why I don't trust classes

[D Wood]

I just opened a file that I haven't accessed for a couple of days, to make some client requested adjustments. My default class is None with no fill, so when I drew a new wall, that's how it appeared. I changed the class to Wall-New in the OIP, expecting to see a dark red fill as per all the other new wallsin the drawing, but instead I got white fill. So in the OIP it says Wall-New, under classes Wall-New has a red fill, in the Attribute palette it says I have Class attributes selected, but that it is white fill. How can this be?

I have played around with walls and objects I had drawn previously, and they all behave perfectly according to the Classes menu, but not new objects.

Regards

DW

[CipesDesign]

Did you double check that the "use at creation" box is checked in the class setup (for that paticular class)???

[D Wood]

Peter

Thank you for your reply.

Use At Creation is on for all wall classes.

Regards

David W

Auckland, NZ

iMac 17", OS10.3.9, VWA 11.5

[JBC]

DW I just tried to recreate your problem and the same thing happened to me. When you change the attributes of a class I think it should prompt you as to whether or not the new changes will apply to the objects that all ready exist, but it didn't. This is with checking the Use At Creation box selected. I tried several more times with different colors checking and unchecking boxes, but to no avail. I was able to fix it by using the eyedropper tool and/or by choosing class color where you see the preview color in the attributes palette, but you should still be able to do it the other way. Just in case I closed VectorWorks without saving and opened it up again and now it works??? Again I tried, and now seems to work fine. So good news is your not the only one who's seen this, bad news is I don't know why it happened. Try starting the program up again.-Brendan

[D Wood]

Brendan

My point is that I haven't changed anything.

Sure I can make it look the same via the eyedropper or choosing a colour in the fill attribute, but it should be true to the class attribute. I don't understand why the fill can be white and be indicating that's the class colour when the class fill colour is red.

I have restarted the program, and the computer, but no better.

David W

Auckland, NZ

iMac 17", OS10.3.9, VWA 11.5

[islandmon]

These Class VectorFillPat issues are humbling to say the least. A fix to one part of the code seems to tweek another somewhere.

I've just gotten to the point of having 'faith' that everything will work out eventually ... just fix that which is broken and then move on. Currently, the whole Class Attributes structure is bogus. I envision a new PIO Tag similar to that used to designate Textures which is designed specifically to resolve these Class Attribute concerns.

[D Wood]

I seem to have found the solution, although I am not sure why it works. The None class did not have Use at Creation turned on. When I turned it on, I could re-assign classes to all objects I drew subsequently and they would display correctly. Somehow it now seems the characteristics of the class selected at the time you draw an object stay with it, even if you change classes.

I'm still puzzled though - I'm sure I didn't change anything in any class between sessions on this file, so I still don't know why it wasn't a problem yesterday but it is today.

Maybe Islandmon has the right attitude - do the workaround and carry on.

Is there any reason to turn Use at Creation off for any class?

David W

Auckland, NZ

iMac 17", OS10.3.9, VWA 11.5

[CipesDesign]

David, that's very interesting. And that's a good question. Yes, I can think of one very important reason to leave the use at creation box unselected: just today I created a new class for the sole purpose of being able to control visibility of a wide variety of objects, like fixtures, cabinets, etc (ie different line types, weights, fills, etc) - in one VP (my floor plan) I need to see these items, and in another (the roof framing plan) I don't want to see them at all. I did not want to change the graphic attributes of any these objects, I only wanted to be able to make them appear or dissappear at will :-)