[Sparky977]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Cool, thanks! Sorry for making you do the looking. I had spent a lot of time already going through the help file for sketchup and hadn't found anything that answered my question. It was late and I was getting irritated.

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

No worries Sparky. I guess I should have put a on the comment above.

I'll probably include a Readme file in the next version to give people a place to start with any questions.

I hope you get to the fun stuff soon!

 

[Sparky977]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Ok, still not able to get this to work completely right. I am trying to use the svg option, but whether I open that file with firefox or safari, I only get the first page of layouts. I am using Firefox 3.0, if that might make a difference.

Edit: Ok, I can see that the page continues, but for some reason, firefox will not give me a scroll bar to see lower than one page. But, like I say, I can see the top of the next sheet of ply layed out. weird.

Edit again: I can zoom out to see all the sheets, but they are so small at that point, I can't read anything. . .

 

[Sparky977]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Ok, guess its back to switching back and forth between mac and windows with Parallels then and just using CutlistPlus. . .

 

[gdoebs]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Hi Steve,
If I choose CSV or SVG Layout I don't get any files, on the desktop or in the directory where the sketchup file is…

Also, when I have Web Page and Layout checked, and all Types checked, I get the list of components along with the total board feet, but I also get a blank window with just the background. There is a print view button at the bottom. Is that where I should see the layout for each board?

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Hi Geoff,

Ok, layout option ( which creates another window) does not work for Mac. That's the blank window you are seeing. So, yes, that's where you would normally see a layout.

As for the files, not sure what is up there because Sparky was just mentioning the issue (common to all platforms) of the SVG output when it spans more than one page. He is on a Mac, so he obviously had a file created or else he wouldn't have been able to see that.

Perhaps you can PM Sparky offline and compare notes.

Or, you can be of some assistance. If/when you do it again, if you can open the Ruby Console, run it again and then copy/paste the contents and send it to me in a PM.

Sorry about the Mac issues, mates.

Steve

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

It seems the only solution for SVG layout pagination is to produce multiple files. I've got a working version almost ready to go. Just a bit more testing, possibly putting in an option to allow optimization for portrait or landscape ( right now i assume landscape but this may not be best for sheet layout).

This should be ready in a few days. I'll announce when it is. Lucky for you guys, it's the middle of winter here in the Southern Hemisphere. It's too cold for the shop and gets dark too early so most of my woodworking is in front of the computer while waiting for the Tour de France coverage which starts at midnite our time

 

[moshel]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

wear thermals! and turn on the light!!!! and its not that cold now…. or maybe i am now completely numb.
anyway, spring is in the air and the Rhododendrons start blooming. wake up and smell the sawdust.

 

[gdoebs]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Hey Steve,
I just sent the ruby script output in a PM. Also, feel free to send me test scripts if you want me to test them on the Mac. This script is awesome so far. It'll keep me for going back to the "dark" side, aka windows XP.

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

lol Moshe! If anyone knows what it's like working in the shop this time of year here, I can't deny that you would be the expert neighbor. Ok, no excuses… I'll turn those bow saw handles with thermals, gloves and the lights on…indeed, spring is just around the corner (never mind that the ski season just started!).

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

lol Moshe! If anyone knows what it's like working in the shop this time of year here, I can't deny that you would be the expert neighbor. Ok, no excuses… I'll turn those bow saw handles with thermals, gloves and the lights on…indeed, spring is around the corner (never mind that the ski season just started!).

 

[depictureboy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Oy, I forgot you are on teh arse end of the world….I had a buddy I met in Hong Kong from Christs church, and another buddy who was part Maori from further north…..

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Yup, Moshe and I are both in Christchurch. We had the first ever Lumberjock picnic in the southern hemisphere ( I believe) some weeks ago when we got together for dinner and some woodshop talk. Neither of us can lay claim to being one of the natives though - neither the colonial occupiers nor the indigenous peoples.

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

v4.0.5 now available

This download link here and the one at the top of this blog and the download link available from my web page have now been updated with v4.0.5 of the Sketchup Cutlist plugin.

This version adds 2 changes:

1. The layout SVG file export is now paginated. When selecting this option the layout is now written to several files, each representing a single page of output. These files can be displayed using Firefox or MSIE with an Adobe SVG reader plugin and can then be printed. Printing landscape format will be your best bet. This will make printing the layout a lot easier.
2. When choosing an output format which produces a file, this file will now be placed in the same directory as your model. If you have started a new model and have not yet saved it but try producing a cutlist, this will be detected and the plugin will remind you that you must save your work first.

Please feel free to post any comments, questions, suggestions here. Thanks for all the feedback and support on list and off.

• There have now been close to 1200 downloads of the plugin since first posted.
• This blog appears #7 in the top 10 google search of "Sketchup cutlist". The other references are to the older version of the plugin.

If you're here looking for the latest on this plugin, you are definitely in the right place!
This is still the only official discussion site for this plugin.

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Hi Dave,

Thanks for passing that on. It's clearly an internal rounding error. Sketchup ( as does the plugin) stores everything in inches and the model units are applied on output. I do the same for volume measures but I'll have a look to see if I can make it more accurate.

 

[ChicoWoodnut]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Hey Steve,

This thing rocks! I have been using it on the model you downloaded. I thought it was wrong once but it was me.

Thanks a million for all this work.

 

[daltxguy]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Thanks Scott! and thanks for the model. It was quite useful in the testing.

I'm glad to see your model now having become a real thing. Well done! - looks even better 'in the flesh' and a great blog series.

 

[gdoebs]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Hey Steve,
I tested the version you emailed me. The SVG files work great on a mac! So far so good. Keep it up!

 

[ecarlson]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Steve,

Thanks for all your effort and to other who have contributed on this project.

You mentioned in your release notes; "Known issues with compatibility with CutListPlus 2009. If someone gets me the details, I'll fix it but I don't have CutListPlus so I need your help."

How can I help? I really like CutList Plus but having to enter everything manually in the past has been time consuming and error prone. I have experimented with importing a .csv generated by Cut List 4.0.5, but it does not work. I am not sure what type of info would be helpful to you. Please let me know.

Thanks again!

Eric

 

[jft68]

Cutlist and Layout from Sketchup

If you're a fan of Sketchup for creating woodworking models, then the next obvious step is to use Sketchup to help you create cutlists and layouts. Sketchup plugin Cutlist 4.1 does just that. CutList 4.1 sketchup plugin helps you determine how much of each material you need to produce your design, taking into account nominal sized lumber with allowances for finishing to final size. Then it goes one further and lays out all of the pieces on boards or sheet good sizes of your choosing. Then you should be all set to head for the lumber yard to get all of the materials that you will need with no return trips.

CutList 4.1 was beta tested by our very own Lumberjocks and is now ready for download.

It's being released exclusively to Lumberjocks first. You can download v4.1.10 here . This is a completely free plugin. This plugin has been around since about 2005 but continues to be maintained and enhanced. It's got the look and feel of old Woodsmith magazine cutlists and layouts. A very early version v3.3 was reviewed in the Fine Woodworking blog 'Design.Click.Build.' by Dave Richards and a later follow up.

Note that there is now a forum on Lumberjocks for further discussion.

Cutlist 4.1 has been tested with both Skletchup 7, Sketchup 8, SU2013 and SU2014 on both Macs and on Windows PCs.

Installing. There are now 3 ways to install this.

Method 1 (easiest) Get and install it from Sketchup Extension Warehouse

• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Extension Warehouse
• Search for and select 'CutList'
• click on install ( big red bar on top right)

Method 2 (easy) Download and install it using the Sketchup extension installer
A relative foolproof way to install is now available with the latest versions (from v4.1.6 and up).

• Download it from link above
• Start up Sketchup
• from Sketchup choose: Window->Preferences
• click on 'Extensions'
• click on 'Install Extension', hen navigate to and select the .rbz file you just downloaded

Method 3 (if all else fails) This is a two step process and more error prone

• Click on the link above. This will download a zip file from http://code.google.com/p/cutlist/

• The file is a .rbz (a zipped ruby source) file. Extract the entire contents into your sketchup plugin directory not just the startup ruby script (srcutlist.rb). There is also a folder called srcutlistui which contains everything else it needs to work properly. The exact locations of the directories required for Sketchup plugins for Windows or Mac are found documented further down in the blog.

Running on a Mac. This is functional. Only the html output window for the layout does not work because of issues with the Safari browser, however, there is a workaround using the SVG export.

Someone in the forum asked a great question which I will repeat here:

Q. What is the point of the cutting diagram?

A. Why indeed would you want a cutting diagram? There are a few reasons:

1. Regardless of whether or not you have a cutting diagram, eventually you are going to have to cut some wood to get a project built. How many boards do you need to buy? If you go by the board feet measured ( or calculated by something like the cutlist plugin) you're going to find that it falls short. Why? because when you to to cut the pieces out of the board, you'll find that you will inevitable have waste. By having the cutting diagram, you can see how much waste there is going to be and you know how much to get when you to the lumber yard.
2. You've got a lot of parts to cut and you want your parts to be as accurate as possible before you even do anything else to the pieces. Ideally you want one setup for each size of part, so that you can cut each of the parts which are the same size at the same time. The cutting diagram lets you visualize how parts may be laid out to minimize on the cuts and the number of setups.
3. Ok, you've decided to build your project out of sustainably harvested plantation teak. It's selling for $50/square foot(!) for 3/4". You might be interested in using those $200 boards as efficiently as possible. A cutting diagram may also be used to minimize waste. Even if you have waste if you could have a larger part left over which you could reuse for another project vs having a lot of offcuts, you've saved yourself some money and you are using the planet's resources efficiently and responsibly.

So, to sum up, it gives you more accurate project requirements, it minimizes setup time and shop time spent cutting the boards while increasing accuracy and finally it helps to use the resources as efficiently as possible.

Finally here are some screen shots in case you still can't quite figure out what it does or why you would want it or can't imagine what it looks like.

Starting up cutlist. Highlight your project and select CutList from the plugin menu. Make sure all of the parts in your project are named and are either a component or a group. ( Nested components or groups are handled ok as well)

The screen that comes up allows you to select your cutlist options from the type of output you want, what you want to have included in your parts list, which parts are solid wood parts, which are sheet goods parts and which are hardware

and the next page allows you to select the layout options. There is a general options section, a tab for board options and a tab for sheet options.

Here is a sample of cutlist output. This is the cutting list in html format. This page can be printed.

If you scroll down, then there is a summary of the board feet and the materials and sheet parts and hardware are broken down to their own lists with their own summaries

If you selected the layout output, then another window will open and place all of the selected parts on boards of your choosing in a layout which minimizes waste.

Sheet parts layout is placed on the sheet sizes you specified.

There's lots more. There is built in help on each option. Just click on the blue ? next to the option.

Feel free to pass along any comments, questions, enhancement requests or bug reports. I'm committed to maintaining the plugin and make it as useful as possible.

Steve,
I'm using your nice tool and have some issues for which I need some comments.
One has been already adressed to you by DaveR concerning the volume calculation accuracy in metrics.
Now I've another question concerning CSV output. I did the test with your last version 4.05 but it was the same in the previous one.
If you check both "Web Page" and "CSV format" output you have a problem with width values in the CSV format. All are 0mm. and total lenght is also not correct. See my screen shots for the same list of components.

http://s525.photobucket.com/albums/cc335/jft68/?action=view&current=CutList_Anomalie_CSV.jpg
http://s525.photobucket.com/albums/cc335/jft68/?action=view&current=CutList_Anomalie_CSV_1.jpg