VectorBob

Hi Gerard I am a geologist and not a mathematician but I will try to give my understanding of FFT. It is a method of generating a surface using sine and cosine functions. This allows for faster rendering, zooming and rotation. An application I have used that has a very fast FFT algorithm is FracSIS (http://www.fractaltechnologies.com/). Other geophysical companies that have applications that use FFT include Encom Geophysical (http://www.encom.com.au/) recently acquired by Pitney Bowes a few weeks ago and Geosoft (http://www.geosoft.com/). It may be possible that VectorWorks has an FFT algorithm but it is not very efficient especially for large data sets.

Congratulations to the VectorWorks team for the adding a translucency function to layers in a past version and more recently to the Windows version. My recommendation is that instead of having to leave the view to set the translucency and then go back to see how it turned out, then do it again it necessary, I would prefer that the translucency be adjusted by a floating slider control that shows a realtime display of the layer as the slider is moved. This is how it is done in Google Earth and in the application FracSIS by Fractal Technologies http://www.fractaltechnologies.com. I realize that this may be more intensive for the processor for this realtime adjustment with visualization but I feel the VectorWorks programmers are talented enough to figure this out without a significant slowdown in performance as others have.

I have noticed that in the process of rotating or moving large complex 3D surfaces (such as DTMs) in VectorWorks that the operation seems to be slow. I know that others may say "Get a faster processor" or "Use more RAM" but I have noticed that other 3D apps are significantly faster. On investigating these applications I became aware of the fact that they use the FFT (fast fourier transformation) algorithm. Can we have the FFT algorithm implemented in VectorWorks to enhance raster response with very large files?

I wish someone, perhaps even the VectorWorks programmers, would write a script that would allow for more efficient importation of GPS data into Vectorworks. Currently I need to download the GPS data, convert it to a comma or tab separated text file, then strip the header, then reorder the columns and then import the file as a survey file in Landscape. This can be very tedious as this needs to be done for both waypoints and tracklogs each day. Furthermore when the tracklogs get imported they only appear as crumbtrail dots. It would be nice to have some function that takes the time of each tracklog locate and automatically draws a line connecting each consecutive timed locate. In essence this would require two new import functions one for the waypoints and one for tracklog. For a most efficient display (from my point of view) each days download should be in a separate layer and each import of waypoint and tracklog can be on separate classes thus allowing for changing of colour or lines. An even more slicker way of doing this would be to link an application such as MacGPS Pro to work on a layer within VectorWorks. Then you could have a live GPS locate on the screen with an underlying VectorWorks map. This would be great for me as a geologist and others who creates geological maps in the field or wish to check out on site data locates. I would even be prepared to contract a programmer interested in writing the code for this. By the way MacGPS Pro only costs $50.00 US. See www.macgpspro.com