The folks at SolidWorks always say that the product is driven by enhancement requests. I know quite a few people at SolidWorks read these blogs so this is my open letter enhancement request to them…

Dear Mr. Guy that invented DimXpert:

You are a genius. The ability to quickly put dimensions on a drawing following manufacturing guidelines (not design intent) is the greatest thing since, well since ever! Whatever you are getting paid, I am sure it is not enough because the DimXpert has saved zillions of people hours of time [and embarrassment from machinists] and helped them produce more accurate drawings.

I know you are busy, but if you have a few minutes (it’s just code right?!) I have a few enhancements I’d like you to look over:

• Once I define my datums, don’t make me redefine them every time I restart the routine.
• Allow me to put the created dimensions on an isometric annotation view (just one view on a drawing, fully detailed? How cool that would be!)
• More power in the auto dimension routine. The automation still misses too many faces. (This is especially true for angled planar faces!)
  • As a sub-comment manually adding location dimensions is too many mouse clicks, I’d love to be able to use the smart dimension tool, just please highlight the datums when I am in “smart dimension” mode to help me remember what I want to smart dimension to.
• I want to use ordinate dimensions!

Again, I love the DimXpert -those that aren’t using it are missing out, but if you could get to some of the ideas above, I’ll vote for you for “man of the year”

Sincerely,

This entry was posted on Friday, April 11th, 2008 at 10:07 am and is filed under SolidWorks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.