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Dashed Line Endings - Rounded/Square Option


ericjhberg

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Years ago I grew tired of asking for this, but since it is again brought up, I'll chime in.

This wish should extend to ALL Lines, Polygons/Polylines, in addition to Line Styles. Line End Cap, or Linecap, control has been lacking for more that two decades. It would be a HUGE graphical improvement over the current Round Linecap, which was a huge improvement over the original Square Pen. Actually, there should be three options for the Linecap: None, Square, and Round.

NONE would terminate a line with a square end, ending exactly at the endpoint of the line.

SQUARE would terminate a line with a square end (where side length = line width) that extends past the endpoint by 1/2 the width of the line.

ROUND would terminate a line with a circular end (where diameter = line width) that extends past the endpoint by 1/2 the width of the line. (Currently Implemented)

Additionally, the Linecap for each end of a line should be able to be set independently.

Thanks for posting this. I feel better already.

Raymond

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+1

Wasn't there some old pref that controlled line caps? Maybe disable quartz imaging or something like that? The pref offered choices for object mapping and transparency relative to each other and to the background, but it affected line caps, too, offering the square option described in Eric's and Ray's wishes.

I can't find it in VWX or MacOS Yosemite. But they might be there somewhere.

-B

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Originally MiniCAD/Vectorworks used a Square pen. This gave you square ends to the lines, but the lines were vertical and horizontal. In addition, the "apparent" thickness of the line was different for vertical and horizontal lines (where you got the edge of the square) versus diagonal lines where you diagonal of the square.

So, the option was added to use a round pen. This gave you the same weight for lines at any angle, but for high line weights the round ends is a problem.

I think this was Quartz on the Mac and maybe OpenGL on Windows. It appears this option has been removed in VW2016.

I think Raymond's request is very appropriate. While the existing way might match well with what physically happens when drafting with pens, why should we be limited in a computer to what would happen on a drafting board. Maybe when it was a 2D only program, but this is less and less appropriate as we move to more 3D modeling.

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I feel like I am asking elementary questions - but after searching I couldn't find the answer to what I am looking for.  I attached 2 images.  One from VWs and one from CAD.  Is there a way to make the end of lines square?  Also is there an easier way to make a line say 2 feet thick?  When we draw storm lines we make our lines the thickness of the pipes.  Also when we end the pipes into a headwall it would be nice if the pipes would be squared off so they are not rounded and protruding beyond the face of the headwall.  

 

Do we have to do math to figure out how many mils it takes to make a pipe 2' in a viewport depending on the scale?  Or do we need to start using mm?    

 

Thanks 

VWs pipes.JPG

CAD pipes.JPG

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2 hours ago, benboggs said:

I feel like I am asking elementary questions - but after searching I couldn't find the answer to what I am looking for.  I attached 2 images.  One from VWs and one from CAD.  Is there a way to make the end of lines square?  Also is there an easier way to make a line say 2 feet thick?  When we draw storm lines we make our lines the thickness of the pipes.  Also when we end the pipes into a headwall it would be nice if the pipes would be squared off so they are not rounded and protruding beyond the face of the headwall.  

 

Do we have to do math to figure out how many mils it takes to make a pipe 2' in a viewport depending on the scale?  Or do we need to start using mm?    

Ben,

In order to solve this issue, we have created custom linetypes that contain square polygons. They can be WORLD-based and scaled to any real-world dimension you want. I have attached a couple of files (BOX LINETYPE_v2017.vwx, BOX LINETYPE_v2016.vwx) with an example linetype. You can edit the linetype in the Resource Browser/Manager and edit the Geometry of the line.

 

This has been our work around to square line ends. The issue with this is that they don't appear when a class or layer is in GRAY state. The class must be active. You could create gray polygons inside the line type, but not gray the class. Also. it can get a little wonky for complex linework, so I would only recommend it on long, staight or broad arc lines.

 

This is not a solution for the wishlist request of square line ends, but a work around in the meantime.

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2 hours ago, ericjhberg said:

Ben,

In order to solve this issue, we have created custom linetypes that contain square polygons. They can be WORLD-based and scaled to any real-world dimension you want. I have attached a couple of files (BOX LINETYPE_v2017.vwx, BOX LINETYPE_v2016.vwx) with an example linetype. You can edit the linetype in the Resource Browser/Manager and edit the Geometry of the line.

 

This has been our work around to square line ends. The issue with this is that they don't appear when a class or layer is in GRAY state. The class must be active. You could create gray polygons inside the line type, but not gray the class. Also. it can get a little wonky for complex linework, so I would only recommend it on long, staight or broad arc lines.

 

This is not a solution for the wishlist request of square line ends, but a work around in the meantime.

I had the same thought and suggested that they make line types for each pipe size if needed.

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Just for history sake, the reason for the round line ends is that VW draws with a "round pen". Long ago VW (and Minicad before that) used a square pen and most users complained that diagonal lines were thicker than horizontal or vertical lines with the same line weight (they were cutting across the square pen and were thicker).  The round pen solved the thickness of the diagonal, but created the problem of having the ends show as curved (as they would on a real drawing board with a real pen), rather than as a "thin rectangular polygon" as we sometimes would like them to be.

 

The round pen end is great for normal/thin lines, but is a problem when you have very thick lines where it shows it can be a problem. As stated above, the solution is to use a custom line type with polygons or use the Double Line tool and the Create Polygon mode to generate a polygon that shows as you want.

 

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