Hi Michael.

Think of the files on a computer. Lots of different folder, full of different files. Folks usually use folders to organize and keep related files together.

But selecting the folder doesn't select all the files in the folder.

When editing a file you generally are going to work on one file at a time.

But there are times when you are going to do something with all the files, such as doing a backup, or zipping them up.

That's how I see groups working in MOI.

Most of the time I will be creating/editing individual objects.

But when it comes, say, to exporting them, being able to export the group makes things easier.

Another use of a group is when I am going to create a new version of an assembly. Each part (object) in the new assembly (group) is going to have the name as in the existing assembly (group). But the new assembly (group) will have a different name - something with a version number in it.

If I can copy-and-paste the existing group as a new group I get all the existing objects already in the new group, ready to be edited as needed to create the new version of the assembly.

I envision a system where the MOI file represents a project which has a name.

Each MOI group represents a set of parts (MOI objects) that make up an assembly. Each assembly (group) has a name, each part (object) has a name.

I then can select the topmost group (the collection of all assemblies) and do an export. Each file ends up named something like "projectname-assemblyname-partname".

Right now I have to do all that one file at a time and the file names need to be edited to reflect what project and assembly they are for.

Hope the helps to understand how I see things and how I work.

Frederick