Bob Holtzmann

I noticed recently that Chief Architect imports PDFs into its sheets, so I would recommend exporting PDF details from Vw, instead of DWG.

I agree, Matt. At first, I felt I didn't need Adobe Reader, and printed from Preview. But then I learned Adobe Reader on the Mac has lots of control over page sizes and scaling, even more than its Windows version (I had trouble finding an Arch D sheet Page Setup in a Windows Reader today). Vectorworks users would probably tend to take varying sheet sizes for granted. I recall using different sheet sizes in Autocad, so it's a familiar thing to me, and is very useful. Perhaps someday Revit, too, will include multiple sheet sizes in a later version (2020 maybe?).

I always have variably sized sheets of in the same Vectorworks file, and never had any problems with it. I usually have an Arch D (24"x36") for the plans, and separate US Letter sized sheet sized for an addendum or perspective rendering. The scaling can then be done with the sheet viewports before exporting PDFs.

If you select the rectangular extrude and use the new Create Auto Hybrid command, then you wouldn't need to convert it to lines.

I used to have freezes on my MBPro with just OpenGL rendering. Upgrading my memory to 8 gigs made the rendering engine work much better. I have MenuMeters (a free pref pane) on the menubar to monitor the processor and memory - sometimes it's good to wait for the processor to finish a high quality rendering of a viewport before working on the computer again. Especially when the CPU's got the cooling fan's speed set on high.

The way to approach it, the window itself is not curved, but the wall is. So that you can place a strip of windows in a curved wall.

I use a weekly reminder sheet from a PDF I downloaded from davidseah.com -- the PDF is on a Design Layer. I put the month/year, dates, and daily notes on the Sheet Layer Viewport's Annotations. I like the flexibility of this system, and can change it any way I like.

One Fundamentals workaround to not having Architect's Wall Styles is to use the Eyedropper Tool to configure similar walls.

@Bob-H If you are truly concerned with corporate governance and shareholder influence Bob, follow these links through and build your own perspective based on the information available to us on both these companies. I?d be very happy to be set straight by you or others on this discussion and the future of Vectorworks under Nemetschek?s ownership. PS Apologies for confusion over the deleted post. M5D, Thanks for the effort in setting me straight at things - a bit extreme, but effective (and no, I'm not that concerned about what goes on in the board room). However, I noticed you didn't mention the fact that Nemetschek Vectorworks is an independently run subsidiary of Nemetschek AG. This could make a difference in any fears or concerns you may have over CEOs losing their cool over upper corporate office policies. Also, I noticed that NV just released a Chinese version of Vectorworks, so they stand a good chance of expanding in the Asian market. On the other side, I am always amused over the upper corporate Autodesk CEOs directing their software product teams on little things like icon logos. The latest one is requirement that all software icons look like origami. The Autodesk logo - a folded paper A, looks good. But the design of the Revit logo is a very sorry looking R. Just looking at it tells me they could have done a better job.

Every CAD/BIM software product has its strengths and weaknesses. I've been lamenting the "elevation viewport update button" dilemma in Vw just this week. I don't know why those hidden line viewports change to wireframe when they need updating. No major tragedy, but just a small annoyance.

To put it simply, Autodesk is very good at marketing leadership, while they put little effort into improving their products with new features. I've had that problem before with AutoCad. To put it even more simply, it's all about the shareholders.

The latest Revit version 2014 has these New Features (and these are ALL of them): Displaced Views Dockable Windows Framework & Enhancements Material UI overhaul Non rectangular crop regions Room calculation Point Schedules Selection enhancements Split Elevations Temporary View Templates View navigation performance Multi Selection - bring to front & send to back Stairs & Railings Double click to edit Point Clouds I'm sure that if Vectorworks 2014 were to announce that it has "non-rectangular crop regions", none of us would be drooling over it, as Vw has had that feature ever since cropped viewports were in existence. BTW, Revit crop regions are still restricted to straight perpendicular sides. The Material UI is an un-kludge of a previous painful setup, and the Double Click to Edit should be a given standard, and not an upgrade feature. And it's nice that the Revit 2014 folks can now "bring to front" and "send to back" multiple objects - shouldn't everyone? I have little doubt that I would ever see a Revit that has decent trees, prop images, terrain editing, NURBS, PDF import, can copy objects between project files, search and replace text, import of DWG linework, movable 3D working planes, backward compatibility to AT LEAST the previous version, worksheets, and some effort to expand from a MS Windows-Only platform. But with so many users who would buy it regardless of its lackluster features, why should every new version of Revit change that much? If computing history tells us anything, it is that Aggressive Market Leadership and Creative Innovation are inversely proportional.

Use one of the Constraint tool buttons to set a distance between 2 objects. You can edit that distance, or remove it, by selecting an object and going to the Modify menu.

Another way to start learning is with the "Getting Started" guides for Architect (and Renderworks, if you have it). They are in the software package. I think the Architect one has an exercise for importing a scanned plan image, and tracing walls over it. It's also on the NemVw website.

Nice work there, Dworks. I like the fair and balanced assessment of Revit, too. It agrees with my impressions that the program stops at some critical points where Vectorworks continues - particularly in 2D graphics and 3D modeling, there are some big differences there in the editing environment. The Siemens parasolid engine in Vw can only get better in its implementation. I particularly like the graphical styles in Vw, and its "Sketch" linestyle. Whenever I use it for design presentations, it always get compliments.

I've found the free Draftsight CAD application to be helpful in cleaning up after doing a Vw export to DWG file. Draftsight can explode those plan blocks (artifacts of the Vw-DWG export), and purging them from the file puts things into better DWG order. There is also a Vectorworks setting to Create Text Without Fill, which might further help to conform to the dumbed-down DWG file.

Good point, Chris. Vw's plug-in window has the easiest and fastest way to increase and decrease window lights (i.e., 1,2 or 3 panes horizontally and vertically in each window). Imagine doing this manually in Revit - I'm talking about making individual outlines for every added pane of glass and mullion! I've found it's really easy to configure a Vw plug-in window, select it, and make it a symbol. Then it's easy to use the same window afterwards. It's even more easy and fast to edit the symbol afterwards, because the plug-in parameters of the window are still inside the symbol. All you have to do is edit the symbol, and get to the plug-in parameters on the Object Info Palette. This eliminates the time it takes to swap out symbols (or Revit families) on the plans. The Custom Selection command in Vw also deserves high recognition, and has saved me lots of time in making changes to multiple selected doors, windows and every other kind of objects. I know of nothing in Revit that can compare to this.

I recall the previous version of StickCar never had the donut problem - it ran under Vectorworks 8, and you would simply click where you want the car to go. The author did state that this is an alpha version, meaning it has more bugs than a beta. Still, it's a nice start - I like how it uses 2D symbols to choose the graphic outline of a car.

I've opened the Stickcar stationery file, and tried the Prius car - works fine. The Obj Info Palette displays metric units initially, but will change to Imperial if you change the document preference's units. I do have a problem with the car doing donuts, though.

I've been looking at this plug-in for a long time. It basically uses a custom automotive vehicle to draw tire tracks on your drawing as it drives in various directions. For a long time, it was only available for purchase in the Japanese language version. But now there's a free demo English version for Vectorworks 2011. Try it! http://stickpackage.sub.jp/

Nice globe model. I tried the command "Model -> Create Animation" to create a Quicktime movie of the globe in Orbit Point mode, and it revolves perfectly.

As a wall, the plywood could not only be rotated vertically, but its base would always be fixed to the layer plane. Using this plywood for a subfloor would not be possible. Too bad, too - it would be a great way to make sure the plywood panel edges line up with the joists.

As a tip, I'm still working in Vw 2013, but for my important files, I'm saving down to a previous version. That way, if the Vw 2013 app fails big time, I can always fall back to a plan B, and open the file in Vw 2012. Also, the automatic 15 minute backup file has recovered my work from an unexpected crash more than once.

My best bet is to stay in SP1 (if there's a backup to restore to, I would try that). Just saying, because my "Check for Updates" does not detect SP2 - and with the reported Workgroup Reference problem, it's just as well.

I'm getting into the habit of making plug-in doors and windows w/ the settings the way I want them, and then make symbols of them. The symbol can then later be edited, by just changing the plug-in settings.