Room Arranger, version 3D (3.0)

Copyright ⌐ 2002-2003 Jan Adamec

This program is intended for designing room interiors. It allows you to place furniture, items and other objects. You can additionally move and rotate objects, change their colors and dimensions. But you can also plan your entire flat, one floor of the house or a new garden.

This file serves as a help for the program and we recommend you to print it and eventually read it. Pressing F1 anywhere in the program will show this help focused on the appropriate section.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. License Agreement
  2. Install And Uninstall
  3. Improve Your Drawings From Older Versions
  4. Getting Started, Creating the Room
  5. Adding Objects
  6. User library
  7. Adding Labels
  8. Saving Into File, Printing And Export
  9. Explore in 3D
  10. Localization


LICENSE AGREEMENT

The program is freeware and it can be distributed only free of charge. Using of the program is free of charge as well.

The program is provided "as-is", and no warranties of any kind (including implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose), express or implied, are made as to it or any medium it may be on. Under no circumstances will we provide any other remedy for direct, indirect, special, consequential, punitive, incidental or other damages arising from it, including such from negligence, strict liability, or breach of warranty or contract, even after notice of the possibility of such damages.

Installing and using the program signifies acceptance and agreement to the terms and conditions of this license. If you do not agree with the terms of this license you must cease to use the program and remove the program from your storage devices.


INSTALL AND UNINSTALL

The program is distributed with an installation program. Leave "Additional Languages" checked if you want to install other languages (not only English) and then select the directory to install in. You can launch the program from the Start menu. If you already have an older version, you should not uninstall it.

In order to uninstall the program you must launch the Uninstall command from the Start menu (Start-Programs-Room Arranger) or select the corresponding item in Start-Settings-Control panel-Add/Remove Programs.


IMPROVE YOUR DRAWINGS FROM OLDER VERSIONS

Every new version brings new features that can markedly improve drawings created by previous program version. You should adjust the catalogue as well; the installation program does not do it automatically. You can find the list of all new features in the file "What's new" accessible from the Start menu.

Rooms up to version 2.20

  1. If you want to see the room in 3D, you will have to change height and z-position of the objects.
Rooms up to version 2.10
  1. There is a new object library in the program. And you only have a great deal of rectangles :-).
  2. Floating text captions created as rectangles turn into Labels.
Rooms up to version 1.11
  1. Increase the wall thickness to 10 and set up the space around the room at least to 35. Both from menu Room->Change Size.
  2. Change the type (in object properties) of the rectangles serving as windows to the new type Window.
  3. Check Snap to Wall in properties of all doors near walls.

Catalogue up to version 2.10

Catalogue up to version 1.11


GETTING STARTED, CREATING THE ROOM

At first, you should look at the example. Open it using the menu command Room->Open and select the file Sample.mst (distributed with the program). Shortcuts to the samples are also located in the Start menu. Try to study it and play with objects. Then you can create your own room using the menu command Room->New.

At the beginning, you should define the dimensions of the room. You can do it in the window Room->Change Size. All numbers in the program are in centimeters, but you can change it and, when planning airfield or the layout of new houses, the unit can be meter, inch, etc...

Walls

If you don't have a rectangular room or if you want to draw the plan of the entire flat, you must click Edit walls button in the dialog window mentioned above. Next window will appear in which you can adjust current walls or add new. Choose the wall in the listing (new wall as a last blank record), fill in the coordinates and press Save to confirm changes for every wall. Alignment of the wall stands for the position of the wall in respect to the coordinates - it can be above them, going through them or bellow them. Width and height of the room are automatically changed to fit the walls; it means that you don't have to keep walls in the room dimensions entered before.

The room dimensions are displayed on the status bar. You can find there also the mouse position relative to the upper left corner of the room and used zoom factor (see menu View). You can measure the distances in the room using the mouse after pressing button on the toolbar or hitting M key. Holding Shift during Measurement measures line with rotation in 45 degrees multiples. If you don't wish to see the result after the end of the measuring, fix the second point of the line with the right mouse button.

You can temporary change the origin of the coordinates in the room (View->Local Coordinates). Position relative to this new point is then displayed on the status bar and it is used also for setting object position. It can be useful if you know the distances for example from the upper right corner of the room.

Windows and doors are the first objects to be added to the room. You should place them very precisely.


ADDING OBJECTS

Objects are added in two possible ways: either from menu Objects->Add Object or right-clicking on the free space in the room. Try to find required object in the library. If you have found it or there is an object only with different size (you can change it afterwards), add it to the room with double-click or selecting it and pressing Enter.

If you can't find the object in the library, button Add basic object will bring the dialog where you can select the shape and other properties of the new object.

If you place the mouse cursor over the object in the room and wait a moment, a brief info about it will appear. And using a right-click, you can select one of the following commands from the pop-up menu:

  1. Properties - edit the object properties (see below)
  2. Duplicate Object - create a copy of the object
  3. Remove Object - delete the object
  4. Bring to Front ...
  5. Send to Back - these functions are good for placing the objects on the top of another object (for example put TV on the cupboard, push a chest under the table,...). In that case, you must sort them with these two commands. These commands do not affect z-position.
  6. Rotate 90 Degrees Right ...
  7. Rotate 90 Degrees Left - quickly change the rotation

Object Properties

Edit the object dimensions, position and rotation. L next to position indicates you have Local coordinates turned on. You can adjust the rotation using the helper beside it and if you hold Shift key, the rotation will change in 45 degrees multiples.

Last performed change of position or properties of objects and the room can be undone by the command Room->Undo or using a toolbar button.

Menu command Objects->Listing is dedicated to displaying the list of all objects in the room. You can remove objects or change their properties by clicking the right mouse button.


USER LIBRARY

There are many objects in the main library, but you would like to add your own objects and remember their definition for later use. The User library is here just for this purpose. You can find it as a first library page when adding new object and you've certainly spotted it on the right side of the Object properties window, which serves for creating of the user library as well.

If you select some predefined object on the right side and press Load button, its properties will be transferred into the object from the room that you are currently modifying.

Similarly, pressing Save button will add (or update) the object to the library. Object is saved with some name, so try to input something reasonable, accurate and general at the same time.

The User library is stored in the file named Catalog.msk in the program directory. You should not edit it manually. It is much better to use menu command Objects->Browse User Library. Then you can:


ADDING LABELS

There is a special object, which can be added to the drawing. It's Label. You can create new label similarly to any other object either from menu or using right mouse button. Unlike object captions, label can stay anywhere in the room. It can also carry more lines of text and, especially, you can select its font, which size is changed according to the zoom level in the room.


SAVING INTO FILE, PRINTING AND EXPORT

It is strongly recommended to save your drawing into the file from time to time. There are several commands in the Room menu for this purpose. You can open the files also using a double click in Explorer or any other file manager, or dragging the file into the program window.

You can also print your work (Room->Print). Select the paper orientation in your printer setup. In the bottom side of the window there is a schematic view on the paper and you can select (and edit) what shall be printed along the image.
Tip: if you want to print in scale 1:50 and the image doesn't fit the page, try to reduce the page border, switch off all texts or rotate the paper in Printer setup.

Furthermore, you can save the result as an image (Export submenu) or copy it into the clipboard and subsequently insert it into a text editor (like MS Word), add some comments and then print it. As a default, 100% zoom is always used for printing and export (the most accurate drawing). You can change it in Configure->Options.


EXPLORE IN 3D

In order to make any use of 3D view, you should set height and z-position for all objects in their properties. Furthermore, you will need some external VRML viewer; it is not part of the installation program. Two of them are described below, both of them use Internet browser's window for the viewing.

Please, study their help, navigation in virtual worlds is quite difficult (before you get accustomed to it). All moves are performed with mouse (press left mouse button and drag). There are three exploring modes: Walk, Slide (including panning and flying), Tilt (rotating the view), you can switch among them using the buttons in the viewer (see images). If you switch off gravity you can fly.

Room Arranger generates several sights of the room for you. They are accessible in the Viewpoint list and you can go through all of them (in case of Cosmo Player) using keys Page Down and Page Up (recommended). The first viewpoint is the start position you choose in the program and it can be saved into to the room file.

Cosmo Player

Strengths: easy navigation utilizing all three mouse buttons (left button: Walk, middle: Tilt, right: Slide)
Preferences (differences to the default setup): on the Graphics page select OpenGL Renderer. Direct3D sometimes jams the computer while you can achieve much higher speed and smoothness with OpenGL in this viewer.
Link: www.cai.com/cosmo

Cosmo Player

Cortona

Strengths: better image quality (antialiasing in particular). It is possible that you already have this viewer, it can be installed together with MSIE 6
Preferences (differences to the default setup): on the Navigation page select Always for Animate viewpoints, and on Renderer page check Idle-time at AntiAliasing.
Link: www.parallelgraphics.com

ParallelGraphics Cortona


LOCALIZATION

Since version 1.11, the program is distributed also in other language mutations, not only in Czech. Translations are provided by normal people (like you) who find this program useful and they want to support it.

If you want to join them and help with the translation into some non-translated language, you already saw any program in that language, contact us using e-mail jadamec@bigfoot.com. You will have to translate only one text file (all translations are in the Language directory) and insert correct constant into the LanguageID line (I will provide it). Just keep the same sense, the rest is fully up to you. Conversion of this help file is optional and not recommended.

Detailed instructions:

  1. Before you start translating, always check the website if somebody else has not already done it! Download the latest version. We will gladly answer any your e-mail questions.

  2. Look into the installation directory with the languages (typically C:\Program Files\Room Arranger\Language) at the existing translations using a simple text editor (Notepad, TextPad, UltraEdit...) and find the language closest to you, preferably English - i.e. file arr_en.lng. Create a copy of this file with the name derived from the new language name (i.e. arr_de.lng for German).

  3. In that new file, translate all strings after ItemN=, change the language name on the top of the file and write any other number in LanguageID (we'll change or send you (if you want) the correct constant for your language).

  4. Start the program and choose your now language. Go through all dialog windows, check the accuracy and see if all texts fit in the space dedicated to them. If not, try to use another phrase or abbreviation. When editing the language file with program running, you must reselect the language in the configurations or restart program to apply changes.

  5. Send us your product; we are looking forward to it!

  6. When working on newer versions of the program, you will have to translate about 30 new clearly marked items every time.