Not compatible contraints

[Musisback]

When I try to contraint the length of and object indirectly (a rectangle for example) it says that the contraint is not compatible. However, the length of the rectangle is not already contrainted. It should thus work fine. Does anyone know how to let the objects change there shape when they are contrainted by external contraints?

Edited April 1, 2010 by musisback

[Pat Stanford]

Are you sure there are not already other constraints? I just tried in VW2010 and it works fine.

Go the the Modify Menu:Edit Contrstraints and make sure there really is not a constraint on the rectangle.

Do you have associative dimensions? Those act as constraints also, but I did not have a problem with that case either.

Please add a signature (My Stuff: Edit Profile above) and let us know what version of VW and your hardware and operating system you are running and maybe we can help figure out what is going on.

Have you tried a single rectangle in a new blank file?

[Musisback]

I tried with a blank document, it still doesn't work. I attached a example. You can see how the rectangle are contrainted. If I change de contraint of the big rectangle, it should change de height of the small rectangle to keep all the contraints correct. Instead, the gives de error message ''the attempted changes of the contraints are not compatible with the other contraints of the drawing.''

Does that work for you?

thanks

[Pat Stanford]

I can't make that condition work here either. I think it is "overconstrained", but should not be. If I delete the long constraint and resize the large rectangle it rotates the small rectangle to keep the correct constraints. Not the desired outcome.

If I remove the long constraint and put in a parallel constraint between the vertical sides of the two rectangles and keep the two small distance constraints, when I change the large rectangle the small rectangle changes correctly.

How are you "changing" the large constraint? Do you really need all three constraints or could you get by with just a dimension for the large one? With a dimension on the large distance, I can change the size of the large rectangle and get the small one to adjust and can still see the large distance. If I try to adjust the large rectangle by changing the dimension (associative dimension), I get the error message.

If this is something you really need, you should file a bug report. I think the problem is really with VW trying to interpret you design intent. How does it figure out which order to use the constraints in? The large rect. is specified by BOTH the large constraint and the size of the small rect and the two constraints. When you change only one of those things it has a conflict. Perhaps it should be smarter, but right now it is not.

[Musisback]

I guess, it is not smart enough. That's a shame because if I need to change a single dimension of an object, it would need much more work and time. The goal a contraints is preciselly to avoid that. I have worked with other CAD software before, and they handled that just fine...

Anyway if VW 2010 does handle it and someone knows how, please tell me.

Edited April 6, 2010 by musisback

[Pat Stanford]

As I said, file a bug report. If it is not doing what you need NNA wants to know so they can fix it for the future. If you don't tell them what does not work, they probably will never come across it to fix it.