[Combined Poly(gon)(line) tool]

Yes, I seem to remember having a fill problem in the past.

I still think that these two tools should be combined.

[How do I save Vectorworks Preferences?]

Yes. Found it.

Thanks!

[Some newbie frustrations on vectorworks]

#2 - There is a "Fit to Objects" magnifying symbol at the top of your page. This will put everything into the window.

[Wall Drawing Woes...]

Thank you Mike,

With your guidance I have found it in the help file.

I don't have the button, however. I'll call tech support and find out what may have happened to it.

[Wall Drawing Woes...]

I very simply want to draw some walls and then modify them without every segment coming apart. Why are the resultant wall edges disconnected? I can't find the "Connected Wall Mode" in the list of 2D and 3D selection options. I can't even find it doing a search in the help file, the forums, or Google. I did see it once in the help file, but not by doing a search using its own name.

Help! This should be very easy.

[Constrain parallel lines?]

I reset the Vectorworks Preferences and destroyed many hours of settings. Still, the "connected wall mode" choice is nowhere to be seen. "Connected Wall Mode" can't even be found in the help file through direct search. I found it once using some other search, but I can't remember what it was.

I'm sure drawing simple constrained parallel lines is something Vectorworks should be able to do easily.

[How do I save Vectorworks Preferences?]

Is there a way to back up the Vectorworks Preferences and then restore them later?

[Constrain parallel lines?]

Yes, the "Landmark" Workspace is active. All the other choices are in the bar where they should be except for the "connected wall mode". The "Standard" Workspace doesn't show it either. I wonder where it went?

[Combined Poly(gon)(line) tool]

"Here today Polygon tomorrow" Ha! That's funny!

Yes, I'm aware that the paint-bucket fill is within the Polygon tool, but, again, that could probably be combined with the Polyline tool.

[Combined Poly(gon)(line) tool]

Why are there Polygons? It seems to me that the Polyline tool does everything that the Polygon tool does plus a whole lot more.

With polylines I can apply visibility to any edge, but with polygons I can only close the last edge of an "open" form.

With polylines I can draw a variety of nodes and curved connectors, but with polygons I can only draw straight lines.

My thought is that they should be combined into one tool.

Curious.

[Constrain parallel lines?]

I don't see the "connected wall mode" choice when I choose either the 2D or 3D selection tools. The help file does show the button and states that this is a tool for Architect, Landmark, and Spotlight, but it does not show up for me. Is this a setting?

[Closing a poly line]

Ah! I see now what is happening.

My original desire was to close a previously "open" polyline or polygon to create a closed object. I see now after your advice to work with the visibility of the edges or to close the polygon that these objects were never "open" to begin with.

For example: Let's say I drew an "open" polygon with 3 segments. Later, I tried to create a triangle out of this line by dragging one end of the line to the other end and trying to get them to stick together by checking the "Closed" checkbox. Now I realize that this segment was already a closed 4 sided figure with one line hidden. That's why I was discovering the extra segment under the "connected" vertices when I tried to move them again later. They were not connectable.

The same is true for polylines, except the visibility of the line segments can be controlled individually.

Thanks to you both! I couldn't have done it without you!

[Constrain parallel lines?]

Thank you, Peter,

I experimented with the wall tool, but it also seems to divide up into separate pieces. I can't just grab a vertex and drag it around without leaving behind the other edge. I think I'm really missing something here. Is there a setting a may have to change?

[Closing a poly line]

Thanks for pointing out that little "Closed" checkbox. I hadn't seen it before.

A couple of things:

1. There is no "Closed" checkbox for polylines, only polygons. Is there a way to close a polyline?

2. Regarding polygons, even if I make the effort to snap the vertices of the two ends exactly together using the above method, closing still adds another segment, although it is of length 0. When I move that vertex later, I find that the two segments that I wanted attached are not and that there is indeed an additional segment.

I agree that it is more expedient to close these polys while they are being drawn, but that's not always possible.

Any thoughts on this?

[Drawing a basic house outline?]

Thank you, Grant,

I will work with the "walk" method soon.

Regarding the your first method of using rectangles and polylines, what does adding a "surface" entail?

Thanks again,

[Constrain parallel lines?]

I want to draw a 2D wall perimeter such that it is one single object and when I modify the shape it will retain the parallel nature and distance of the inner and outer lines as well as have the vertex connections stay intact.

When I use the "Double-Line Polygon" tool in "Create Lines" mode to draw a closed shape I end up with a collection of line segments that are not related to each other. This makes editing what I would consider one object very problematic.

I have a similar problem when using the same tool in "Create Polygons" mode. It does create a single object, but the inner and outer lines are not constrained by my original distance setting and therefore editing the positions of the verticies is not elegant either. Also, the end points, when connected, don't close the object, but rather just touch and display kind of a cut line.

What is the real way to do this?

[Drawing a basic house outline?]

With the idea of having a sketch and measurements of the perimeter of an actual house in hand, I would like to discuss some methods of drawing the house footprint.

The way I did it in TurboCAD was to draw construction lines, which were easy to place and orient in relation to each other, and then snap a poly line to the various intersections. For 2D it seemed to be a fairly quick operation.

This is not repeatable in Vectorworks with it's different drawing philosophy. I have tried drawing lines and turning them into guides but that has turned out to be labor intensive. I'm sure there are much more interesting methods of which I am not aware and I'm very interested to hear what Vectorworks users are doing to accomplish this.

[Closing a poly line]

How do I join the ends of a previously drawn poly line so that it becomes a shape rather than just overlapping points?

[Sheet Layer help]

Let me try to be a little clearer. For example:

"Edit Sheet Layers"

- Origin x = -5.5, y = -4.25 (origin should be at the upper left corner of a 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper in a landscape position)

"Page Setup"

- "Pages" 1 for horizontal and vertical

- "One Printer Page" for printable area

- The width and height of the printable area is correct for my printer

Now an interesting thing happens. The origin is not at the upper left corner of the sheet. It is shifted about .04" x and .004" y, and consequently the actual print is not acceptable.

However if I go into my printer settings and set the print area to borderless then the resulting origin is precisely where it should be on the sheet layer and the print looks good.

Why is there a printable area block that has so much power? I wouldn't mind a graphic representation of the area, but it seems to affect things it shouldn't. Am I missing some powerful uses for this?

Thanks

[Sheet Layer help]

I'm trying to understand the complexities of the sheet layers.

What I would like to do is:

- 1. Choose the paper size and orientation.

- 2. Snap the coordinate system to the paper, directly or otherwise.

- 3. Draw the sheet layer graphics onto the paper outline.

- 4. Add viewports.

- 5. Print.

It does not seem to work quite like this. I cannot align the coordinate system with the paper except by zooming in and eyeballing it. Also, the Vectorworks print area outputs as the actual paper edge shifting my sheet graphics into the non printable area and shifting everything out of alignment.

Am I missing the simple philosophy of this?

[Zooming Challenges]

Anyone have any thoughts on this?

[Zooming Challenges]

I would like to discover if there is a way to accomplish the following zooming functions:

1. When zooming with the mouse wheel in TurboCAD, the cursor and the area centered below the cursor immediately jump to the center of the drawing. A very useful way to zoom. Vectorworks zooms directly below the cursor without centering the cursor in the drawing area and therefore the object then has to be positioned separately.

2. In TurboCAD there is a "zoom factor" setting which sets the amount of image size change when zooming.

Thanks,

Mark

[How can I move the Vectorworks Preferences file from Mac to PC?]

I would have thought this was a relatively easy process.

My answer was to reattach the old computer, open up the preferences file, and write by hand all of my settings, reattach the new computer, and manually change the preferences settings.

Mark

[How can I move the Vectorworks Preferences file from Mac to PC?]

I recently began using a Windows Vista machine again after experimenting with a Mac for about 5 months. I spent a lot of time setting up my user interface in the Preferences section on the Mac. Is there a way I can copy the Preferences file from one platform to the other? If so, where is that file stored on the Mac and where should I put it in Vista?

Thanks!

[Can't import my plant database into VW plant database]

I must be missing something obvious. I have converted my database into an Excel speadsheet (.xls) and then from the VW Plants Database chose File:Import Records:File. In the finder window the Excel file is grayed out and non-selectable. Actually, I can't find a single file of any type that is selectable, even the VW database text files. Any suggestions?

Thanks