Eons to regen viewports w/ 2d fills and 3d objects.

[LarryO]

I've created this page in VW2024 and thought if I tried to do the export in VW2026 it might export to pdf in a reasonable time frame but no such luck. Both versions are running at over 30 minutes without producing any output. page E2

9210 Constance House.vwx

[Pat Stanford]

How much memory do you have in your computer?  This generated in about a minute on a Mac G3 with 128 GB of RAM under VW2026.

 

 

9210 Constance House v2026.pdf

[LarryO]

HP Z4 with Intel Xeon W-2123 @ 3.5GHz with 16 GB RAM NVIDIA Quadro P2000 5GB VRAM Dedicated

[LarryO]

I missed mentioning that upon import into VW2026 from VW2024 I had to reset all the background rendering for details 3 through 12 to dashed hidden line and tick the display 2d fills box. And change #2 to shaded.

While #2 renders quick enough, trying to update just one of the dashed hidden line renders with 2d fills on is not getting to completion after more than 15 minutes.

 

It is looking like I have to use wire frame and hope the reviewers do not get too confused by all the lines that shouldn't be there.

[LarryO]

Take #7 for instance. set background render to dashed hidden line and check display 2D fills, then attempt to update the view port.

While that is processing do the same for #3 and wait a minute before pressing update to see if #7 finishes quickly. #7 might partially regen but not come into focus. Which is the point at which I pressed update for #3. This is the memory use after more than 15  minutes while processing only 2 viewports.

[LarryO]

Program cannot even terminate the renders to close the file. Seems to save ok but I have to kill the VWs to close the file window and open another file.

[Pat Stanford]

@Jesse Cogswell Any chance you can test on Windows and see if you can make the PDF or if it hangs?  I don't have a Windows install to test.

 

@LarryO Since this processed well on Mac, if we can get another Win user to test it would help define if it is your installation or a VW Windows problem.

 

I would consider potential corruption in your User Folder/Preferences as a possibility.  Maybe consider some of the following steps to help in troubleshooting.

 

Quote

Other standard trouble shooting steps are:

 

1.  Check if the same issue occurs in a new blank document.  If the issue does not exist, import half the layers (with the objects) from the problem file. If the problem exists then you know know it is with that half the layers.  Repeat with a smaller number of layers.  If the problem doesn’t exist import the other half the layers and see if the problem exists.  Sheet Layers can be manually created in the new file and then viewports and objects Copied/Pasted into the new file. Bring Design Layers in before moving the Sheet Layers and Viewports.

 

2. Run the Vectorworks Updater (in the Vectorworks folder in Applications folder). Click on the Advanced button on the right center and then choose Repair. Let this run and see if it solves the problem.

 

3. In Vectorworks Preferences click the Reset button at the bottom left.  This will clear everything in your preferences except your serial number, so you will have to set things back to how you like them. Restart VW and see the problem is fixed.

 

4. Make sure you are not running any "helper" apps that might be interfering with VW.  One way to check is to boot into "Safe Mode".  On a Mac, "Turn on or restart your Mac, then immediately press and hold the Shift key until you see the login window. Log in to your Mac. You might be asked to log in again. On either the first or second login window, you should see “Safe Boot” in the menu bar." Check and see if the problem is gone. If not, then quit VW and restart in normal mode. If the problem is solved then check and see what apps are started a boot time that could be causing problems and turn them off. Anti-Virus software is also a potential source of issues.

 

5. In Vectorworks Preferences:User Folder pane click the Reveal in Finder button to see you user folder in the Finder.  Go back to VW and quit.  Rename your user folder. Restart VW.  It will create a new User folder for you.  Check if the problem is solved.  If it is not, quit VW, delete the new user folder, and change the name back on the original folder.  If the problem is solves then you have to decide what information you need to copy from the original user folder to the new one.

 

6. Uninstall and reinstall VW.

 

[Jesse Cogswell]

Just tried this on VW2026 on my Windows machine.  Took less than 10 seconds to export the PDF.  I no longer have VW2024 installed on my machine, so I can't check that.

9210 Constance House v2026.pdf

[LarryO]

9210 Constance House.vwx

Here is the VVW2024 file again with the expected dashed hidden line background rendering set and the display 2d fills checked for all the applicable detail viewports. Give it a try with this version. I'm not getting any completion to updating even one detail viewport using VW2026 update 3.1 build 850644

 

 

Fortunately I am not at the final submission stage so for today I simply used shaded rendering.

 

 

[LarryO]

Two teapots running in circles. 😞

[LarryO]

I had just finished the update to 2026 31.3.1 (update 3.1)

The repair procedure in the updater app found no files requiring repair.

 

Interesting to note that there are two tea pots appearing when trying to update the viewport.

I attempt to close the file without saving, one of the teapots disappears as VW attempts to cancel the rendering but the VW locks up before the second one has a chance to be removed. Back to TaskManager to kill VW.

[Pat Stanford]

Even updating one viewport at a time is taking over 5 minutes (all I had patience for before I force quit). 

 

I have not looked at what is in the viewport that could be taking so long.

[LarryO]

Thanks Pat, it appears that this issue is bigger than us.

Given that this locks up when one wants to render the 2D fills I suspect one or both in combination, the fill pattern used for the wood and or the hatch used for the concrete. It may also be the way this render option is being implemented. There could be two functions chasing (processing) each other's data output.

 

[michaelk]

I think there are three things going on:

 

1.  The concrete hatches are kind of busy.  They are page based scale and not even rendering usefully in the area available.  I tried just deleting those hatches and it got better.

2.  The Sheet DPI is set to 600.  I tried turning it down to 150 and the speed was much more reasonable, with no noticeable degradation in the image.

3.  The smoothing angle in the render settings is 5º.  You can easily go up to 20º or 30º and not notice the difference.  

[Jesse Cogswell]

I have a bit more time today so I have spent some time diving more into the drawing.  These are the things that I found so far:

• On VW2026 on my Windows 11 machine, I could not successfully get a Dashed Hidden Line viewport to render with 3/E2, but I could get a standard Hidden Line no problem and pretty quickly.
• If I turned off the MATERIAL - CONCRETE class, it would take about 30 seconds but I could get a the viewport to complete the update.
• If I did a class override on the MATERIAL - CONCRETE hatch to a more simple hatch (I used the Cast Iron HF hatch), it would successfully complete.
• If I left the MATERIAL - CONCRETE class as original and turned off the Hatching class, the update would complete after 20 seconds or so.

With these observations, I opened up the Model design layer by double-clicking the problematic Viewport and selected the Design Layer option.  This opens the Design Layer with the same class visibilities that the Viewport is using.  I think I have found your issue.

 

You have two overlapping Polyline objects in 3D space, each with a hatch.  One is in the MATERIAL - CONCRETE class, the other in the Hatching class.  Because these are both occupying the same 3D space, it leads to something called "Z Fighting", where two objects are occupying the exact same planar space and VW can't tell which to render.  It looks like this in Shaded view:

 

 

When rendering in Hidden Line, VW seems to have little trouble with the overlap, letting the Hatching object win:

 

 

But with Dashed Hidden Line, it tries to render them both, which is causing the hang.

 

Here are the solutions:

• Turn off the Hatching class in the Viewport if it is always going to be cropped out.
• Delete the polyline object in the Hatching class if it is not needed.
• Use Modify -> Clip Surface to "clip" the Hatching polyline from the MATERIAL - CONCRETE polyline.
  • Select the Hatching polyline, the run Modify -> Send -> Send to Front
  • Select both polylines
  • Run Modify -> Clip Surface
• In 3D space, move the Hatching polyline out from the MATERIAL - CONCRETE polyline by 0.1mm so that they are no longer occupying the same space.  This allows both polylines to exist and the Viewport to update in Dashed Hidden Line:

 

After moving the polylines away from each other, I was able to update all Viewports on the sheet.  It took a little time (around 20 seconds for each Detail Viewport), but I think this has been your issue.

 

 

If you run into any other Viewports that fail to update, be on the lookout for overlapping polylines.

 

9210 Constance House Sheet E2.pdf

Edited February 28 by Jesse Cogswell

[ashot]

All is good for Shaded Rendering, the problem occurs when using Dashed Hidden Line.

 

So, for Dashed Hidden Line Rendering:

For Viewports 1 and 2 - I found no issue.

For Viewports 3 to 12 I select them one by one and then deselected two Classes: 

Fasteners - (3D)

MATERIAL - METAL New

Now Everything renders in a split of second

 

So, please check what is wrong with Dashed Hidden Line Rendering for these 2 classes

 

Attached is VW file V24

9210 Constance House v2024.vwx

[ashot]

I found solution for one class:

MATERIAL - METAL New

Changing Material Hatch to Solid and Use at Creation

Now when Turning On this class for all Viewports

Dashed Hidden Line Rendering takes from 2 seconds to 16 seconds

 

Still looking for solution for class Fasteners - (3D)

9210 Constance House v2024.vwx

Edited February 28 by ashot

[Jesse Cogswell]

Fascinating.  Going back to the original file, removing the Fasteners - (3D) class makes the Viewport instantly update, even with the overlapping polys (good find, @ashot).  I don't have a ton of experience with the Lag Screw tool, and I don't recall ever running into this issue before, but the only objects using that class in the Viewport are the six Lag Screw - 3D objects in the M1 symbol.

 

I went into the M1's Edit 3D Components view, selected the six Lag Screws and ungrouped them, resulting in each screw becoming a Sweep (shaft) and Generic Solid (head).  I selected each head and shaft, used Model -> Add Solid to make them a single Solid Addition, then used Modify -> Convert -> Convert to Generic Solid to make each lag screw into a simple Generic Solid.  Now each Viewport takes about a second to update.

 

The MATERIAL - METAL New class didn't affect speed either way for me, though the material hatch isn't needed for these viewports since it only appears in the source objects of Extrudes, so you could probably make it Solid as a Viewport override.

 

I think there may be something wrong with the Lag Screw - 3D tool when used with Dashed Hidden Line Detail Viewports.

Edited February 28 by Jesse Cogswell

[ashot]

Inside of  M1 Symbol with six Lag Screw - 3D objects,

I selected all of them and in OIP changed Display at Detail Level from All to Low Detail only

This is not a good solution, since Viewport at Detail Medium Level will not show Lag Screws anyway, so deselected class has the same effect..

 

So the best is just convert Lag Screws to Generic Solids, as Jesse suggested.

Edited February 28 by ashot

[LarryO]

On 2/28/2026 at 9:38 AM, Jesse Cogswell said:

You have two overlapping Polyline objects in 3D space, each with a hatch.  One is in the MATERIAL - CONCRETE class, the other in the Hatching class.  Because these are both occupying the same 3D space, it leads to something called "Z Fighting", where two objects are occupying the exact same planar space and VW can't tell which to render.  It looks like this in Shaded view:

Hmm, that is an interesting aspect of rendering priorities I had not been aware of beforehand.

I was anticipating that I could get both hatch patterns to be visible at this location. I had placed the concrete hatch first anticipating it would be in the background vis a vis 2d hierarchy protocol and removed the background of the second hatch.

I adjusted the placement as you suggested moving it 0.5 forward of the concrete hatch and for good luck removed the background of the concrete hatch, but ultimately was unable to get #1 viewport to render it as Hidden Line rendering. Increased smoothing to 20°. Only in wireframe was I able to see both patterns and while shaded rendering completed it too masked the concrete pattern with the other hatch instead of showing through. Shaded rendering does not seem to recognize alpha channels of hatches.

[Jesse Cogswell]

@LarryO While I saw a small performance increase from spacing out the hatches, the real issue is with your Lag Screw fasteners.  For some reason VW has a really hard time rendering them in Dashed Hidden Line while inside Detail Viewports.  In a post above, I found that if you Ungroup the screws and add the geometry with Model -> Add Solid, the Viewport rendering time dropped from 20 seconds to less than 1 second.

 

It might be worth sending your drawing in to VW as a possible bug.