jan15

He did, earlier in the thread. But the problem is that other people keep giving their opinions. They should only be asking him questions. For an example of the proper format, see Petri on BIM - the self-interview sessions.

Same here, bc. Maybe they're waiting to see how many people respond before setting the price.

Have you opened them in a DWG viewer to make sure it's not a problem with the files themselves?

Layers can do most of what Classes can do, plus some other things that Classes can't do, chiefly the spatial distinctions described above, and scale, and creating drawing sheets and viewports. Both have the on/off/grey/etc. options. Both can be used in both 2D and 3D work. But you don't have to use both, or either one really. They're available for your convenience. In 2D work, Layers are like layers of drafting film, and they can't overlap. Everything on a higher layer is above and can hide anything on a lower layer. In 3D work, a tall object on one floor can extend through the base plane of the floor above. The layers are only floor levels if you set them up that way. Most people use Classes for the same things in 3D as in 2D, like distinguishing between plumbing fixtures, doors, furniture, etc. or distinguishing objects that you want to print all the same color, lineweight, etc. You can assign those attributes by Class but not by Layer. Objects in a Group or Symbol don't have to be all in the same Class, but they're all on the same Layer that the container object is on.

The Get-a-Quote link leads to a form that asks for your serial number, at gm-link.com. Maybe a piracy scam?

Time to get serious for a moment. Some people have complained about the prolonged kidding, pointing out that it's not funny after a while. That's true, but I think they miss the point of the Petri humor thread. It's not primarily intended to provide humor. It's primarily a thread dedicated to Petri, whether the tone is humorous or not. Its main purpose is to humor Petri ? to give him the attention he needs, and to provide an outlet for his insults and rages, and for his tedious whining and attempts to wax philosophical. If we don't provide that outlet here, he finds it in the serious discussion threads. You should compare it against that known pattern, when evaluating the humor thread. Another possible solution, which has been touched on several times, is to eliminate the humor thread and simply ask everyone to ignore Petri's insults. I would prefer that solution, and I actively campaigned for it for a long time; but it hasn't worked. People can't help becoming incensed when they're called 'profoundly ignorant.' They try to defend themselves, sometimes sinking to the same crude level once they discover that a rational argument has no effect on Petri. The resulting brawl disrupts the serious discussion. And consider his attacks on newcomers, who can't know that there's a special protocol. If we maintain the humor thread, that hazard can be contained in a place where it does less harm. There's no serious discussion to disrupt here. It's all about Petri. And forum users can easily avoid it if they want, confident that they're not missing out on anything. Those who do check in, hoping for a laugh but finding only old material, shouldn't complain. They should be contributing. I'm not paid to come up with fresh humor every day. Contributions don't have to be humorous. I think flattering material about him would work just as well, as I suggested early on in the original humor thread. If you know of any, consider that option. Or discuss some of his issues in a non-comical way. As evidence that the humor thread works, note that Petri has made only civil posts in the serious discussion threads ever since this venue started. Also, a number of people who formerly dreaded Petri's vicious attacks have learned to laugh at them; so the humor thread appears to offer a kind of inoculation against the threat to the rest of the board.

That's very good, Petri. Now you're working from your strengths. Keep developing the class-action insult. And that mental impairment slur is much more subtle and refined this time, a big step up from the old "you're a stupido" approach. I think you still need a little work on controlling the Dear me's and some of the other Marlene Dietrich touches, but that's o.k., you'll get there! I have to talk to the grown-ups for a while, so you go outside and play, or go up and watch your Beavis and Butt-head tapes.

It sounds like you have a glitch, since you're getting it to work on the other machine. The usual suggestions for that: 1. close VW and restart 2. shut down system and re-boot 3. remove and re-install VW

After you save a new workspace, it appears in the pull-down list of available workspaces. Choose it instead of Classic, and you'll see the changes you made. Are you using RenderWorks? It's an add-on, not part of VectorWorks.

Petri, you're still not getting the hang of this list-posting technique. You did pretty well this time with the mock-polite introduction, but the list itself needs a lot of work. You can't just post a bunch of URL's with no content or even links, and then a withering "Oh Dear." You're not Marlene Dietrich. And why should you even try to use lists? Why imitate me? You're so much better when you stick to your own techniques. Can't you think of an ethnic slur about New Jersey, for God's sake? But if you insist on trying your hand at lists, here are some pointers: You have to include actual text quoted from each post, not just its address, and you have to select and edit, to develop a theme. The selections should all have something in common, and often there's a humorous angle. I'll give you another example:

Instead of 'Edit the current workspace' select 'Edit a copy of the current workspace.'

bc, you're right. I've got to do something about this addiction before it destroys me. I'll just have to resist the temptation to read or reply to anything from Petri, even that list where he implies that I've made a lot of posts ridiculing him. What an insult! No. Mustn't do that. I mustn't even mention him or respond in any way. Must resist.... mustn't react.... must think only pure thoughts.... Serenity, now.... Serenity, now.

It's very kind of you to ask. My personal favorite was the explication of quote #27 on the mid-term exam. It's nothing like your own wit, of course, but since you've shown interest I'll post it again for you: Answer: Petri - #74133 - 02/09/07 10:30 AM This quote is the centerpiece of Petri's oeuvre. It's his manifesto -- a concise yet all-revealing verbal portrait of his struggle and his passion. It captures, in a single flawless paragraph, everything he was trying to tell us in all his other posts. He came close to the same level of self-revelation yesterday with: But although it is simpler than #27, it only gives us Petri triumphant. It doesn't immerse us in his kampf -- his daily suffering through long years of being forced to breathe the same fetid air as the inferior races, and the simultaneous loathing and pity he feels for them. As a contrast, let's look at an example of Ignatius writing about his greatness and the problems it causes for people who behold it:

Caution: Petrisphere area. Hazardous emissions present. Do not poke at the Petrisphere. Poking is futile and potentially addictive. Before posting a reply, please read warning in technical bulletin #84764.

You could Select All, Copy everything to the clipboard, and then Paste-in-Place into an empty file that has all the new class attribute settings. 3 clicks.

And is there some way that, whenever Petri makes a post, the forum server could automatically attach a disclaimer to it? Something like this:

Right. If a regular hatch is an option, you can control how heavy the dots are. Higher-level features tend to give you more power but less control.

Brilliant, Raymond! I laughed so hard I fell out of my chair. It's definitely the last word in the sense that noone can top it, though the birthday boy is sure to nip at its ankles. And it raises a serious issue for the Petrisphere-Poking community. Trying to put your third paragraph into layman's terms, we have to face the fact that no matter how much attention we give him, it's never going to be enough. It's like playing with a child -- the child never thinks it's time to quit and go to bed. But on the other hand, if we don't give him at least a little attention every day, he'll seek it in the only way he knows, by misbehaving. God knows his serious comments aren't worth responding to, but people do react to his insults, turning the discussion into a brawl. This humor thread provides a pressure relief valve for all that built-up hot air, but we can't just run it for a little while and then stop. It has to be maintained, or else he'll start acting up in other threads. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. However, if all forum users were properly trained in the physics of Petrispheres, then perhaps noone would try to throw anything into the Petrisphere, and consequently its emissions wouldn't disrupt a discussion. Noone would be sucked into that vortex of anger and petty insults. The most promising solution to the emerging Petrisphere-Poking craze, therefore, is to make your post a permanent part of the read-only Announcements list, and to require all new users to study it. Katie?

The 'others' in 'show/snap/modify others' means only other layers at the same scale. Long before there were viewports in VectorWorks, we had some of the functionality of viewports in the layer scale feature. All of model space is seen through a kind of giant automatic viewport into the geometry, its zoom factor being determined by the active layer's scale. Changing to a layer with a different scale is like automatically changing to a different giant viewport that occupies the same 2D space. So geometry at other scales can be displayed at the same time, but not manipulated, because it's in a different viewport.

Different scale?

Love at first sight. The face in the mirror.

An excellent point. The truly gifted man is in awe of his gift, and of the giver. The blowhard has no choice but to pump himself up, since his work condemns him. Petri, still in his drunken stupor, confused Leonardo with the Borgias.

Do you know you can change the line thickness of the lines used in a hatch pattern by going into the 'Edit Hatch' window? Each 'Level' within the hatch pattern gets its own line weight assignment. And for a stipple hatch, I would always set the 'Units' to 'Page' rather than 'World' (in the 'Edit Hatch' window), so that it prints right at any scale. I keep two different stippling hatches, one coarse and one fine.

Yes, the name Convert-to-Group is a little hard to connect with what it does. It sounds like it would do what the Group command does. It used to be called Symbol-to-Group, which I thought was easier to figure out. I guess Convert-Symbol-to-Group would be too long.

If you only want those loci as snap points for something else, there are sometimes quicker ways to do it, skipping that step. For example, if the line is horizontal, and what you really want are lines perpendicular to it at 12 equal intervals, you could draw one vertical line at its left end, then group that while it's still selected, then enter the group, then offset the line to the right 12 times (or array it). The offset distance doesn't matter -- you can use 1", or whatever it's already set on. Then exit the group, grab the right center handle of the group and drag it to the right end of the horizontal line.