acepernich

Keep the wall a wall. Make the niche (doesn't go all the way through the wall, right?) a symbol. Edit the symbol's insertion options to: Insert In Walls: On Edge Wall Breaks: Half Break This will break the wall surface only on the side the symbol is inserted on, and keep the walls 'wallness"

Yes, Vectorworks allows you to use mathematical expressions in it's input boxes. Say, if you want to shorten a line by the width of 3 items, you can just enter the formula w/o figuring out the final lenght first. Example 25'6"-(3*3'4").

I suppose it all depends on the type of work you do. I do mostly school work (US) and almost all of our double doors have a removable mullion for latching rim exit devices (panic bars). Almost never use surface bolts (accessibility & maintenence issues). Being able to set a default would be nice, tho'.

And conversely, command-[ or Ctrl-{ for entering them.

Add loci to the door swmbol at the points where you want the wall to break. If you don't specify a wall break location/width with loci, the symbols bounding box is used to break the wall.

Try running a find on 'Sketchup' w/ Find under the File Menu.

To Tom K and almanac. Tom, sorry for the stridency. You didn't get under my skin, I was just having a bad day. My boss just DID say we are switching from VW to AC. [ 02-16-2006, 01:13 PM: Message edited by: Antone Cepernich ]

This is just a personal bug with me, but here goes anyway. It is not true that in AutoCAD you draw everything at 'real' size, or you would need a monitor a couple of hundred feet square. You draw everything at the scale of 1 drawing unit to 1 foot (or whatever), with the drawing zoomed in or out to fit what you need to work on on the monitor. You enter 3 feet to draw a 3 foot item. In Vectorworks, you still enter 3 feet to draw a 3 foot item, and zoom in or out to fit the monitor, no matter what scale layer you are drawing on. You don't draw/dimension any differently. The difference is that with a layer scale set, you can see what your drawing will look like printed, with line weights visible and text sized properly, and you can include the appropriate amount of visual info. If you draw a detail knowing you want it at 3" = 1'-0', you can tailor your drawing to that. With AutoCAD, and every thing drawn on the same scale layer, the act of drawing something is more disconnected from what that something will look like printed. So, everyone is drawing to some scale, and everyone is entering an input dimension to represent the same dimension in the 'real world', but with scaled layers you are drawing with the final printed output in mind from the beginning. End of rant. Sorry for your time.

Ah, but the question remains: Has anyone gotten an Intel Mac and tried VW on it yet? Would like to know how VW runs under Rosette, if at all. AC

Well. here's what I've got. My Tekton font (type 1) was living in OS9 system folder. There it was available to OS10.3.9 and/or Vectorworks 11.5.1 for general text (would display and print), but would have another font substituted for it in worksheets (printed output only - it would display OK), even though it appeared in the worksheet's Format Text menu. (Weird huh?) I installed Tekton in OS10 via Fontbook, and now it print fine. Thanks all for your suggestions.

This has probably been discussed already, but... VW 11.5.1, MacOS 10.3.9. I use the tekton font in a worksheet - it displays OK on screen, but prints as Geneva. Haven't tried others yet. Can I get my font of choice to print?

Just upgraded to 11.5.1. Behavior still the same.

Maybe it should, but it doesn't . New Design layer. Draw some objects. Select and group them. Enter the group and select one of the objects. Layer pulldown in OIP is grayed out - even in top/plan view. Same even if I draw just 1 object and group it.

I am now using v. 11.5, coming from v. 8.5. In 8.5, on entering a group and selecting an object, the object's class and layer would show in the OIP, and could be changed by selecting from the pull downs. In 11.5, apparently, on entering a group and selecting an object, the layer pull-down is greyed out, so the object's layer cannot be changed without cutting the object out and pasting it into the new layer, or ungrouping everything first. Is this really the correct current behavior? If so, is there any way to get the old behavior back? AC [ 08-12-2005, 05:20 PM: Message edited by: Antone Cepernich ]

Has anyone tried using Spotlight for searches of text in VW drawings?

I prefer the 'Arc by Tangent' for note leaders. You can start the arc out horiz. from the note, then bend it down to the referenced item. The horiz. start from all the notes keeps the dwg. looking neat. If you need a bendy line, draw the first line, then start another at, and tangent to, the first. OT: A quicky way to draw arrow heads at a line of objects, like WC.s, is to draw 1 long arc from the note that crosses all of the items, add an arrow head at the end farthest from the note, then split the arc @ each of the items. Each arc segment will have an arrow head pointing the same way.

Can't drag the columns on my setup (Mac OSX 10.3, VW 11.5). There is no bar between the columns, and clicking as close as possible only selects one of the columns.The 'Type' column in the Resource Browser appears to be a fixed width, while the 'Name' column resizes as the Resource Browser window is resized.

Is there any way to minimize or eliminate the 'Type" column in the Resources list? Since icons for the resource types are shown, the name of the resource type is redundant, and takes up space that could be used for showing the resource's name. AC

Something about Chris D's reply hit wrong... There are 2 types of hatches: Associative Hatches, which are applied from the Attributes palette, and plain old Hatches, found on the Tool menu. The associative hatches are like a fill - they are related to some internal Vectorworks point, and not to the polygon they are applied to. They WILL fill a shape if it is edited (like a fill), so they are good for indicating things like concrete, soil, etc. They shouldn't be used for things where the location or orientation of the hatch is critical. The plain old hatches (Tool Menu) are drawn from a user selected origin, and may also be rotated during application. Once they are applied, they become just a Group of lines, and therefore will not fill a shape if that shape is edited. But, being a group of lines, they will always be aligned with an object if they are moved with that object. This is the type of hatch to use for things like masonry, ceiling tiles, etc. (pre VW11) [ 05-27-2004, 03:59 PM: Message edited by: Antone Cepernich ]

Pls. clarify. Do you mean, instead of a fraction being printed as number slash number, you want number over horizontal line over number?

2. You used to be able (v8.5.2, anyway) use Command-Option-J to do this. In v10, Join in the Tool menu gives you 3 options - the third,"Join (no trim)", does the same. The Command-Option-J key combination is now used for a different command by default. You can gine the Join (no trim) command a key combination and or change them around as you want in the Workspace editor. [ 07-23-2003, 04:52 PM: Message edited by: Antone Cepernich ]

Here's what I do: In your source file (the one with the worksheet), show the worksheet on some layer, make a symbol of that visible worksheet, then delete the image. In your target file, reference the source file and import the worksheet symbol. You can then show the worksheet on any layer, as usual. A down side is that whenever you open the target file, you are asked if you want to replace the worksheet (if you are set up to regen workgroup references automatically). Answer is yes.

...and a couple of other ways. 1. Drop your symbol anywhere on the the drawing and then Group it (NOT Symbol to Group). You can then put it anywhere without it inserting in walls. 2. You can Edit the symbol in the Resource Pallet. Choose the Insertion Options button. You can there choose which, if any, wall cutting behavior you want, or whether the symbol inserts at the center or the face of the wall. Also, edit the symbol's 2D component so that the insertion point is at the point on the symbol where you want it. [ 07-03-2003, 05:12 PM: Message edited by: Antone Cepernich ]

I've done this both by the symbol method (pre- workgroup reference), and by the clipping-the-plan-to-be-enlarged-and-putting-it-on-its-own-layer-and-linking-it method. An inconvenience with the symbol method is that when editing the symbol, the rest of the plan isn't available to refer/snap to, so it makes coordination of changes to the symbol plan and the main plan somewhat difficult. [ 06-02-2003, 12:53 PM: Message edited by: Antone Cepernich ]

I use the Arc By Tangent tool & put an arrow head on one end. You can draw straight horiz. from your note, then bend it down to the detail. You can also do 'S' curves by starting a second arc off of the end of the first - tool will let you know when you are tangent. For 1 reference to multiple items (i.e. w.c.s), draw the line from the note through all the fixtures to the last one, then give it an arowhead. Cut the arc @ ea. fixture, and ea. segment will have an arrowhead.