2: Getting Started

If all goes well during installation you will notice upon starting Grasshopper (GH) that there is a new category called Karamba3D on the component panel. It consists of roughly ten subsections (see fig. 2.1). In case you do not see any icons select “Draw All Components” in Grasshopper's “View”-menu.

The installation can be tested by placing a Karamba3D “License”-component on the canvas: it should not issue a warning or error. If not, see section 4.1.3 for how to solve that issue.

On Apple machines make sure to have Microsoft's .NET Framework 4.0 installed in case of Rhino5 and version 4.5 in case of Rhino6.

Fig. 2.1: Category “Karamba3D” on the component panel

These are the subsections which show up in the Karamba3D category:

Tab	Function
License	The “License”-component contained in here delivers information regarding the current type of license and how to get a pro-version of Karamba3D
Params	containers for Karamba3D objects like beams, loads, models, . .
1.Model	lets you create a basic models with default settings for cross sections and materials
2.Load	components for defining external forces
3.Cross Section	contains components to create and select cross sections for elements.
4.Materials	components for the definition and selection of materials
5.Algorithms	components for analyzing the structural model
6.Results	for the retrieval of calculation results
7.Export🔷	for exporting Karamba3D-models to RStab or Robot via DStV-file
8.Utilities	contains some extra geometric functionality that makes it easier to handle and optimize models

The colors of Karamba3D’s icons have a special meaning: black or white designates the entity or entities on which a component acts. Products of components get referenced by a blue symbol.