cberg

Sorry to sound obtuse, but I only see two commands. 1. AEC Menu - Fit Walls to Objects. 2. Roof Face - Wall Clipping Tools. -If I fit "Walls to Objects", I can only fit the left, right, or center of the wall to the bottom edge of the Roof Face. One cannot fit the wall to a specific component within the roof. -From there one needs to cut a section and manually offset each wall component to line up (as needed) to the associated roof component. -The roof datum doesn't seem to impact much of anything, beyond moving the roof face up or down. (It doesn't impact where the wall fits to the roof) -If the roof moves vertically, or changes pitches, one must repeat this process over again. (The two elements aren't linked) Is that correct, or am I missing some critical functionality of roof - wall association? Best C

That was my question. Thanks so much for your help! It sounds like the process of clipping walls to a roof is not automated, even if the walls are associated with a roof. In other words, roof components can be clipped by the wall. But wall components aren't able to be clipped by a roof/roof face. The code to do this exists in VW, but it hasn't been implemented consistently through the various architect tools. "Best in BIM" software must allow dynamic, interactive connections between roof components and wall components. Fiddling as much as we do in VW wastes so much time.

I understand how to associate walls with Roof and Roof faces. I also understand that there is a component setting within the roof face that allows you to adjust the roof edge component to a portion of the wall component. Inside face, outside face, etc... Clip walls, clipped by walls... But I don't understand how to trim the wall to the associated roof / roof faces. Typically I would fit walls to objects, and offset wall components. It sounds like I am missing a setting somewhere if the walls can join up with a specific roof component. VW help implies that you can do it. roof test.vwx

This is such a confusing topic. I have never been able to successfully clip walls to a roof face in VW2023 or 2024. 😵‍💫 I typically work with roof faces. Building them from shapes. Is there a good video describing how it should work. VW help is not super helpful.

This problem was not fixed in 2024 Update 2.

Apologies for the rather clunky screen recording, but here is a quick video documenting the issue. Screen Recording 2023-10-24 at 9.39.48 AM.mov

I am still talking with Tech Support Premium to get this submitted as a bug.

@Tom W. There is no reason why it shouldn't be a menu command that can get added to the right click object context menu. It's a great idea. Your workaround at least helps me ferret through the Resources Manager. @line-weight I have to go back to that discussion thread you referenced when I am not in the middle of a deadline and spend more time with that list. I probably will learn something new. Thanks again all!

I don't think I would have ever figured that out. I was vaguely aware that those options existed. But in my mind, it was just another random dialogue box somewhere, which up until this point, I didn't have much occasion to tinker with. At the very least you should be able to access the plug in style options when you edit the railing object style.

Thank you.

I created a custom railing style in VW2024. For some reason, I can't assign a class to the railing when it is styled. The class is grayed out in the object info palette. Am I missing a dialogue box or instance setting somewhere? Railings.vwx

There appears to be a bug in VW2024. You cant reshape floors with the Reshape Tool without double clicking into the shape. If you happen to reshape the floor the selection handle moves but the floor does not. There are also snapping issues, that I need to explore. May be problems on my end. If you do try to reshape, the floor gets corrupted and cannot be selected. VW 2023 does not work this way. I will submit this as a bug. Reshape floor problem.vwx

Moving/Adding curtain wall mullions is not super fun, but it's workable in a cludgy VW way. You may want to use the move/copy commands, but that doesn't work. Work in Orthogonal view, elevation. Set the working plane to the face of a mullion. Set guides. Even divide is your friend, especially with a rectangle (because you now have vertical lines to snap to). Double click to select the mullion, make sure the select frame mode is selected. Snap to the mullion center. Move by left clicking on the mullion, hold down and drag. Copy by left clicking on the mullion, drag, and holding down the option key. You can also move by a set distance by tabbing and manually entering the required units. It's harder to copy by a set distance, but you can. Select mullion. Move, tab, enter distance, and hold down the option key. As for mullions randomly appearing, usually that happens when you do something to reset the curtainwall, and the grid settings reintroduce themselves. I haven't figured out how to entirely eliminate this. Sadly there is no even divide mullion setting. C

Thank you for your response @Nikolay Zhelyazkov. It would still be great to implement this feature. (Tagging objects in symbols from outside the symbol).

Just curious. Does VW2024 add this functionality? Playing around with it, and I do not see any changes...

@Ed Wachter Unfortunately the Connect Combine tool will only join one roof to the other. It will not create a gable recess in the other. At least as far as I've been able to determine.

There is no way to do it without making two walls. Stacked/Varying sectional wall components have been requested for at least 10-15 years, and for whatever reason, the technical challenges associated with this much-needed feature have proven too difficult/costly or generally not deemed important enough to implement. Perhaps it is in a future development section of the roadmap. Even though it is probably the most frequently used VW tool, the Wall Tool is a much-neglected tool that truly needs some love. The only way you can do this is to make two stacked walls. Duplicate the walls in question. Offset the top of the low wall by the elevation of the shift. Offset the bottom of the high wall by the same shift elevation. Then, switch out the wall type. Class them by Wall High and Wall Low for plan visibility purposes. Openings that span the break will have to be duplicated. If it sounds painful. It is. And we've all been there. Best of luck.

@zoomer I always thought I learned that tip from you. As long as layers are set to Show Snap Modify others, and you group into the desired active layer, then yes the grouped objects can change layers without moving in the Z axis.

Grouping is the only way you can change an object’s layer without messing up its Z height. (Another VW quirk/hack/feature) While another step, right click the objects before grouping and activate class. This at least makes the process a little less disruptive to your workflow.

There is some way to probably join the roofs but that never works so well for me. I would copy the two sets of roofs off to the side by a set distance. Then take the roofs and subtract the solids. This gets you the intersected geometry. Using the 3d tool extract the shape of the new roof (minus the gable end). Then you can double click the roof and clip the rectangle to the new surface. Running to a meeting. Hope this helps. Roof Study.vwx

Thank you @markdd. I was having snapping problems, and couldn't for the life in me figure out what the heck I had hit to make my lines only snap to 30 and 45 degree angles.

While I appreciate the perspective of the folks above, I also think that the some of the whiz-bang features are pretty useful. For example, Graphic Legends have really helped my project documentation. I use them to generate partition types, door types, and window schedules. Sure, there were some bugs along the way. But the bugs get worked out. It often takes a few Service Packs or releases. There are also features that don't seem interesting at launch but become much more valuable over time. Data Visualization comes to mind in that regard. I use the tool regularly, but it took me four or five years to really figure out how it might benefit me. With some tools, the present-day implementation remains a bit kludgy. (The Space and Stair Tools certainly need some help still.) That said, I prefer working with software that innovates. Using a tool that gets stuck in time has it's own set of problems, because eventually that software stops being useful (Sketchup comes to mind in that regard...) VW is unusual in that it markets itself as interdisciplinary software. This has drawbacks and benefits. The BIM tools are not as robust as ArchiCAD or Revit. However, the software does many things, albeit much more generally. The 3D Modeling, Visualization, lighting, and landscape work together in one package, but certainly not all perfectly. The quirks and flexibility allow me to use the software to explore ideas, solve problems, and communicate these solutions to others.

I developed a data visualization that shows the callouts (in blue) that are associated with a database. It is useful to help me see which notes are "live". Is there any way I can further refine this set to visualize which specific database is being referenced? I know I can use the Reconcile Notes command, but the interface is clunky (at best).

The "Energy Area" parameter does indeed allow adjustment of unit precision. What exactly does that measure? "Room Dimensions" does not, which is also one I would also like to adjust.

@BartHays In my file/setup, the Units and Precision settings are grayed out, so I never thought they could be changed. I wonder how the data tags are differently configured.