Vectorworks and precision

[Christiaan]

Following on from this discussion, where it was noted that we can now work at a different precision than that of the dimensions:

http://techboard.vectorworks.net/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=166697

...this is handy because it means we can work at a high level of accuracy, therefore avoiding associated problems with unwanted lines in rendered images where walls etc. don't line up exactly.

But wouldn't it be better if we could actually just control the precision of a file? So for instance instead of having to work at very high levels of accuracy we could just restrict the actual accuracy to 1 or 2 decimal places.

Maybe this would have huge implications, I don't know, but it seems completely daft to be using 10 decimal places to design buildings, which can have tolerances of up to 30 mm.

[Christiaan]

One problem with working at an accuracy of 10 decimal places is you can end up with numbers like this in your OIP too: 1.79e03

[Christiaan]

Any thoughts from those who know more?

[bcd]

I can't repeat it but try

Untick Trailing Zeros in the File>Document Settings>Units dialog

[Christiaan]

Not so much that but my original thesis in first post.

[Dieter @ DWorks]

I also used the max. precision to see that all is correctly drawn. But It drove me nuts to see that in many cases, things where 0.00000001 off. So I switched back to less precision.

[Christiaan]

So wouldn't it make sense to be able to restrict the precision of VW files? Would this be possible without a huge rewrite of VW code?

[bcd]

This is a very interesting question bringing together drawing / material/ component / construction tolerances etc and should also be considered together with collision detection and gap allowances.

It's conceivable that every object drawn is associated to a particular tolerance grade and that templates can be established for project type with typical preset TGs.

Also possible would be for objects to have a magnetic radius, and auto-snap together.

In the meantime, setting the Snap Grid to 25mm / 5mm / 1mm to control the accuracy of your file via the Document Settings>Units dialogue may be helpful.

[Christiaan]

In the meantime, setting the Snap Grid to 25mm / 5mm / 1mm to control the accuracy of your file via the Document Settings>Units dialogue may be helpful.

I did wonder about that but you would run into problems when you model/draw anything that isn't at a right angle I would have thought.

[Christiaan]

Interesting that ArchiCAD only lets you work to one decimal place when working in millimetres (2, 3 and 4 are greyed out). Is this perhaps part of the reason why ArchiCAD is so much faster/more efficient when it comes to things like rendering large models in OpenGL?