volumetric properties

[Benson Shaw]

In VW 11 for Mac, Volumetric Properties tool yields object volume in cubic inches and area in square inches. What is process to change units in the display panel? eg to cubic feet and square feet.

[mike m oz]

A suggestion NNA

Please modify the object info routines so that you can include a checkbox in the OIP that allows the user to see the information in sensible units like feet or metres.

For us metric users (95% of the world's population) the OIP currently returns numbers which are nigh on unreadable.

Being able to have a check box so that the areas can be returned as sq metres, and the volumes as cubic metres, would be a real boon. I'm sure even your USA users would appreciate being able to nominate the units as being sq ft and cu ft respectively.

And while we are about it can you also please produce a version for the rest of the world that has metric units as the default units, rather than feet and inches.

For most of the people in the world feet and inches are about as relevant and understandable as ancient Egyptian cubits. Even in countries with English colonial heritage, like Australia, most people under 45 don't have a comprehension of feet and inches. To them it is just ancient history.

I did read somewhere once that you in the USA committed to adopting the metric system back in the 1800s, and you still haven't done it. How about getting on with it - it really isn't that hard and the benefits are enormous. Australia converted to the metric system in the early 70's - it took just 3 years from start to finish!