Conrad Preen

You could do the same with a Data Tag too.

@tom-SPL Well that doesn’t need any special programming. You can make a worksheet report of your racks listing the power consumption for each rack. In another column divide the power by the voltage to get the current, then divide that by 20 and round up to the nearest integer to get the number of feeds needed.

Hi @tom-SPL "generally useless" ??? well respectfully, that's just like your opinion man...! Many people find it very useful to know the power consumption of a rack. Each equipment item in a rack each has a power consumption and that's what we add up. Converting that to current consumption involves knowing the voltage of the power supply. This varies according to which country the installation is in. I think the best solution for you is to use a Data Tag that will do the calculation. The formula you need is Amps = Watts / Volts. That would give you the total Amperage. Regarding your other points, I'm not clear exactly what you mean by this or Send me a picture of what you want and I'll see what I can come up. Conrad

Dear @Ian5100 Would you be able to share here or PM me the file in question? For any problem, the first step on our road to helping you solve it is to be able to reproduce it here. So the more information you provide the faster we get to this first stage. Ideally in general we would like to know: What you were doing when the problem happened. What you expected to happen. What actually happened. What version of Vectorworks you are running including the build number. What platform you are using (Mac, Windows) and what version. An example file that's shows the problem and the steps required to make it happen. Screen shots or videos are also very helpful. I completely appreciate that it isn't always possible or even necessary to supply all of these, but the more you give us the sooner we will be able to help you. Any customer-supplied files are treated in Vectorworks as highly confidential and we will only use them to diagnose the issue. At the moment I know that you are running VW2024 and that you are seeing multiple entries for Devices and Circuits. Looking forward to hearing from you soon. Conrad

@Pat Stanford Thanks for the input Pat! I still think that the rack frame is a good starting point. It will need slightly different fit-to-slot behavior and locations will have to designated ordinally from left to right. That creates a bit of a hassle in that if you want to insert a module in the middle the locations of all the modules to the right of it need their slot numbers incrementing. And we need to think about empty spaces in the middle too. But we can stretch the model a bit more to fit all this. No promises for when. Conrad

@Pat Stanford Isn't it true that DIN rails use a standard module width of 18mm? In ConnectCAD you can specify the number of slots occupied by an equipment item. So on that level I think the rack-frame is a possible starting point. @spettitt regarding 2D vs 3D, I think there is no question. We've gone 3D with all our equipment layout and we're not going back. Anything that is required to make 3D as easy to use as 2D is definitely on the map. As for the link between DIN rail devices and modular equipment in a DIN-rail-style rack-frame, this pretty much comes for free since we'd be leveraging the existing model. Regarding circuits as signals vs. cores yes there's a kind of ambiguity but it's a good ambiguity because you can use it! ConnectCAD keeps track what's connected to what and leaves it up to you to decide on the interpretation. It's very easy to add complexity to software and very hard to get rid of it once it's there. So unless I can see a very clear path to a deeper level of detail in the general sense I think it's better to leave it as is. Conrad

The thing is that the symbols used internally in sockets and device labels are scaled according to the snap grid at the time of import. But the text drawn by Circuits is scaled according the current snap grid. So if you change the snap grid in mid design then this can give unexpected results (in the same document). So that might be an extra complication here. Generally for schematic design find the snap grid you like and leave it for the duration. In the online help there are some recommended snap grid settings for common layer scales. In the next version we are introducing a ConnectCAD grid setting separate from the snap grid.

Well what I did and successfully repaired the issue was to delete the referenced layers and the reference, set the snap grid the same in both files and then redo the whole referencing. It was a bit of a dance but it did fix the problem.

This arises from having a different snap grid in the two documents . When referencing between documents make sure there have the same snap grid because this value is use to set the sizing and spacing of ConnectCAD schematic objects. Conrad

@tom-SPL I'm wondering if we can bend the RackFrame object to be a DIN rail? Essentially we are talking about a mounting that has a fixed number of equal-sized slots into which we can drop modular equipment that can occupy one or more of those slots. That's basically what a rack frame does - it just doesn't look anything like a DIN rail. What do you think? would that fit the bill if we had DIN-rail-style graphics? Let me know. Conrad

I'll add it to our wish list! Conrad

Any chance you could PM the files so I can investigate? Conrad

Basically all you need to do to get your equipment items to update is to select them all (use magic wand) and then sat toggle Auto-BTU in the object info palette to make them refresh.

I'll pass this on to those who maintain Spotlight Numbering. Meanwhile do try out ConnectCAD re-numbering. We put a lot of work into it and personally I think it strikes a good balance between features and ease of use. C

If you use ConnectCAD > Drawing > Renumber ConnectCAD Objects ... it will work because ConnectCAD knows to tell the equipment that there's been a change. Conrad

Ah, in 1. I mean just draw the circuits the way you want them. The Connect tool doesn't separate circuits.

Hi @VW_Harry Well there are several ways: 1. with the Connect tool. After you have clicked on the source socket a preview line extends to the cursor. Click at any intermediate point to add a vertex, ( move about and do it again if you like. ) then click the destination socket to complete. Try it and you'll see what I mean. 2. Draw the circuits as you did in B. Select them. Then use the ReRoute Circuits tool and hover over the first circuit - it highlights - now click and drag the mouse and you'll see the preview of spaced out circuits, release and you're done. Harder to describe in words than to do. Best Conrad

@garrettohler it's a feature! It rests on the idea that the last selected cable type for that signal is likely to be the one you want in the next case. To me that doesn't seem like an unreasonable assumption. But since this is causing you problems let's have the conversation about why, and see if we can find a better workflow. From what I understand, the problem you are facing is that the software is making the wrong guess instead of doing nothing. And it's much harder check each item to make sure it's not the wrong thing than to fill in the blanks. Is that the issue? Here are some ideas of mine to get the ball rolling. Option #1 - leave cable type as a totally manual assignment the way it used to be. Option #2 - improve the prediction of cable type. Find a better basis for guessing what you want. Or at least not guess when it's not a sure thing. Option #last-of-all - Adding a preference. This is something I try very hard to avoid. Software should just work. Other random thoughts: You are using broadly-defined signal types ("buckets") for the purpose of cable number prefixes. Presumably these are your own signal types? so you have control over whether a cable and connector type is assigned to them. If you don't have anything assigned, isn't that Option# in my list? You can also un-assign the default cable types for all the application folder signals that you use. Another thought - you are doing this for cable number prefixes - correct? The prefix is editable for all signal types, application and user. So how about editing the prefixes to your taste and saving all this in a template? Let me know what you think. Conrad

Check the Vectorworks Preference Zoom Line Thickness as a starting point. C

@Conrad Preen let us know what do you think. I think it's OK as it is. I would love reports worksheets to have reveal triangles that could expand to show the summarized rows. In fact I think I already filed a request for that. C

I would expect something that is comparable to what's available in Spotlight cabling tool where it would calculate the parts based on the cable lengths specified in the settings. So for instance, if the route is 89ft, it would call for a 100ft cable if that's listed and if there nothing that long it would break it down into sub parts ie. 2 x 50ft cables. Is that something that is on your list of things coming up? The key word here is "expect". ConnectCAD is not in the business of detailed modelling of physical cables. As you say this is covered by Spotlight Cable Tools. For most permanent installations the aim is to use unbroken runs of cable for greater reliability. If you want to use Spotlight Cables to model the physical cables in your system all you need to do is set the Circuit.Cable parameter to the Spotlight Cable Run ID by picking it from the popup list. After that the Circuit follows the Spotlight length and is updated by Calculate Cable Lengths. I think a better way to support users who want standard lengths might be to add an option in Calculate Cable Lengths to round up to the nearest standard length. My 2c Conrad

- Seems like we take in account the cable slack for the end points only. If we have intermediate drop points with slack it does not get accumulated to the result. I don't think that slack at intermediate drop points should count towards the circuit length. The cable doesn't stop at these. Conrad

@SSvectorproblems I really would like see that file. At the moment all I have to go on is what you tell me. And it does raise some questions: Are you drawing your schematic on a sheet layer? not a design layer? Again, not on a design layer? seems unlikely because sheet layers are fixed at 1:1 scale. This strikes me as odd because software is pretty much deterministic. What appears to be random is usually not. Obviously the symbol chosen by the Create Equipment command is not the one you wanted but which symbol is it? Knowing this could help. Does this mean that all your devices and their equipment items have the same name? That could seriously confuse ConnectCAD. Let me explain... On a schematic it is sometimes useful to have parts of the same device in different places so that the signal flow is clearer. A classic case of this is patch panels (a.k.a jackfields). You wouldn't want a patch panel to be a single monolithic device with all the various connections snaking to and from it, because it would be impossible to understand the signal flow. The same thing is true to a lesser extent for other devices too. So, in ConnectCAD if 2 schematic devices have the same Name parameter value they are taken as referring to the same real-world device. Equipment Items are used on to-scale layout drawings to show the location and size of devices in the real world. Equipment Items also have a Name parameter which forms the link to the corresponding schematic devices. Equipment names should be unique. However ConnectCAD doesn't do a lot of enforcing - we believe that professional designers know what they are doing. Instead we provide the Check Drawing command that goes thru and lets you know if anything seems amiss. Because often designers will want to create a schematic first and then worry about the layout, we have extra parameters in devices that carry physical device information (dimensions, power, weight) that actually belong to the equipment item. This lets Create Equipment automatically create equipment from devices. Once an Equipment Item exists for a device (same name) then the Equipment Item takes over command of these parameters and on the schematic they become read-only. Now let's talk about symbols. The Equipment Item by default draws a 3D box of the given dimensions (H,W,D) or a rack-mount box if this is set. To allow you to have richer graphics in your layout we have the Use Symbol option in the Object Info Palette that reveals a symbol picker control. Here you can select a 3D symbol of your choice to represent your Equipment Item. Obviously it would be a bit weird if there was a mismatch between the dimension parameters and the actual dimensions of the symbol. So, on the assumption that the symbol has the correct dimensions we set the dimension parameters to the bounding cube of the symbol. If you regret the use of a symbol and uncheck the Use Symbol box the old values are not restored simply because they were not stored anywhere. So the symbol dimensions remain but become editable again. Perhaps that is a little unforgiving, but there is always Undo... So to recap, correct naming is crucial to the function of ConnectCAD. It gives you the flexibility to assign more than one schematic device to the same equipment item. By not playing the role of "uniqueness policeman" ConnectCAD lets you use powerful duplicate-and-modify-rename workflows that leverage the patterns inherent in most systems. Given the little information I have I may be completely off-track here. But I think the above explanation with be useful to others as well, so it is time well spent. Best regards Conrad

@SSvectorproblems Please could you PM a file showing the problem. I will investigate and see if I can reproduce the behaviour you describe. Conrad

@spettitt So cool that you are getting into all this 🙂 !!! If in your adventures you find that some scripting hooks are missing do reach out. I would like to add better support for scripting to ConnectCAD and the best way to do that is demand-driven. Conrad