Technoflash

Hi Guys Does anyone know how to stop VW automatically creating polygons while drawing a shape using the line tool. I want to be able to draw a shape and then manually compose it into a polygon. At present I have to keep decomposing the geometry as I go..very irritating

Thanks for all the advice. It just seems to be one of those little bugs that we all love so much. Nothing seems to help...oh well

Hi Has anyone had the Smart Cursor spontaneously turn off certain features during a session. I have a drawing at the moment in which Smart Cursor wont find corners or centres. (Yes it is turned on in the VW Prefs). It seem to do everything else without a problem (ie angles, alignments etc) If I open a new project it works fine, if I open an existing project it works fine. It just won't work on this drawing. I have relaunched the program...no effect. I have rebooted the machine...no effect. Any ideas?

Hi All I'm trying to create a site model using "2D Polys to 3D contours" After I've input the data I open the AEC/Site Model menu and try to create the model. I get an error message "Error: _587 _137 - Menu cannot be found. Edit Plant Catalog". This also happens if I try to create the model using 3D loci points. Any idea?

Ah..thanks guys..I think Now Paul, are you serious? Is VW so unstable that you have to resort to saving every other keystroke . I do that too now, by the way "Are you listening to this Katie? of course you are, you're omnipresent, silly me" The trouble is, everyone wants to blame the other guy. Microsoft tell me it's the ATI driver. ATI tell me that Microsoft wouldn't know a good driver if it jumped up and bit them in the bum. Nevercheck...oh sorry and Nemetschek gives us "beta software" at full retail prices. The Nemetschek retailer in my area tells me all my problems will vanish if only I would buy a Mac. Spare me....I'm tempted to go back to my stick drawings in the sand. Answer me this, when was the last time your pencil crashed and you lost 20 minutes of work? And Viper, about that massive memory leakage, don't worry brother, it's just a sign of advancing age. Most of my memory leaked away by the time I was 30. It's my life's ambition to have absolutely no memory left by the age of 50. Then I can be like the guy who sold me this dumb program (sorry Dave but, BUY A MACTINTOSH!!! are you crazy?, I just got rid of one)

Hi Katie Yes I did, and I updated the motherboard drivers that controll the AGP access to system memory.

Is anybody else out there in VW land experiencing a lot of runtime errors with winXPSP2? There is a belief that the new Data Execution Protection (DEP) feature in SP2 is stopping VW writing to certain areas of memory that the OS considers sacred. However I've turned that feature off for vectorworks.exe and it has made no difference.I've also turned off my antivirus software with the same result. O.K Katie....go!

Hi Dave First I select the artRW option (previously rendered in openGL), then I rerender. It then crashes during the attempt to render. And yes, it does seem to be only on one particular file. I have tried other files without a problem. I'll send this file to a friend and see if he has the same problems on his machine. I am also experiencing a lot of runtime errors. (say 4 a day) I get the usual message "c:\blah blah blah\VectorWorks.exe, this application has requested the Runtime to terminate in an unusual way. Please contact... Sorry, this is getting off the original topic but is bound to be related. Regards

Hi All With the new Artistic Renderworks feature in VW 11, if I select "Over Lapping Lines", "Stipple", "Lines with Shadow", "Soft Lines", "Ink Print" or "Tappered Lines" I get a runtime error. The other options yield perfect results. Does anyone have any idea why that is? Mike VW11.0.1 Architect Renderworks. AMD3000+ 64bit CPU.512MB RAM. RADEON 9200 128MB VID WinXP SP2

Thanks Katie Mr Nemetschek, give that girl a raise! Her diligence is only exceeded by her good looks. (actually I think there is some sort of support group you can go to for this "C.O.A.A"--Compulsive Over Answerers Anonymous) :-) So reading between the lines, Vectorworks itself won't take advatage of a 64 bit processor (yet) but there may be an overall speed advantage because of decreases in processor time for other open applications..Yes? Vectorworks itself doesn't take advantage of dual processors but Renderworks does. In reality Renderworks is where you need the power anyway. Finally, I take your point about the future being 64bit so I'll buy a machine to take advatage of that. I understand the latest release of Windows XP ultilises 64bit technology and by all accounts delivers a real increase in speed. I'll let you know. Thanks for your help Mike

Thanks Katie (I knew you couldn't resist :-) ) How about the other questions, any ideas? The reason I ask is that I'm upgrading my PC and have the choice of the "old" 32bit Intel Pentium 4 or the 64 bit AMD Athlon. If there is no speed advantage I'll probably stay with the Intel chip which is a little cheaper and more "Industry Standard". However if there is a speed advantage I'll go with the AMD chip. So there is some kind of real world application to these questions. Mike

Hi everyone Does anyone know (apart from Katie who seems to know everything ) if Vectorworks runs more quickly on a 64 bit machine as opposed to the usual 32 bit. It seems obvious that a 64 bit machine would be quicker but if VW is only 32 bit code is there any speed advantage? Secondly does VW take advatage of dual processors on the PC platform. I've been told that the program has to be written to take advantage of this facility? Thirdly, I notice there are a lot of people out there using 1 Gig of RAM on the PC platform. If you open the Task Manager and watch how Windows is using the RAM during a VW session you will notice that it never uses more than 256 megs. In fact with even with a bunch of apps running it rarely uses more than 256 megs. So, why have a Gig of RAM. Am I missing something here? Mike

Hi Ola Having tried both Nemetschek's CDs and Jonathan Pickup's books I would go with the books. I've got 3 of his manuals. If you work your way thru them you will come out at the end knowing more about Vectorworks than most people in the world...no kidding. I havn't been able to find better training resources than these books anywhere. He returns all email questions promptly and really knows his stuff. Give him a go, you won't regret it. Mike

Hi Guys Can anyone help with this? I have 3 polygons each on a separate layer. I want to align the corners. I turn on Show/Snap others on each layer. All polygons are now visible but smart cursor wont snap to any but the active layer..why is that? Mike Henderson Technoflash Design Ltd

Hi Jan15 Yep, that was it. Actually I like that click drag option, it does seem to suite me better. Thanks Mike

Hi Jan15 That method does seem a little better, I'll use parts of it, thanks. I can see why people freaked out about changing hands though. I "unfortunately" have built my work station around a righthanded person. My right arm is totally supported to avoid RSI, so changing hands is not an option. I actually don't mind taking my hand off the mouse to type because it exercises different muscles. You must be using a Mac though because holding the mouse button down during data entry and releasing it at the end of the process doesn't seem to work for me. I still have to do that pesky final click Regards Mike

Hi Katie That Boomerang mode is great...why didn't you tell me about that before and don't give me any of that "read ya User Guide" nonsense. Mike

Hi Katie Thanks for the info. Yes I was aware of that method I do use it. However If you count the steps required to enter data (especially for any subsequent lines) you don't actually save much time. The point is, I am trying to aviod having to "fill in forms" to draw a line. VW knows where my line is to start from, because I've clicked the start point. VW knows which direction to draw in, because I've moved my cursor in that direction (with the help of smart cursor). All VW now needs to know to complete the task is, how long?. At this point the "L Field" should highlight automatically, ready to recieve the obvious data. After the data is typed in and the enter key pressed, it is redudant to then have to press the left mouse key. The minute I press the enter key the task is finished. Obviously there are times when being able to enter every parameter for a line is required, so leave that functionality there. Just add this other feature as the default. Make it a selectable feature if you want and I'll be the happiest camper in CAD World. Regards Mike Trying to make the best better

Hi everyone I've got a couple on my wish list I would like to see steps taken out of the basic line length data entry process. For example, if I am drawing a simple line 100mm long. I would like to be able to click the first point, move the cursor in the direction I wish to draw (You can use the horizontal vertical and angle snap points to achieve this), type in 100 and press enter. The line would then be created 100mm long in the direction I had moved my cursor with the cursor now snapped to the distal end of the line. At present we define the proximal end of the line with a click, hit TAB, TAB TAB TAB along to the relevant field, type in the value, hit enter, then click. (and if you bump the mouse before you click you put the line in the wrong place). This method will save 4 steps. To recap at present we: 1)Click to define start point. 2)Move cursor in direction we wish to draw. 3)TAB. 4)TAB. 5)TAB 6)Enter line length data 7)Press enter key 8)Left click mouse. My method 1) Click start point 2) move cursor in direction you wish to draw 3) enter length data 4) Press Enter key...done There will be times when TAB entry of data is desirable but in most cases smart cursor gives us all the positional info we need, all we need do is define a length. Secondly. When zooming in and out and panning I would like the "zoom keys" C and V, and Pan key Z to only be active while they were actually held down. When they are released, vectorworks should revert to the tool you were previously using. This saves time and makes the operation for zooming similar to using a scroll wheel to zoom. If you've read this far you deserve a medal Merry Christmas Mike

Hi Jnr I took Andy's advice and bought a Radeon card. I bought the 9200 as the 7500 is no longer available (although you can get them if a dealer has old stock). The 9200 has 128meg of ram so is a bit quicker than the 7500(64 meg). So far I've had no problems at all. (Thanks Andy) "Crash prone, glitchy software" The sales guys never said anything about that "feature" when I purchased the product. . However I do share your sentiments to some extent. I have considered giving my copy back to the dealer and invoking my 90 day money back gaurantee. However since I have installed the new card things have improved out of sight. I think most of the problems I was suffering were due to graphics problems caused by Windows not Vectorworks. Having said that though, after 7 weeks of using VW I still haven't managed to produce a drawing that I can use or show a client. But then maybe I'm just stupid

Hi BaRa I'm using XP pro but I turn off all the "features" to speed it up. When you do this it goes back to what it really is...Win2000 with some window dressing. And sneaky old Bill tried to make us think is was a new O.S Regards Michael

Hi Andy Yeah, the Geforce card is in the AGP slot and the TNT is in the PCI slot. I did wonder if a dual head card would work. I was reluctant to buy one and then find out that it didn't work. Have you actually tried it and if so which card are you using? Regards Michael

I've solved it but I'm not happy. WinXP's OpenGL API can't accelerate two graphics cards at once (all you MAC guys can laugh now ). I've been running two monitors for years with no problems but of course my old CAD package didn't use Open GL. The "problem" only came to light once I starting using VW. Grrrrrrrrr I hate computers! Mike the monitorless

Hi, I'm running VW 10.5 on a PC P3 830mHz with XP pro 256 megs RAM. I run two 21" monitors. Main screen uses an N'Vidia Ge Force4 MX 420 (64 megs ram) vid card and the second screen uses an N'Vidia RIVA TNT Model 64 (16megs Ram) I have installed the latest drivers from N'Vidia. Here's the problem. Whenever I try to render anything, the model goes black and no details can be seen (such as windows and doors). I usually get the following error message (but not always) "N'Vidia Open GL driver mismatch, exit is the only option" Then the program closes. This is very irritating Anybody got any ideas? Mike