Naming Styles

[LarryAZ]

How do you name a style so it shows in your class list as Style Wood, or Style Stone, instead of #1 and #2. If I rename the class the plugin just creates a new class with the old number.

Thanks

[Jonathan Pickup]

yes, what you need to do is to edit the list of classes that VectorWorks uses.

The way to do this is to edit the plug-in object that you use to make the door. It?s posible but slightly complex. Then if you make any changes you will have to remake the correction if VectorWorks is reinstalled or updated.

If you really want to do this I can give you more information.

[mike m oz]

Jonathon

I have tried this on the Circular Stair PIO - this was after I had problems with not being able to have it recognise the selected finish for the stringers.

The circular stair has only 4 components which you can apply finishes to - each with a pop-up list of None and Style-1 through to Style-15.

After I had finished being 'clever' (or so I thought) renaming the choices I discovered that it would only recognise selections from the first pop-up list, and therefore add these to the Classes list in the document.

From this I assume that each of the pop-ups for the NNA PIO's have to have the same list to select from, OR to put it another way that you are still restricted to generic names rather than names which actually communicate something about the component and improve the understanding of users

I will admit I haven't tested it on any of their other pop-ups, but if it is the case across the board then it is absolutely useless.

[mike m oz]

So that is where I went wrong

I was playing with a stair that was already in the file and that already had all four components.

I will try it again to see what happens - yes it does appear to work as long as you choose the component finish after you have created the component.

I assume the logic for this is to prevent unwanted classes being created - wouldn't it be better and less confusing for users though if you could do it in either order. Additional unwanted classes is less of an issue for me than having the problem of a class apparently not being created because I didn't do things in the right order.

I am an architect and like most of my kind we do not do things in an absolutely logical linear fashion. if you are interested look at the Myers-Briggs characteristics of architects vs engineers - it illustrates our different ways of working and thus why the traditional tension between our two professions occurs.

Now all I need to do is test it once I have renamed the four separate components with class pop-up names that are meaninful. If I don't repost it worked.

The better solution for me though would be for the PIO's to come with meaningful class names in the pop-up lists.

[ 02-09-2005, 08:24 PM: Message edited by: mike m oz ]

[klinzey]

Unless there is geometry for that component is created the class won't be created. You can set the column finish to the column-1 class, but the column-1 class will not get created till the stair draws the column for the first time. Also all the Finishes may not apply to all the configurations of the stair.