Hi everyone, I'm Troy

Introductions
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My name is Troy McConaghy and I’m a software developer from Canada.

I was curious about making plugins for Adobe products, so I read about that. I learned about UXP and it seemed like a nice modern way to develop plugins. That led me to Adobe XD, the first Adobe product to support UXP. I decided to learn about UXP by creating plugins for Adobe XD.

While creating my first non-tutorial plugin, I ran into some issues, so I did some Googling and I found my way here. These forums have already resolved problems for me several times. Thanks!

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Hi @TroyMc.

Welcome to the forums :wave::slightly_smiling_face:.

Feel free to ask any questions, we’re always happy to help.

Happy coding,
Pablo

PS: Good catch with the issue in the xd-dialog-helper. I hope I’ll get to fixing it within the next week :wink:

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If anyone’s curious about the xd-dialog-helper issue that @pklaschka was referring to, see:

xd-dialog-helper has helped me quickly create modal dialogs for my XD plugin. It’s open source, with an MIT license!

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@TroyMc

Looking at your website, it seems we both have something (unusual for XD plugin developers) in common: A background in aerospace engineering (and related fields) :wink:.

I am currently studying space- and aerospace computer science (or, depending on who you ask, also called “Aerospace Information Technology”) at the University Würzburg (Germany).

May I (just out of curiosity) ask how you got to developing plugins for XD (or curiosity about plugins for Adobe products, in general)?

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I thought X.D. was short for Aerospace Engineering.

Just kidding!

On a more serious note, I’m interested in the design of spacecraft trajectories (my PhD research), the design of electrical circuits (thanks to my brother), and more generally, the optimal design of systems subject to constraints. If the system being designed can be simulated or predicted accurately, then the design problem can be formulated as a mathematical optimization problem, which can be solved using numerical optimization software.

You might call that design-by-optimization. It’s one way to do procedural or generative design. I’m really interested in that approach to design, i.e. where there’s a tight feedback between mathematical modelling, computer simulation, computer algorithms, and human intuition.

As you know, Adobe has many software products for doing computer-assisted design, and many of those products take that same approach. I’m excited to write plugins for Adobe products because I don’t have to rewrite all the existing functionality (written by Adobe and third parties); I can focus on writing new functionality, which is much more fun :smiley:

Why Adobe XD? UXP is the new way to write plugins for Adobe products, going forward, and XD is the first Adobe product to support UXP.

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