Benson Shaw

Here is one. Start with projection of slide path on ground plane. Derive some z values along its path from elevation views. -B

I think the extrude along a path command causes the profile to be always normal to the path. The normal wanders in 3d on a path such as yours. You might need to model this in several sections (usually these are built from several sections), or as a 2 rail loft. Rails follow top edges of trough, with a semi circular profile curve. I will see if I can get one to work, but not today. -B

Try this: Dbl click the extrude object to enter the edit mode. choose the profile. You should see your clipped ring. Rotate the ring 90?. Exit to see if that is what you are after. -B

My version 2009 should arrive in the next few days. Perhaps others will jump in here. -B

I tried creating a test file and a master with viewports of viewports per your list above. I moved the viewport with referenced info and snaps stay with the viewport. I cannot reproduce the snap failure described. Perhaps you could make some simple new files to test. Or maybe I missed part of your set up. If you find same behavior in your test files, post them to this forum so others can review. Also, please create forum signature showing your VW version and basic computer specs. Create it in the My Stuff link at top of this forum page. Good luck. -B

The viewport within a viewport does not seem to be an issue for snaps, with one horrible exception. Most viewport snaps are same as non viewport snaps. Here is my experience In VW2008 with smart cursor, intersection and object snaps enabled (2009 may be different): All "points" produce snaps in any view setting (Top Plan, Custom, etc) of the annotation mode of the step 3 viewport. "Points" would include vertices and centers of visible (projected) 2d objects. 2d edges also produce snaps, as do vertices of 3d objects including NURBS control points and the vertices in 2d components of hybrid objects such as Wall objects. In views other than Top Plan, there is an offset of snaps of edges and vertices of projected 2d objects. The snaps are offset to the object's Top Plan geometry location. This produces ghost snaps in the viewport - very confusing (see attached). In Top Plan view of the step 3 Viewport, a Snap should occur for all vertices as described above, and, additionally, all edges of projected 2d objects. Smart Cursor prompts for 2d objects include Object, Locus, Center and Point. The edges/perimeters of 3d objects do not produce snaps in any view, except where vertices or control points are coincident. This behavior is consistent in SLVPs of both Design Layer and DLVP. -B

Instead of fill for the window types, perhaps use different line colors and heavy line weights to distinguish the extrude edges in wireframe views? Select the extrude and change fill colors in the attributes pallet to apply any color for the rendered glass surface. White seems closest to clear window glass. Reflectance might be emphasized with darker greys or other dark colors. If renders take too long, copy/paste part of your model into a new drawing to test. -B

When you say lose, do you mean deleted permanent loss? Or just a bad screen redraw? No zoom problems. Sometimes the pan with scroll wheel & opt key fails. It is intermittent and only when cursor is over selected object. Hot key plus click would do a dupe (cursor shows a plus sign). Scroll wheel action apparently confuses the system. Move cursor away from the selected object or click to deselect and no pan prob. -B

VW2008 went for about 6 months on my system with no crashes. That is great stability! I restart at least daily and repair permissions weekly. Most of my crashes are while editing or nudging in groups and/or zoomed in. Recently, a 30MB VW file started crashing ("unexpectedly quit") with increasing frequency, about every 20 or 30 clicks at the end. I duplicated the file and have been working crash free on the copy for several days. Cause was corruption? or fragmentation? Dunno, don't care. It's fixed now. -B

Sometimes this helps: Place a 3d locus somewhere on your 3d object (corner point? Center of Mass? Face center). Select the Locus to see its coordinates in OIP. -B

Keep trying! The loft will result in a group of several surfaces if one or more of the origination curves is not continuous (has corners for instance), or has very sharp curves. If the curves have differing vertex count, that can cause a split/group loft, too. If you start with 3 gentle curves as shown, your loft should result in one smooth surface. My file is attached, if the moderators let the 300kb pass. Check all the layers and zoom out to see all the objects & text. Start in Plan on the 3d Setup layer, but explore with the Flyover tool. -B

I don't know of an easy, free method. I once made 800sf of pavement into a much bigger unit paver order because of the unknown duplicates. Fortunately the vendor took back the extra units. But Optimize Drawing plugin at Vectorbits might work for you. It has a remove duplicates function, and lots of other useful features. It costs 30 Euros. (cheap compared to all those pavers) www.vectorbits.com Look at the demo in the 2008 collection. -B

I haven't tried it with a worksheet object, but in Mac OSX, select and copy a VW object, then paste the selection into an email. It shows up as a PDF attachment (or in-line graphic for some recipients). There is probably a Windows version of this, too. -B

Only 3d objects have z values. If a straight line is what you are after, you can draw a 2d line and convert to 3d poly or NURBS, or draw a straight line with the 3d polyline tool. The z value shown in the OIP of any of the above will correspond to the z value of the center of the object. Or are you inquiring about something else? -B

In plan view make an arc or spline polyline and extrude it to make the outside surface of your wall. Using a simple arc will result in a slice of pie shape, so stick with the polyline. Switch to front view and place your 2d cityscape polyline over the extrude. Rescale as necessary. Use the Project Tool in Project and Trim mode to cut the extrude. The result may be a group. If necessary, enter the group and delete unwanted elements. In Plan View, use the Shell Tool to create the shell/wall. Adjust wall thickness in OIP. -B

Sorry for no responses after this long time, but here is my stab at it. It is not really easy but results are pretty close to fabric shape. The short story is that you start with a bigger NURBS surface and trim the edges to suit. Start with a plan view, 2d pentagon. Vertices are your shade pull points. Convert to 3d poly and raise the z value of each vertex. Still in Plan, draw two edge NURBS connecting vertices (they converge at one end. the other end is open), and a center NURBS (straight) Edge curves have proper 3d shape. Raise the mid point z value of the center line to make it curve off the ground plane. Loft the 3 curves. In Plan, draw arcs as trim surfaces along each edge and use the Project Tool in Split mode to trim the NURBS Surface. Switch around in side, top and front views to adjust vertices as nec to make a closer shape to the fabric. I hope you figured out some way to do this. Mesh may be another way to go. -B

This is a Mac OS problem I think, but perhaps VW or forum readers have a solution I am missing. Prior to OS10.5, page set up included two landscape modes, one for each feed direction, "bottom" of page (the wider margin) could be on right or left. Now there is only one - bottom/wide margin on the right. There are situations where it should be on the left. A portrait mode document (say, letter size, single sided) is usually bound or stapled on the left. Landscape mode pages in such a document require clockwise rotation to view so that binding is away from viewer. The bottom/wide margin ends up on viewer's left. If I draw on a sheet in landscape mode, the drawing will appear upside down when inserted into a portrait mode doc. I can rotate all the drawing elements 180, or draw with view rotated 180 to accommodate, or create a custom page reversing the margins, but why should I have to do that? OR, more likely, am I just being thick? -B

Lofting could work but it seems kind of difficult to get the curves correct in 3 space. Perhaps the pointy corners are preventing a successful loft. You could also try starting with a curved extrude for the front face and then trimming/cutting away the edges and U-shaped voids. At least 2 ways to do it: 1. Project Tool to trim with 2d objects - results in a NURBS surface. 2. Solid Subtraction to trim with several extrudes - results in a Solid Subtraction. -B

Welcome to the forum. Please create a signature (My Stuff in the forum menu bar) showing your VectorWorks version and computer OS. Your post is not very specific, so here is some guessing. Is your heading created with the Text Tool? A couple things could be happening. One is that Use at Creation is checked in Edit Class dialog (read about Setting Class Properties in VW onscreen help). All new objects will exhibit the class color. See if unchecking that box helps. The other is probably just standard behavior as described below. It actually makes sense and is helpful, once you get the hang of it. You probably discovered this, but here are some tips for working with color in text boxes. 1. Change the color of existing text: Select the text, either the whole text box, or portions of the text in the box. Alter color with attribute palette. This affects only selected objects. When you exit the selection, the attribute palette reverts. 2. Make a new default color for new objects: Deselect everything (choose the Selection Tool and click on empty area of drawing). Change to new color in attributes palette. Every newly created object will exhibit the new color - text, lines, etc. To create objects with yet another color, deselect everything and change color again. Class settings may override this. 3. Change text color on the fly: Choose the Text Tool. Click in the drawing to create a new text field/box. Change to new color in attributes palette. New characters entered in this text box will have the new color. Change color again while still in the text box and subsequent characters will exhibit the new color (mid word, even) resulting in a multicolored text box. As soon as you escape this text box (access a different tool, start a new text box, press esc key, etc) the color for new objects reverts to the default (this is what you described, right?) -B.

Draw a poly for fence boundary. Send it to surface. Draw a profile which is the fence cross section. Extrude along a path. It may wobble a bit instead of staying normal to the surface. Or for no wobble you can use lofting. Draw the fence outside poly and inside poly. Send them to surface. Now you have the bottom of the fence following the contours of the DTM. Duplicate them and move the dupes upward to top of wall height. Loft along these. As your observe, extrudes and other objects do not bend or conform to the DTM when sent to surface. Which is usually a good thing. There is a fence site modifier (M0dify>Convert>Objects from Polyline), which could work for you, too, but I find it a bit buggy when working with curves. File size goes up, etc. Investigate Stake Objects, texture beds, and DTM fence objects (the grading modifiers, not the barrier things) objects to make your roadways work in the DTM. Good Luck -B

change to a side view of your rafters. Draw a 2d rectangle which has one edge coincident with the rafter ends. Extrude. Now you have facia at correct rotation. Unfortunately, one end will be on the working plane. You may have to move it (say in top view) with the 2d select tool and snap it to the rafter end. OR Execute 3d drag snaps in a view where the pick point and target point do not overlay any other points (isometric view, for instance, or just skewed a bit with the flyover). Zooming way in is also advised. VW does not "know" which of the stacked points are the user's intended snaps. -B

Select the site model and choose Modify>Edit Group Key command is Cmd [ In the group, you should see your contours in plan view. Draw or paste a 2d polygon (not a polyline!) representing your property line. Exit group. Now your DTM displays as trimmed to the polygon. The contours, stakes or loci used to generate the DTM are unchanged on their layer. If you need to edit the trimming polygon, it visible in the Edit Group view. -B

Sorry, that was art speak. As you probably know, orthogonal views keep parallel lines parallel. Perspective views skew or curve parallel lines so that extensions of the lines would "vanish" or meet in the distance. That is also a quality of foreshortening. I don't know the whys and wherefores of Project 2d. It seems that Project 2D is only available if the viewport projection is set to Orthogonal or Top. If you can tolerate an Orthogonal view, your extrudes will appear on your projected site plan. You can still use the flyover and other view modifiers to change the view angle. Anyone else out there know of a way to use perspective views with Project 2d? -B

If it helps any, you can choose None for plant tag display, and create a text block with text similar to the tag text. Create a poly line leader. Or use the callout tool. -B

I am working in VW 2008, but I think VW12.xxx is similar in this issue. Here is a follow up to my first post: A Sheet Layer VP of a RW Camera view or any other view set to perspective projection does not allow Project 2D. The RW Camera defaults to perspective (in my setup, anyway). As bryceg notes, the VP check box for Project 2D is gray. Change VP projection setting to Orthogonal and the Project 2D box "ungrays". Enable the Project 2D option, and the 2d objects appear in the view as objects on the ground plane. This, of course, defeats the perspective in the RW Camera view shown in the VP. If the VP projection is changed to any setting other than Orthogonal or 2d Plan, then the Project 2D goes away. I guess the projected 2d objects cannot be adapted to foreshortened geometry. -B