DBLand

A lot of links (ie. HTML hyperlinks) don't work in the help files. Some do some don't. I assume blue underlined text is a link as it always has been since the dawn of HTML. Do other people experience this? I use Firefox as my browser. Is this the problem? Since a search of the boards reveals nothing I feel very alone with this annoying bug.

Thanks Pat, I have noticed that function but I can't seem to import my own title block symbol that way. My set up is this; The default settings in "Doc Settings>Document set up" are border= none. With this setting I cannot choose a title block. So I choose a typical ISO border (which I don't want) and this lights up the title block option. Now I can see a list of standard title blocks in the Title Block drop down menu. I can see the default/included list and 'Top Level' and beneath that 'Drawing Border Components' My title block is not there even though it is loaded into the resource browser (i.e a separate 'Title Blocks' drawing with various symbols is pointed to.) So I drag my title block symbol into the document from the resource browser. Now its is available in the title block import dialog so I choose it. Q1 This 'Doc Setting' seems to have no effect when I set up new sheets so what is it for? Assuming this isn't the way to do it. Q2. Should I be setting up a 'drawing border component' (as described in the resource browser folder) If so how do I do that? Q3 If I use the drawing border tool to add a border with the intention of using the 'title block only' option this option is greyed out, so all I get is a border. If I right click and attempt to choose a title block nothing happens. It is set to none and can't be changed. (same this if I do it from the RB). The help pages are less than clear on this. I would appreciate if someone could just write the steps to set up the default border to have a custom title block. thanks

Ah.., this is where our methodology is different. I use it as a title block symbol not a drawing border object, I can't double click it and get to the 'Edit Title Block" dialog, rather I get the 'Edit Symbol' dialog. So I use the Object Info Palette/ Data tab to fill in the data. In this place multiline entry definitely does not work. None of this is mentioned in the manual/Help. I have not used the Border tool as we don't have a border on our drawings and shift the title block sometimes to fit the view. As I understand this tool, the Title block is fixed unless you detach from the border via the option in the Object Info palette. That is a solution I suppose. I didn't think it would be this hard to set up multiline but I can get round this by setting up multiple fields in the symbol as well. Thanks for your help. D

Thanks Highpass, I checked out your titleblock and there is no way I can edit the multiline text. For example where you have Sheet Title: " Building 1 "/line break/ 'Overall' I can edit your lines but not make a new break. I tried every combination of return + too (alt, ctrl, apple-option etc and three at the same time). Is this an apple thing I wonder?

Its an odd one isn't it. You can define the 'other leader markers' in Dimension Preferences but it does seem to effect callouts unless you draw on the dimension class. You can use the little attributes palette - via the little arrows at the bottom to instantly change one or many objects- one to switch on, one to choose type- (much easier than your stated method). Or set the class default line type end, but that is not very useful if you want to draw other lines on that class.

VW help says that if you put a "pound sign (#)" after the line when creating a record format then it will be multiline text. Useful but I can't get it to work. First is it supposed to be a hash or a pound sign? In my language (English-English) they are different (and on my keyboard hash is not present but it can be copied from a MSWord document via symbol insert). I have tried both and there seems no way to move the text to a new line when typing data into the title block. Any help appreciated.

Stipples are not well served in VW help, but from this forum I have found out how to find them once I have saved them. Thanks people. But once saving all my stipples they disappeared from the Resourse>Stipple Folder when I closed the file and reopened it the following day. (if I reopen immediately they are still there). (I am in the current file by default in the file structure) I can now choose and re-save them each time I open a file for that session but does anyone else experience this obvious bug?

1. You can turn off annotations separately to crop outline if you assign all annotations to a class from within the edit annotations window. Then select the VP (which must be on a different class) and turn off your annotation class on the VP OIP.

I had a long exchange with VW techs about this. http://techboard.vectorworks.net/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=102564&page=1 I even sent the file to them and they gave up with it. Best to turn off the logical problem solving brain and don't spend hours of time on it like i did, its an illogical problem. Despite what the old hands say I think it is possible to get into a loop that VW can't get out of. I tried everything. Easiest to start again and delete maybe after copying properties across using the eyedropper tool. In future create the VP on a class (call it VP or use None)in the first place. You'll have no problems.

Thanks Monkey. That's the setting I wanted.

I cannot get height text to align to read uphill on a contour line as is normal cartographic practice. Whether I use rotate command or rotated text the text flips the wrong way at certain angles (45degrees). Is there any way to over come this setting?

Exactly I relocated the references fine.It should have nothing to do with the problem as you said. Viewport settings should reside in the file. How can they get lost? This has happened twice now and I have also had a frozen viewport that refuses to have class or layer visibilities changed. Had to start again. Some viewport visility settings can get quite complicated and the only reason to spend time doing it is to save time on updates later. I'll send you the files. D

I finally got round to setting up a big project the way it should be done with a model file (with architect, survey, landscape layers) and drawing set up files with references. Great I can control the colours of lines in the drawing set up file (by overriding) and have a simple way to update drawings as the model progresses. This took quite a while but I was ready to impress my dubious boss. Then we changed the name of a top level folder and wham! every single reference and viewport setting was lost, even after I relocated the reference on file opening. How on earth can this happen? The boss is recommending I follow his cut and paste method and multiple file copy method in future rather than references. He has a point. I want to go home at 5.30 too.

VW does the clever stuff but struggles with the basics. (snapping, cutting, panning). With AutoCAD its the other way round. Its best to keep it simple and not try to do all the things that the manual says you can do particularly if you are more than a couple of years behind the curve in hardware.

Thanks, Split> Trim by line is what I want, except counter intuitively I click the bit I want to keep. Can't have it all I suppose. David

Can anyone help as to how this tool is supposed to work? The help has only a few lines and says the object to cut with, should be over the object to be cut. OK so far so good. It doesn't say I should select the cut line but I reason that VW needs to know which line I want to use. I still get random results. For instance a road edge could be crossed by many lines. I want to delete half of it and draw a line across it, select it, send to front, choose trim and click the half of the road edge I want to see disappear. Does it delete? Nope, only a short section goes to the next line that happens to cross it. Yeah, another select-delete and its gone but it ain't supposed to work like that. Sometimes it will ignore my selected line and trim to the next one. Am I missing something? All classes are set to selectable of course. Thanks

I have to admit I am bemused by this bug, which plagued VW 11.5 and admin here could not work out what was wrong when i sent them a file. If you try to move a viewport to a new class after creating it, you will never see it again.

I have been advised by N to install SP2. Have done. It seems to be working now. I am familiar with the 'two objects miles apart' view. It wasn't that.

Once I deleted all the sheets and started again the handles came back. haven't seen them all week on this file. Very worried that this VW2008 does not work on my G5 Mac as they say it should. BTW I put viewports in their own separate classes.

Ray You cracked it with a sanity check. Thanks. Its the old problem that I used to get on AutoCAD but never on VW until I started 2008 this week. A corrupted file that starts behaving bizarrely. Loads of other tools and functions stopped working and even more bizarrely VW seems to have created a parallel file system (i.e a copy of the server file system) in a hidden folder in my home folder. It all started when I autoconverted a VW11.5 file to 2008. Moderatator Does 2008 really work on Power pc macs? Are there any repair file functions on VW?

thanks for the ideas but I've done the obvious things. Cropping is completely different in 2008. In 11.5 you used to have handles to edit the existing crop. Now you have to delete it and start again. Delete the existing crop and the whole drawing appears in the background. You have to then draw a new polygon and the new view port crop is created. But back to this problem; I have all classes visible and the crop itself cannot be selected once in crop edit mode (it has no outline). Even if I do nothing I cannot leave the crop edit mode because of the 'more than one crop object' error and therefore have to close the file and reopen it to 'escape'. As I said. I cannot see these objects, cannot select them, cannot delete them. I can see my existing view port crop but I cannot select it. Of course I have deleted the sheet layer and started again. But still don't understand what went wrong.

Well it works the way it should in Sheet layers but in design layers I need to do edit/select all then click the zoom to objects button. It works the way expected when an object is already selected. I'll work around but it does seem right.

Well, I double checked this. I have been using VW for a couple of years now so I know how it should work. There are no other objects in the crop edit view. (i select all and delete) Drawing a new crop is the new way to edit a crop in VW2008. The thing is I am now stuck in crop edit and cannot leave it.

Fit to entire drawing is pretty useful, but it just doesn't work for me. Whatever layer I am, I click empty space and use the fit to objects button and absolutely nothing happens. Thanks if you can help.

Editing the crop of the new style VW2008 viewports is causing me a big headache. I want to change the crop of an existing viewport in the sheet layer. I do exactly as the help page says. I select viewport, then edit crop then draw a new closed polygon (a rectangle) then exit viewport crop. All I get a message that says 'a viewport cannot have more than one crop object'. I actually had this working once but now whatever viewport I create a cannot edit the crop. I can't think what I am doing wrong? Any help much appreciated. David