Parent Class Visibility

[Mark Aceto]

I just watched the excellent Hidden Treasures Seminar presented by @BSeigel, and was thinking maybe there's a setting hiding in plain site that I've missed all these years... 

 

See attached screenshots:

1. Some Child Classes are set to Invisible
2. Parent Class is set to Invisible to hide that entire department
3. Parent Class is set to Visible to restore #1 settings (but overrides them)

Is there a "nondestructive" way to change Parent Class visibility? The reason I continue to use Layers for Departments is because I'll have my Classes set to all manner of Visible / Gray / Invisible, so I can easily hide an entire Department by hiding it's Layer. Then, when I restore that Department's visibility, the Classes aren't affected.

 

In addition to using VW the way it was intended (Layers are "where" and Classes are "what"), this also helps myriad other areas, like exporting to DWG.

 

The goal is to have a proper Layer hierarchy like

• Production Air
• Production Stage
• Production Ground

Surely, there must be a way to do this that I'm overlooking.

 

Edited March 26, 2020 by Mark Aceto

[halfcoupler]

On 3/25/2020 at 10:30 PM, Mark Aceto said:

Is there a "nondestructive" way to change Parent Class visibility?

 

Hi Mark,

 

I think I know what you mean, I always use child classes to switch to certain detail levels of presentation, for example switching of the decks of a scaffolding stage to show the underlaying structure or showing trusses only in their axis to project  their position on ground plans.

Switching forward and backward these classes is always a question of mutiple clicks. My "tool of the day" for this is saved views that only contain settings for classes. By switching between these views you can keep the parent/child structure. Maybe this is what you are looking for ?

 

😀

 

 

[Mark Aceto]

10 hours ago, halfcouple said:

 

Hi Mark,

 

I think I know what you mean, I always use child classes to switch to certain detail levels of presentation, for example switching of the decks of a scaffolding stage to show the underlaying structure or showing trusses only in their axis to project  their position on ground plans.

Switching forward and backward these classes is always a question of mutiple clicks. My "tool of the day" for this is saved views that only contain settings for classes. By switching between these views you can keep the parent/child structure. Maybe this is what you are looking for ?

 

😀

 

 

 

Saved Views would certainly be a workaround but it would add as many clicks as it would save in the long run.

 

Another similar workaround I've been entertaining is Filter Views but that hits a law of diminishing returns pretty quickly too.

 

I'm really trying to work within the framework of how the app is designed / intended with a minimal amount of tweaking and fiddling, and just wondering if I'm missing a setting that's buried in some hidden document preferences menu (or even in hiding in plain sight but oft overlooked).