Dimension Format Units

[Chopsaw]

Does anyone know if these units of feet and inches can be edited or duplicated within the program or can be accessed in any way by a user ?

 

[Alaskan_Son]

To what end?

[Chopsaw]

So that the scale can be changed to make the software more suitable for precise modeling of small objects.

[Alaskan_Son]

Scale?

[Chopsaw]

6 minutes ago, Alaskan_Son said:

Scale?

 

In a sense yes but not in the way that the term is usually used.  Draw or model at 10:1 or 100:1 and then dimension without having to resize the drawing or model.

[glennw]

Chopsaw,

You can certainly create a custom unit and have it available in a Units dropdown.

Is that what you are asking?

Are you needing to dimension with a greater fractional than 1/128”?

[Chopsaw]

14 minutes ago, glennw said:

Chopsaw,

You can certainly create a custom unit and have it available in a Units dropdown.

Is that what you are asking?

 

Yes I know how that works but feet and inches are not the same as the rest and only appear in the dimension drop down  but not in Unit Conversions.  Also there does not seem to be a way to get formatting in Unit Conversions the way chief does.  The other problem is once a format is used it can not be duplicated with a false scale.  You would think a format would have a title or label and not just the formatting symbols. The software would be a lot more versatile if chief did not make so may assumptions on how it should be used and let the user have a little more control.  Of course none of this would be necessary if I was not looking for a workaround for another deficiency.  

[rlackore]

Chief is not suitable for the precise modeling of small objects - you may want to investigate other software. A program like AutoCAD (and the AutoDesk suite of products) gives the user much more control over the drawing units and precision, as well as the ability to assign an arbitrary scale factor to the dimension tool. For example, here are two boxes in  AutoCAD, the dimension on the left box is set with a dimension scale of 1.0, and the dimension on the right box is set with a dimension scale of 0.5. Same box, same drawing units, just a different scale for the dimension:

 

If you want this kind of functionality in Chief, make it a Suggestion. Maybe when they finally decide to give us a user-defined coordinate system they will also give us dimension scaling.

[BrownTiger]

What about creating your own false dimensions symbol? Since you appear to want the false scale anyway.

 

 

 

I suggested adding support for calling ruby functions, so designer can have myConvert(56.12345) as a macro

 

 

[Renerabbitt]

13 hours ago, Chopsaw said:

 

In a sense yes but not in the way that the term is usually used.  Draw or model at 10:1 or 100:1 and then dimension without having to resize the drawing or model.

I got emotionally abused on here last time I requested this. Deep scars, deep, deep, ChiefTalk scars.

[Alaskan_Son]

1 hour ago, Renerabbitt said:

I got emotionally abused on here last time I requested this. Deep scars, deep, deep, ChiefTalk scars.

 

Just something to remember me by buddy

 

On a side note though, I do think Chop's use case is quite a bit different than yours was.  I think what Chop is looking for is essentially a way to use Chief to build a dollhouse and I'm thinking it may not be such a bad idea.  Its a lot more complicated than just changing the dimension units though.  We would end up having problems every single time we went to enter a dimension in any one of the dialogs.  I thing what we would need is a default scale modifier setting where each plan would get a single 3D scale modifier. 

[Alaskan_Son]

BTW, there are even more complications to think about to such as how imported objects are handled, how models and CAD work are exported, etc.  No small undertaking for a 3D modeling application.

[Chopsaw]

Thanks for all of the great feedback guys.  It's just another one of those things where I was brainstorming and trying to exploit a weakness but hit a wall.

 

7 hours ago, BrownTiger said:

What about creating your own false dimensions symbol? Since you appear to want the false scale anyway.

 

I had explored the macro route but also wanted to take advantage of Chief's grid rounding feature and figured that was out of reach of a macro without an extremely complex setup.

 

Not quite sure where you are headed with your posting in suggestions without an example as I am not a programmer, unless my description is exactly the scenario, but again not sure how a macro would be applied.

 

6 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:

I think what Chop is looking for is essentially a way to use Chief to build a dollhouse and I'm thinking it may not be such a bad idea.  Its a lot more complicated than just changing the dimension units though.  We would end up having problems every single time we went to enter a dimension in any one of the dialogues.  I think what we would need is a default scale modifier setting where each plan would get a single 3D scale modifier. 

 

Yes this would be a rather unique situation and the way Preferences are set up would likely need to be drawn it it's own plan file or cad detail.  Also you are correct in anticipating other issues but without the scaling option we may never know, but it seems dealing with the repercussions might be more straight forward than the original scale adjustment.

 

7 hours ago, Renerabbitt said:

I got emotionally abused on here last time I requested this. Deep scars, deep, deep, ChiefTalk scars.

 

I did not realize I was venturing into such murky waters.  Just trying to find a way to make the software work for me without having to buy another program.

[Alaskan_Son]

19 hours ago, Chopsaw said:

Not quite sure where you are headed with your posting in suggestions without an example as I am not a programmer, unless my description is exactly the scenario, but again not sure how a macro would be applied. 

 

If I am understanding the request correctly, in it's simplest form, his suggestion would essentially result in the capability of telling a macro which road to take without having to use a separate macro.  Take a 12"x12" rectangular polyline for example...

%my_area_macro(inches)% ======> 144"

%my_area_macro(feet)% =======> 1'

%my_area_macro(feet_inches) =======> 1'-0"

 

One macro, multiple paths.

 

As it is now, the above would require 3 different macros.

 

In your use case scenario you could hypothetically use the macro to set your scale  such %my_dimension(1_100)% for 1:00 scale or %my_dimension(1_50)% for 1:50 scale.  Of course we currently don't have access to a dimension's value so all we can use at this time to mimic the behavior is a polyline.

 

19 hours ago, Chopsaw said:

Yes this would be a rather unique situation and the way Preferences are set up would likely need to be drawn it it's own plan file or cad detail.  Also you are correct in anticipating other issues but without the scaling option we may never know, but it seems dealing with the repercussions might be more straight forward than the original scale adjustment.

 

I'm sure the original scale adjustment would be super easy.  I've seen corrupted files on multiple occasions where this exact thing is happening already.  Here's a recent example...

...of course Chief hasn't given us any direct access to the code that controls the unit conversion, but it's obviously written in there somewhere.  I think the main thing here is that Chief is a 1:1 scale 3D CAM application specifically designed for modeling homes.  What you're asking for is something outside what Chief was ever designed to do and by adding the type of setting you're asking for, you would be introducing an enormous number of problems to contend with (of which I only scratched the surface)...all for just a few oddball use cases.  Again, it might be a cool option to have, but I can completely see why Chief hasn't and probably never will introduce this feature. 

[Alaskan_Son]

On 9/19/2019 at 8:28 PM, Chopsaw said:

Of course none of this would be necessary if I was not looking for a workaround for another deficiency. 

 

Do you care to speak to what that "deficiency" is?  I can think of a few myself, but something tells me they're not the same as what you're contemplating.

[Chopsaw]

7 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:

If I am understanding the request correctly, in it's simplest form, his suggestion would essentially result in the capability of telling a macro which road to take without having to use a separate macro.  Take a 12"x12" rectangular polyline for example...

%my_area_macro(inches)% ======> 144"

%my_area_macro(feet)% =======> 1'

%my_area_macro(feet_inches) =======> 1'-0"

 

One macro, multiple paths.

 

As it is now, the above would require 3 different macros.

 

That makes more sense to me now.  It seems like a great idea to simplify macro's like the recently added function of macro within a macro but this would be preset formatting with a macro ?

 

7 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:

In your use case scenario you could hypothetically use the macro to set your scale  such %my_dimension(1_100)% for 1:00 scale or %my_dimension(1_50)% for 1:50 scale.  Of course we currently don't have access to a dimension's value so all we can use at this time to mimic the behavior is a polyline.

 

This part I am not so clear on how it would work or the advantages .  It seems that the same thing could be done with a mathematical formula ?  Or are you suggesting that you could have several macro's using the (1_50) or (1_100) formatting formulas that would be referenced form somewhere else ?

 

7 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:

I'm sure the original scale adjustment would be super easy.  I've seen corrupted files on multiple occasions where this exact thing is happening already.  Here's a recent example...

 

I remember that one but I don't think a plan file was provided and I did not want to randomly tinker with my Unit Conversion settings to try to reproduce the issue.  Did you figure it was plain random file corruption or a miss guided setting ?  It was obviously an Imperial template but the 9' 39" was a bit of a mystery.  What tipped me off was the 39" that seemed like 9m, 39" = 10m but was labeled as 10' in the opposite direction but was clearly not 10'.

 

 

7 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:

I think the main thing here is that Chief is a 1:1 scale 3D CAM application specifically designed for modeling homes.  What you're asking for is something outside what Chief was ever designed to do

 

I guess that when I purchased the software I made the assumption that designing homes also included the critical components that need to be assembled to construct a home.  I am not assuming that chief is optimized to design appliances or electronics or even automobiles but I was hoping that when a custom bracket is needed for a framing connection I would be able to draw it even if I am not qualified to do the engineering certification.  I am not really into dollhouses but the same theory would apply as a bracket might be 1/100 or 1/1000 the size of the over all structure but it seems to give chief a challenge and produce random results.

 

I was doing a cad detail of an elliptical cutout the other day and I calculated the focus points and laid them out on the cad detail with identical length cad lines laid out from center snapped to the same point and dimensioned them and they were not the same.

 

I just don' think it should be necessary to check every single thing that is dimensioned in a plan set and check the decimal equivalent of the measurement and determine if it is correctly rounded to a consistent accuracy and make little adjustments here and there so the people using the drawings can trust the measurements and fabricate or construct what has been drawn.