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mr. iagea

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Everything posted by mr. iagea

  1. I agree with gmm. I suggest using the Roof Face command instead. Start by creating discrete polygons for each roof face you want to create, then run the command on each polygon. You will have better control and are not limited to the somewhat annoying hip roofs that the Create Roof command limits one to.
  2. Thanks for responding, Wes. Yup, I get those too. But in my case, the home run marker tag is nearly a half-page away. Try making a circuit that is much bigger than that, say over an entire 40' x 40' room, using recessed light fixtures and a wall switch. It's quite odd. The other issue was due to the documentation being unclear about how to properly use the Tool. After much trial and error, I've solved the problem.
  3. I have given up completely on using links in the provided HTML help pages. They just don't work. Not on Firefox, not on Safari, not at all. Maybe somebody should write a help document for the help pages. :grin:
  4. I've noticed two issues since updating to SP4. Neither of these very basic things were happening before I updated. I've trashed my Prefs. This is repeatable. Check out the attached file "wrongtacle.vwx". 1. When duplicating any polyline or polygon, and then rotating it, the duplicate retains the width and height settings for the original, rather than showing the correct dimensions. For example, If I had a 2" wide x 3" high rectangle, and then I duplicate that and rotate it 90 degrees, the OIP shows a rectangle with the same 2w x 3h dimensions, rather than the correct 3w x 2h dimensions of the rotated duplicate. And, if I change the width numeral in the OIP, the height of the rectangle changes. 2. When re-naming (or creating new and then renaming) sheet layers, the layer list does not reflect the new name. I actually need to quit the program and re-open the file for the name to properly show up in the layer list. Anyone? Thanks,
  5. Hi all. Been away a while, and now SP4 is on us. Hooray for that. Circuiting question: The whole thing, really. I placed a panel (mistakenly on a sheet layer at first, which resulted in VW telling me I didn't have any panels at all when I went to create a Panel Report!). Fixed that by putting the panel on a design layer. Now, I'm still a bit confused. I've created all my outlets and lighting, and then I use the Circuit Tool to run circuits, but when I do, two awful things happen. 1. When I place a Home Run Marker, the label is way off somewhere else on the drawing. That makes no sense. What's up with that? 2. Even though I've only created one circuit (or so I thought) I now have four circuit records, and they're all different. When I select "Check voltages...", VW tells me the voltages are incorrect and would I like to overwrite the existing data. To which I mutter..."Existing data...?". I tell you: I really just need to create path lines between my fixtures, and VW has made this process way more complicated than it needs to be. Since I need to actually get some work done, I'll end up building my circuit and panel schedules more quickly and accurately by just typing them in an Excel sheet and importing them that way. Is there a good explanation of how to use the circuiting features? The manual's instructions, which I followed to the letter, resulted in my current state of confusion. Any guidance is appreciated. Thanks!
  6. good stuff. thanks, mike!
  7. Can anyone tell me how to get rid of the 3D axis lines (the light blue lines running through the middle of the image) that are rendering in this camera view using hidden line? (See attached) Thanks! PS: I tried turning off "Show 3D axis labels" in the prefs.
  8. I just really need to get the Issue Manger working correctly, and at this point, it is not. I cannot enter new Issues because only old deleted ones are showing up on the sheets. The Issue Manger is having issues. Anyone know how to get this to work correctly, without me having to go into each individual sheet and enter the same data 28 times?
  9. We really need a way to get at the Issue Manager data and edit it. I am constantly frustrated by "old" issue entries, which had been deleted from my sheets, overriding my new entries, or being printed when I'm trying to add a new entry. In particular, I'm referring to a more efficient method of dealing with ALL the entries. Currently, to remove and old entiry, I need to individually delete it from each sheet title block where it resides. With documents that are 20+ sheets, this can be very tedious. It would be better to be able to see all the sheets' entries in a single location, and manage the entries that way.
  10. That's what I was planning on. I can grab my prefs from the backup. But, I just wanted to be sure which folders I should replace with the older ones. My thinking is this: Vectorworks 2009 application folder [Libraries (both User and System)] > Application Support > Vectorworks > Vectorworks 2009. ...and the Prefs, of course. I just wanted to make sure I'm not missing anything. (and yes, I did trash my prefs when I updated. I would just like an explanation of why the redraw has slowed down so dramatically (ha! fat chance! )
  11. So, how's it going with that SP3 Update? Here's what I've noticed on my machine: I updated, then immediately noticed a dramatic slowdown in overall responsiveness. So, I then ran some disk utilities, updated all my PIO's (and reset them, too, which caused numerous beams to magically displace themselves all over the building..that was a joy to track down.) and that seemed to fix it, sort of, and temporarily. After a few hours of working, I have a general sluggishness again. The sluggishness is most noticeable when zooming in and out of my drawing, which is something I do several hundred times a day, so it's starting to get annoying. This afternoon I noticed the biggest thing yet: stacking all my floor layers and then rendering in OpenGL (also something I do a lot, with never a delay in SP2), took a full 68 seconds! What's that about? It was nearly instantaneous in SP2. This is repeatable. In SP2 I did not have any speed issues at all, and I was working full days without having to restart. I was able to perform all these functions (yes, even the OpenGL stack layer thingy) without any noticeable speed hit. I'd like to go back to SP2. At least it was stable. How do I do that? I do have a backup taken literally moments before I updated, but I'm uncertain what to back-date. Seems like there were lots of plug-ins replaced as well as the app itself. Is there a list? Can NNA please publish a list of what was updated and how to go back to SP2? Anyone else having these or any other issues? Thoughts? Thanks!
  12. mr. iagea

    SP3 Install

    Thanks, Jim, I will do that.
  13. It's important to keep in mind that layer links are superseded by DLVPs in v2008 Design Series. They can no longer be created, but can still be viewed (when created in files from earlier versions). Just an FYI, if you're working in v2008 or 2009.
  14. mr. iagea

    SP3 Install

    I'm still having slow zooming and viewport updating after updating to SP3. Even navigation seems to have slowed down some. It's really noticeable now, and I cannot work for longer than a couple of hours before I have to clear out caches and restart the app. Occasionally when I select a VP for updating, click the update button, nothing happens. This is also new. I've already run disk utilities after updating, as well as updated my plug-ins and reset them all. I did not have this problem with SP2. Anyone else experiencing this? Thanks!
  15. mr. iagea

    SP3 Install

    I updated to SP3 last night, and immediately noticed a significant slowdown for zooming. It takes about 1-1.5 seconds for the new zoom resolution to "lock", whereas before the update, zooming was pretty smooth. I ran disk utilities, updating permissions and that seemed to fix it, although it does still seem a wee bit more sluggish when zooming. I had a possible file corruption issue that took place. After the upgrade, I was unable to import classes from the file that I was working on just before the upgrade. Other files as sources were fine (not v2008 files, which I think is a big mistake on NNA's part, not supporting their own files!). The solution was to run the two update commands: Update Plug-in Objects and Reset Plug-Ins. I saved out a new version of the file, and was then able to import classes to a new file from that "cleaned" file. Y'all may want to watch for this, and perhaps run these commands, as the updater installs many replaced structural Plug-Ins. Just an FYI. Other than that, the update went smoothly and all seems good. The custom door leaf bug is still unfixed, though. . Oh well, can't get 'em all in the first pass.
  16. Keith, I think you may be confusing two separate things. Correct me if I'm wrong, and bear with me if you know some of this already. Layer linking has been essentially superseded by Viewports, which is a way to create "snapshots" of entire layers or portions of layers for use elsewhere in a project. There are Design Layer Viewports (DLVPs) and Sheet Layer Viewports (SLVPs). Each have unique functionality. Read the online help system for more clarification. I think you'll find that they are quite essential to a good workflow. For an architectural project, a common use of SLVPs is to create final sheets for printing. For example, if a first floor plan is designed on a discrete design layer, one can then create a Sheet Layer Viewport of that layer and select which sheet to place it on. The resulting SLVP can be moved and positioned as precisely as any other object, in this regard behaving in the same way a grouped set of objects does. Of course, changes made to the relevant design layer are reflected dynamically in the VP. Viewports' real power comes by being able to set the visibility of layers and classes all separately for each VP. To preserve the model built on a design layer, we'll do the dimensioning in the Annotation space of the SLVP, as Michael mentioned, rather than on the design layer. This way, dimensioning can be done between any of the layers that you set to be visible in the SLVP. A great way to think of viewports is to consider them as mirrors or, as the name implies, views of portions of your project. Stacking layers is a way to "glue" design layers together visually. In the above example, I'll create three floor plans on three separate design layers. I then set each of them to be visible, click the Stack Layers button (next to the Render Mode menu in the Viewbar, or select "Stack Layers" from the View menu), and then when I rotate the model around using any of the 3D views and tools, the stacked layers will move together, preserving the relationships between objects on different layers. This gives the appearance of a cohesive model on screen. After I'm done spinning my model around, I usually go back to Top/Plan view, then select "Align Layer Views" from the View menu, so that all the layers go back to their "flat" state and I can continue working without some surprises (try not doing this and see what happens). So, you see they are two different functions. Viewports, nee layer links, are for "aliasing" sections of a project. Stacking layers is a model visualization function. At least that's how I most commonly use them. Finally, to address the dimensioning and polygon issues. Even when you've stacked layers and are in a 3D view, dimensions, polygons and polylines will remain in 2D because they don't have a Z-axis plane for VW to work with in 3D. This is another reason why it's better to dimension using SLVPs. This is not true of all kinds of modeling, but it is very true for architectural modeling. So, if you want an object such as a rectangle to work in a 3D relationship with the rest of your model, you must extrude it first. Select the rectangle, then select "Extrude" from the "Model" menu, give it a Z-axis height, then click OK. Then it will behave like a 3D object and work in proper relationship with the rest of your 3D objects. HTH.
  17. Text (font formatting) classes, or the option to have a text sub-class attachable to a "master" class (any of what we now normally refer to as classes), would go a long way to helping unify a project's appearance. I am constantly having to set and reset a font for things like door and window labels, not to mention dimensions (should definitely have a font formatting option). This gets old after a while. I wish I could generate a group of font classes, similar to the way we set up classes now, except use font face, size, style and paragraphing attributes. That way, I could assign them to existing classes and/or objects, and not have to go in and change discrete objects (isn't that what classes are for, anyway? ).
  18. I restart my machine nightly, using a crontab that runs some maintenance scripts and clears out caches?pretty much the same thing that Onyx and/or Cocktail do. The exception to that practice is when my machine crashes. Then, I always restart at that point, as well. Just habit, I guess.
  19. I tried to get walls to be what I've wanted, and the demolition class is a big one. I think the classing implementation in VW is highly frustrating, and with walls (and especially viewports), one must occasionally set a class in as many as eight different locations so that it can show up properly in different parts of the drawing. Grr. Anyway, I tried duplicating the walls and then simply changing the component classes to the demo class. That worked for one drawing, but not for all. Then I thought to do what islandmon suggested, by simply making a demolition wall set and saving that into my default template. I've now got 2x4 and 2x6 demo walls that have a dashed line and hatch fill, and ALSO use the A-DEMO class. Now, I just draw my existing conditions floor plans, copy the walls that will be demoed, paste those onto a demo design layer and re-style them to the appropriate wall style. This seems to work pretty well, but like a few other things in this app, requires a little work in the front end. See the image below for an example. Another way I've been trying is by simply setting the walls component attributes to use the container class attributes, that way I can set the walls to be that style, but then the appearance can change depending on what container class I set them to.
  20. Yes, notice that I said there are no vulnerabilities in the OS. Safari is an HTTP client, not an OS. Internet Exploder for Windows is so deeply embedded now that it IS Windows, hence the security troubles for the OS. Nice work, though, picking the one in a handful of computer geeks capable of hacking into Safari. So what if you need a few suction cups. This machine is so excellent on my desktop, I don't care. And, why replace a hard drive when you can plug and play an external USB 2.0 drive just by plugging it in and having it show up on the desktop, ready to work, within 3 seconds? The Mac OS allows external drive boot services quite easily. And as far as any data loss from the hypothetical failure, y'all DO backup hourly using the FREE backup software included with every Mac OS X install, right? Of course. Of course. And the RAM thing, the part they don't tell you is that Unix is so efficient with RAM that you don't need 32GB to run MS Word. I run Vectorworks, Illustrator, Photoshop and my mail and web clients all just fine on my "measly" 4GB. Also notice that I did not say anything bad about Windows that's not an "opinion" thing (SMB idiosyncrasies are a simple fact), just what's good about Macs. People use Windows all day and are perfectly content with it. Far be it from me to steer them away. Good for them, I say. The IT support industry needs a reason to stay employed, and Microsoft has been happily providing it for them for the last 15 years. And, by the way, the Yugo was garbage, and was not cute at all. If people weren't smart enough to do the research and discover that on their own before plonking down the cash, then that's their loss. Caveat Emptor, my good man. Folks can bash all they want, but I will still sit here and get my work done happily on my Mac, along with all the other people who ARE cool enough to be Mac people
  21. UGH. No doubt! Seems like this is a common enough activity, it should be easier to access than that. Hmm, I just want to get rid of old data that is irrelevant. If that's the ONLY way I can remove old data, then that IS bad programming. Ugh x 2. Thanks for the assistance, Pat. I'll see what I can do.
  22. resist! resist the urge to contribute to this thread! naaahhh. Try this wee experiment: Plug in a printer, scanner, phone, camera, oh just about anything into a Windows machine. Don't bother loading drivers, or software. Then, try to make it work. You'll spend all night. Do the same with a Mac. It'll work. No restarting. No drivers. No conflicts. And it'll do it in a stable and elegant way. This is not true obviously for everything, but for about 95% of everything that is commonly used in daily computing. Other stuff: Mac OS X is a true multi-threaded environment, based on one of the oldest operating systems in existence. It works, and when it doesn't, the reason is obvious and logged in simple english. You can go read what happened and why in the log files without having to be a systems analyst. There are no "networking issues" with Macs. Macs are UNIX-based, which is the OS that practically started the wave of computer networking. I have years of experience as a network admin for a design firm where we had about 60 Macs, 30 Windows machines and about 30 Unix machines. All these were able to talk to each other and "see" servers and services just fine. Anyone who tells you differently has simply not had the time and experience doing what it takes to make things work in that complex of an environment. With Unix's superior SMB networking modules well in place and supported, Macs are easily capable of handling the overly-complicated Windows networking protocols. Like adding peripherals, Macs are definitely "plug-and-play". Mac OSX does not, and has not for years, get viruses. Windows is plagued with security holes that are constantly exploited. The reasons for this are too involved for this thread, but those characteristics simply do not exist with as much vulnerability in the Mac OS. There are macro viruses that ride in on Microsoft products like Excel and Word, and there are certainly viruses that can be run when an unwitting user downloads and launches an application that is meant to install a virus, but that will be true of any computer. The OS, however, is very stable against viral attack. Macs are PostScript native. You can create and print PDF's without any other software needed. Macs have an intuitive and simple interface, a huge following and plenty of support. There are very few applications that are not available on a Mac these days. They're just really cool looking. Oh, one other thing: AppleScript. It wipes the floor with WSH. Polls have been done. Long-time PC users who have switched to Macs are happy with the choice, become re-energized about using the computers and get more creative work done. Long-time Mac users who switch to PC's often go back to the Mac within a very short period of time. Anyone who uses both will tell you that Macs just work with less frustration and more satisfaction. I've used both environments for decades. Macs have always been superior in many ways. There are zealots in every camp. I choose Macs. I'm happy. That's it.
  23. Anyone know where is the master Issue manager data kept? I am having trouble with "old" entries which I had long ago deleted populating my Issues whenever I add a new entry. I want to simply wipe out (or at least manage) the data in the Issue Manager. When I edit the issue data for a specific sheet (via the OIP), I can get to the data and it's fine, but I want to apply this data to all my sheets, which I can only do through the File > Issue Manager command. This is where I am having the trouble of old data automatically being plugged in (and sometimes even the entry I just put in not showing up at all, but being replaced by the old data. That's bad programming, people). Thanks!
  24. the dims are on the same layer. in many cases, upon closer inspection, i notice that even the dims are incorrect, placing the actual dimension in the incorrect location. layers and classes were set to show/snap/modify others. this tool needs work.
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