rbryanh

Thanks - I do appreciate the suggestions. Unfortunately, I'm not fond of the off-the-shelf stuff I've seen, and nearly all of them are Windows-only anyhow. (I'll draft on burlap using my own blood for ink before I'll run Windows software.) Oddly, neither Graphite nor Cobalt individually has the feature set I need, but since both are so magnificently buggy, it's moot anyhow. Ashlar's offerings are, aside from Windows, the ugliest, least reliable, most annoying commercial software I've ever encountered. LOL, Bryan

Thanks again, everyone. I'm designing clothing patterns. The pattern itself exists as a set of relationships to a block based on body measurements. Charles... You seem to be implying that references to one object may be somehow included in the Object Info for others, which would go a long way to solving some of my problems. But how? I'm unable to find a thing about this in the docs, and a few casual experiments haven't revealed anything new. Pardon me if I'm being particularly dense. -Bryan

Thanks folks, but the required changes invariably alter the proportions of the objects in ways beyond what scaling can achieve. No doubt I oversimplified my example. Some of the necessary resizing is sufficiently esoteric as to even require some "If/Then" decisions. Cobalt and Graphite are allegedly able to do these sorts of things, but in practice, Cobalt and Graphite are so horrifically buggy as to be unable to do anything at all. But I appreciate the replies nonetheless - "You can't do that with VectorWorks" is a useful answer, even if it doesn't leave me doing a little happy dance around my workshop. <g> -Bryan

Despite having eventually come to loathe Cobalt, I'm missing its Equations Palette, which provided the ability to constrain the dimensions of objects based on values derived from simple formulas. For example, "Line B = Line A * 2", so that when Line A is resized, Line B is always twice as long. I do a lot of of this sort of work, where the size of the finished product is based on a set of initial dimensions which varies from project to project. The provided parametric constraints aren't quite sophisticated enough to meet my needs. What's the best way to use VW to resize several objects based on the dimensions of another object? Ideally, I'd like to relate parametrically constrained objects to dimensions on a worksheet, and use the worksheet to resize the objects. It seems this is likely possible using VectorScript, but it also looks as though that would be very, very labor intensive. Any advice will be much appreciated. After days I've fighting with this, I've reached an impasse.

Can VectorScript create an object that can be used as a function in a worksheet? Thanks, Bryan

As you've said, VectorScript is powerful, but as programming languages go, it's not exactly the cutting edge. Nor, as the manual admits, is it much good for integration with other apps. All things considered, I'd much rather have a well written VectorWorks AppleScript dictionary than VectorScript. Using Automator and AppleScript as a unified interface for controlling sleek, lean, elegant applications and their interaction is ultimately much more satisfactory than having each app try to be all things to all people. And AppleScript offers the possibility of developing a complete, custom interface to drive and coordinate the activities of any number of applications. Still, VectorWorks is a great working environment, and I'm not finding VectorScript difficult to learn. And of course better AppleScript support wouldn't do Windows users a bit of good. -Bryan

I'm finding that both IsWSCellNumber and IsWSCellString return TRUE regardless of the contents of the cell being referred to. Am I missing something, or have I run into a bug? Thanks, Bryan

Thanks very much for the advice. As I'm an absolute beginner with Vectorscript, and further hints you'd care to give would be welcome. Scripting data into and out of VW's worksheets looks to be my primary issue. I've considerable geek background, but egaads... Nemetschek's idea of a function reference for VS is a bit, uh... minimal. Thanks, Bryan

I'm considering upgrading to Vectorworks 12, and have a general?question about a somewhat out-there application. I'd be grateful for some advice. I need to create 2D drawings from dimensions stored outside of Vectorworks. The idea is that the actual dimensions of a parametrically constrained drawing are determined from information stored in a spreadsheet (which, come to think of it, could be inside Vectorworks). In other words, I need to generate multiple, differently dimensioned instances of a single stored pattern. I'm currently doing it in Cobalt, but I find it buggy, ugly, and very limited for my purposes. A day's perusal of the VectorScript Language Guide gives me the impression I'm not barking up the wrong tree, but I'm not sure. Any speculation on the possibility, feasibility, and ease of this application would be much appreciated Thanks. -Bryan

Folks... I'm considering upgrading to Vectorworks 12, and have a few specific?questions. I'd be grateful for some advice. My primary need from CAD software is generating clothing pattern designs based on measurements.?? Clothing design is a process of adapting 2D materials to 3D surfaces, so 2D drafting is essential and 3D modeling is of interest.???I currently use manual methods, assisted by assorted graphics programs, am shopping for the best tools with which to automate the entire process. Most important is the ability to apply fairly complex numeric dimensional and parametric constrains to a 2D drawing.? The measurements I use are stored in spreadsheets and a client database.? Ideally, I'd like to be able to link or import them, generating many patters from one drawing by altering a table of numeric measurements.?? I don't find this easy or even possible in Vectorworks 11, and am unable to determine from the documentation if anything has changed. Speculation on the possibility, feasibility, and ease of this application would be much appreciated. Thanks. -Bryan