you can type full coords if you want. polyline-pick point-type value hit enter-hit tab-type coords.

Hi Marc,

> Or maybe if you press another time on enter? Although this
> might interfere with some underlying logic.

Yeah I'm not so sure about messing with enter for that, since it is already being used at that point as an alias for pushing the "Done" button...

I think maybe a good way to do it would be to have some option like "Apply distance constraint immediately" under Options > Snaps that when checked would then make it behave like you were talking about.

It should not be difficult to add this in for v3 - I've added it into the wiki wishlist to help keep track of it.

- Michael

Michael, when I worked in Lightwave, Newtek gave you the option of being in "numeric" mode or "sketch" mode. I like the idea of hitting "n" and being in the numeric entry mode.

Perhaps for V3?

Cheers,

Chris

More progress. Booleans rule! LOL It is very nice to know that if the real thing is 8'2" in length, then my model is also 8'2" in length. Once it is completed, I scale the entire thing to 1:22.5 and output an STL for RP.

Sweet!

C.

Hi Chris,



What would you want to have happen when you were in "numeric" mode?

In MoI you usually don't need to go into any kind of special mode to do numeric entry, just type a number and the keyboard focus will automatically go to the first available numeric input field (like the radius field for a circle for example), or the x,y,z input control in the bottom toolbar if a command does not have any special numeric fields.

It basically knows to go into numeric entry mode because you typed in a number - isn't that more convenient than having to type some thing else like 'n' first?

- Michael

Hi Michael. I think it is another case of me trying to "out think" the software. I am so used to having another tab on screen for numeric input that the mere thought of just typing numbers gives me the willies. LOL

Perhaps I will finally become one with Moi after some more work/practice. I will say however, that it is working quite well so far. I like the SIMPLE interface. Now I just need to figure out how to pay for it.

Please don't let it "evolve" into another (impenetrable) SolidWorks.

Cheers,

Chris

>>>Please don't let it "evolve" into another (impenetrable) SolidWorks.
>>>>>>>.

Well, when they give him 20 million for MoI, because it is the best, and then integrate and bloat it, we will have to find out what he's working on with his son, and buy that! :o

Hi Chris, don't worry, it is a major goal for MoI to keep its streamlined interface and ease of use as it evolves. I put a lot of effort into planning the UI in order to make that happen.

V2 has already been very successful in this department, since there has been a whole lot of stuff added in but without a "bloat" happening to the UI.

One thing that I try to do which helps a lot is to try and increase the power and flexibility of the existing tools when possible.

- Michael

Making some good progress on my model. I'm hoping to output the STL file for RP printing next week.

I am also *finally* getting used to "just typing numbers in" for numeric input. LOL

Cheers,

Chris

My RP guy is getting odd translation errors from my IGS file conversion. Any ideas? I turned up the polygon level to its highest setting when I did the output/conversion.

Thanks

Chris

Hi Chris, above you wrote "IGS" file conversion - did you mean STL conversion?

Normally to get a clean STL file generated, you should have just a single solid object that you are exporting.

In your case you don't have that - instead your model is made up of 11 different individual objects, note the readout after a "Select All" here:



Also if you look in the scene browser, you can see that you have at least one object that is an open surface instead of a solid:




You can use the scene browser to select that open surface object by clicking on the text for "Surface" there, that identifies this part as the one that is not a solid:



Then running the script from here which selects naked edges, identifies these edges as being open and not attached to anything else:




So to remedy that, select that crossbar piece and then run the Construct > Planar command, which will fill in the open end with a trimmed planar surface and seal it off.

Once you have done that, you will then have 11 solids in the file.

It may possibly work at that point, for some cases it may be ok to have multiple solids within a single STL file but really the main original intent for an STL file is that it should contain just 1 single solid in it and not multiple ones.

So then you would probably want to use boolean union to combine those multiple solids together where they are touching so you only have just 1 solid. That's what I've done with the attached updated 3DM file.

The attached file is now all ready to be exported to a good STL file.

- Michael

Michael, I'm on the run today but I wanted to say THANK YOU for your help. I will post photos of the RP output next week.

C.

Michael, is the "scene browser" available in the demo version? Did I miss it? LOL

Thanks

Chris

Hi Chris,

> Michael, is the "scene browser" available in the demo version?

No, it's available in the v2 beta - the demo version is v1 and doesn't have it.

There are a whole lot of improvements like this in v2, v1 is actually about 2 years old at this point.

I've just recently released the final v2 beta - next I will be updating the documentation and after that is done then v2 will be released and at that point I will update the demo version to be a v2 demo instead of the current v1 demo.

- Michael

Yes, I started with V1, and thought it was pretty good.

V2, however, is fantastic :)

Hi Michael. My 3D model got bounced once again by the RP house for not being watertight. Any suggestions? I've run the "find naked edges" script, but have been unable to repair the model. Can you guide me through this?

Thanks

Chris

Hi Chris, well there are going to be several steps involved.

Even apart from having some holes in the bottom part (84 naked edges) you've also got your model set up as various separate solid pieces instead of just one single solid which is what those RP things want to have.

For example you've got 1 object here which is a solid:



But then right next to it you have this completely separate object which is another solid:



You generally want to combine things like that together into just one single solid, probably by doing a boolean union on them.


The openings look like you have some surfaces in place ready to be joined in to seal them up. Like for example this part has some openings in it:



However, you've already created some surfaces that fit in at least some of the openings, these are some separate surfaces that are hanging out just right in that spot:




You need to use the Edit > Join command to glue those separate objects like that together so that they will be connected at a joined edge, rather than just having completely individual separate surfaces that are just positioned next to one another.

The actual joined connection is what you need there.


I haven't had a chance to look at all the different holes in that lower part, but if they're all like that then you just need to join those pieces together in order to make closed solids from them, then probably do boolean union between those solids to make the whole thing just 1 big solid instead of a bunch of different separate objects.


Does that make sense for what needs to be done to fix it up?

- Michael

Hi Chris, here's an example of another piece that needs to be finished - this is one part from the bottom, as you can see i't missing some planes from it, those need to be created and joined to this piece to make it a closed shape right now it just has some totally open spots:




- Michael

Also a few pieces are not touching and will need to be moved slightly, for example here notice these parts are actually floating a bit away from the other surfaces instead of touching them:



- Michael

Hi Chris, it should actually not take much work to get this finished, I've got it nearly all cleaned up but I'm heading out for a while, I can probably finish it for you later.

- Michael