttons. I will look into that in the future as well.

Lastly, the Recalculate, Nest and Redraw actually do something different. The recalculate button only recalculates the door offsets. This basically realigns the doors in numerical order.

The Nest actually trys to nest the doors from largest to smallest. It will renumber the doors as well.

The redraw button is actually responsible for drawing the doors on the screen. In one of the earlier versions, the program did not automatically add the doors to the drawing layout area. The user had to do that manually. Now, it is done automatically, but the button is left there for programmatical reasons.

Again, thanks for your input. Your input will definately help in the design of future versions of Free Doors.

Bruce

[paul60]

Hi Bruce.
its been some time since i tried using free doors.
i got an order today to make a few doors, and i have been trying to get a dxf output but with no luck.
i got the output option dxf clicked i created the door files, nest the files, then click generate door files but dont see any dxf files showing.
what i am trying to do is export as dxf and create my cutting files using vcarve.
thanks paul

[cabindoors]

I've also never been able to output dxf files in order to use this program. I always get "An error writing the CSV date file occured". It opens my turbocad program but nothing ever happens. And the "Doors Output" screen is blank. Some serious tutorial needs to be writen to use FREEDOORS. IMO

[richards]

Paul and Tom,

I just tried the program and it exported DXF files to the C:/Program Files/Doors/Files folder. I had no problem opening the resulting DXF files in AutoCAD LT. There are extra lines in the DXF files (jog paths) that need to be erased, but it seems that the output is basically there.

If you continue to have problems, send either Bruce or me an e-mail and we'll look at the specific issues.

Edited:
Tom, have you used Bruce's tutorial? It explains things pretty well.

[david_busbee]

Mike and Bruce,

Thanks for a Great Door program it has worked perfectly generating door files with my Windows XP Laptop but it will not generate files on my
Vista Laptop. Any ideas why?

[richards]

David,

I'm afraid that I have held off installing Vista, so I have no way of checking without getting to a Vista computer.

From your description, it looks like you might have a permissions problem. Do you have full privileges on all sub-folders in the directory?

If you would like, send me an email <miker@xmission.com (mailto:miker@xmission.com)> with any error codes or other messages and I'll try to reproduce the error when I can get to a Vista computer.

-Mike

[richards]

I've just finished an update for the FreeDoors/Doors program that Bruce Clark and I worked on (several years ago). The new version does a better job of generating code to produce parallel arches. It also totally changes the ramp-in routine that caused some users to get 'divots' when their cutter changed direction at the end of the ramp-in routine.

Internally, the program has been almost completely rewritten, but those changes are hidden from the user - so no one will have to learn new ways of doing things.

If you would like an update, email me directly and I'll email you the update. (After unzipping the update, you can install the new program easily by clicking the 'update.bat' file that is one of the files included.)

miker@xmission.com (mailto:miker@xmission.com)

[mikeacg]

Mike,

I guess this was started before I had my machine and became a forum member so I was happy to see it pop up. I am grateful to you and Bruce for spending so much time and energy on this and look forward to trying it out.

Mike

[bruce_clark]

I plan on doing a new build and release of FreeDoors as soon as I get my current project done--building a MAME game arcade cabinet for my brother for Christmas. So I hope to have a new build on the website before New Year Day.

Bruce

[myxpykalix]

Bruce don't build it too big or it won't fit under the tree!

[richards]

It's been a long time since Bruce Clark and I worked together on FreeDoors. The program is still available on Bruce's website (http://home.centurytel.net/bwclark/).

Bruce wrote the GUI part which is the part that you'll see if you use the program. I wrote the programs that generate the cut files.

I noticed that some of the arches were not correct. They "flared" a little. That was caused by some faulty math in my program. I've rewritten all of the program files that generate the cut files. As far as I can see (without a Shopbot), the cut files generate the proper tool paths without "flaring".

If you would like the free update, send me an email. I'll send you a zipped set of files. You'll need to copy your existing Doors folder to a safe place and then run an INSTALL.BAT file. That file will install the new version for you. The source code files include some text files that explain how the spreadsheet files (generated by Bruce's programs) work. There is also a brief explanation of the math used to properly cut the arches and the V cut corners. All of the C++ code to generate the cut files is included so that you can modify anything if need something different.

Send me an email (miker@xmission.com), and I'll send you the zipped files.

[kevin]

thanks for making the program available for free its a great bprogram

[richards]

Several Shopbotters have requested the update. I hope that I've responded to all of you. If you haven't received the update, please send me another email with "FreeDoors" as the subject. (My email client is setup to reject most emails unless the sender is already in my address list. Some of you may know what it feels like to get tens of thousands of emails when you've become a spam target.) I'll configure my email client to allow any message with "FreeDoors" in the subject line to pass through the spam check.

miker@xmission.com

[jamesburrus]

This sounds like awesome door program for any size material