Viewport placement

[Travis]

Dav13,

Why not just create a layer link? If you need to trace at a differenct scale than the original model, make two layers visible with the layer link on the "back" layer. Each layer can have its own scale. It's possible that no link is necessary--just trace on another design layer that's above the original.

Since, presumably, you're only going to trace a portion of the model, does it really matter that *you* can see all of it while you're tracing? If it does, clip a smaller shape (rectangle?) out of a larger one that extends beyond your view (size of screen, probably); delete the smaller one and give the larger one a solid fill (probably white). Bring this mask in front of the layer link. Now go to your "tracing" layer and you're off to work.

We generally try to "work" in the Viewports as little as possible, doing all modeling and drafting on Design Layers.

Good luck,

[ 03-07-2005, 02:09 PM: Message edited by: Travis ]

[Dav13]

Thanks Travis.

Yes, I do use layer links but those you cannot crop.

So Viewports could have been a solution, but it's a little impaired..albeit a great addition I was waiting for many years.

[Ray Libby]

Make a viewport of the original floor plan, and another of the floor plan to enlarge in a separate viewport on a sheet layer. Draw your elevation in the design layer and make another viewport for that. Why viewports are not used in the design layer was discussed and Nemestchek has some good reasons not to. Do all your drawing in the design layer and all viewing and printing from the sheet layer. I find viewports very flexible, and dynamic etc. I think you are limiting yourself by not understanding fully how to implement them.

[Dav13]

Ray,

"draw your elevation in the design layer..."

then we are back to pre-vieports: if I draw the elevations using the design floor plan, which I cannot rotate or crop, what's the advantage of viewports, just display/ print? I want to use them to build other elements using their capabilities of cropping, scaling, rotating. That's the point of referencing portions.

I am sure Nemetschek has its reasons, but even a $ 300 TurboCad somehow overcame them... not to mention Microstation 95 (as in 1995) which allowed then to worgroup reference something and crop, scale, rotate it in the same space where you draw.

[Dav13]

Travis,

sorry I didn't see your complete reply before about masking layer links.

I have been doing the "polygon mask" trick for years:

it's very unsofisticated, slow and why should we make this "patches" when the viewports could do the trick?

Also, why is it a problem that I see the whole plan?

Well, when you have a very large and complex commercial or institutional floor plan and you need to draw interior elevations of the restrooms in the middle of it, it is a hell of a pain getting the whole thing around your elevations and masking is ...well not cad-like.

Thanks anyway, that's what I do for now and also I make the restrooms plans symbols and copy paste rotate scale as needed.

[Ray Libby]

I don't understand. What is the reason not to draw the elevation in design layer? How does this keep you from using the capability to crop, scale or rotate viewports?

[Dav13]

In the design layer, where I have the "real" floor plan with all the other info,

I don't want to rotate it to be aligned with the elevations.

I want to rotate a referenced copy of it.

And if I use viewports, I will have to draw the elevations within the viewport

as annotations, which is slow, cumbersome, deal with all the classes settings and then I have to cut them out of there and paste them on another layer once I am done...too complex when all it'd take is the capability of pasting a viewport on any design layer, set the scale of the layer and draw from there the elevations.

[eric.rktek]

Dav13,

It really sounds less like you need viewports in design layers, as simply the ability to best handle and manipulate layer links and or WGR. Being able to easily crop and rotate layer links would increase the power and flexibility of VW tremendously. I think this has become my new soapbox. I try to get my feedback in on this issue every chance I can. Once one has experiences these capabilities in other programs, it is very frustrating to work in an environment without them. I think they are almost as powerful as the multiple undo feature, which took many generations of MiniCad to finaly incorporate. I can't imagine working without that now.

[Dav13]

Hello,

I am sure other users already talked about this issue.

I do find very limitative having to place view ports only in a presentation sheet while many times I rather have them close (at a different scale) to the source layer drawing, in the same sheet (detail enlargement).

Presentation sheets are not really meant to be drawn in and sometimes I might need a view port just with the purpose of drawing an elevation for instance. I tried to do that drawing in ?annotation? edit mode, but it was so slow and cumbersome to enter/exit the edit mode. The presentation layer is in another scale from the view port, so working from outside the viewport doesn?t exist?

I know could use WGR and LL to do that, or even symbols, but those options don't allow me to encompass just the portion of the drawing I need.

View port need be more flexible and dynamic, fast and peaceable everywhere. I understand there's a concern of self-referencing, of redundancy, but there are ways of working around that as other software do.

Any idea on that?

Thank you.

[Kevin]

Dav13, I am not sure just what you are saying or asking.

Viewports in my opinion, are an improvement. You mention detail enlargements. This is what viewports excels at. You can chose any part of a drawing with a cropped viewport and display it at any scale.

Perhaps you could be more specific in your request or opinion.

[Dav13]

Kevin,

in a nutshell, I would like to be able to create an enlarged plan viewport and place it by the original floor plan instead of a special layer that cannot display any other layer. I want to place them on regular layers where I can draft off of them.

If I do that within a sheet layer without entering the viewport,

the drawing will not be at the same scale as the vieport.

If I enter the viewport the tracing and the viewport are basically grouped together.

And then there's the issue of speed...and I am using a dual G5.

Thanks

[matto]

The other possiblity is you need 2d user rotateable view of the drawing space, another feature MicroStation has had since 1990something.

Of coarse a combination of the two would be the best of all.