HELP!...Google SketchUp needs a Python API

[greg]

I for one would love to see a Python scripting interface
for Sketchup. I carried out a fairly major Sketchup
scripting exercise recently [1], and while it was fun,
I would have enjoyed it more if I'd been able to use
Python.

However, I think it's going to be a fairly tall order
to persuade the Sketchup developers to do this, since as
has been pointed out, it would cost them considerable
time and effort, and they would need to perceive a
correspondingly large benefit. I suspect it would take
either (a) a *lot* of people asking for it, or (b)
someone who is already enthusiastic about Python
joining the development team.

I wouldn't count on Guido being able to help much,
since he probably has little to no contact with or
influence over the people responsible for setting the
direction of Sketchup development. Google is a big
company, and AtLast is a subsidiary, not a part of
Google itself.

However, it might be possible for us to help ourselves
if we could embed a Python interpreter into a Ruby
extension module, and create our own Python wrappers
around the Ruby API. I'd be happy to discuss this idea
if you'd like to take it further.

[1] http://www.cosc.canterbury.ac.nz/greg.ewing/marathup/index.html

-- 
Greg