3D CONSTRAINTS: 'Flip side' context menu option of the Mechanical Browser allows to change the relative placement of constrained entities.
ANTIALIASRENDER and ANTIALIASSCREEN system variables control the amount of anti-aliasing ( edge smoothing ) applied during rendering generation and on screen rendered mode display. Default value is 1, maximum value is 5. Note: high anti-alias values incur a high calculation cost.
ASSEMBLY DESIGN: introduced parametric components. Parameters defined in a component file can be changed in a higher level assembly maintaining the link to the source component definition.
BIM design:
Concept:
Instead of creating a set of dedicated BIM primitives like walls, slabs, columns, etc..., each with their own restricted behavior and properties,
we opted for offering maximum flexibility. Any 3D Solid can be used in a BIM model, whether it is created and edited by using existing BricsCAD modeling tools,
new powerful BIM commands, or even imported from 3rd party software or edited by 3rd party tools.
At any stage one can decide to classify 3D Solid, or other entities, as Building Elements of type Wall, Slab, Column, etc... Classification can be done automatically and manually.
The automatic classification tool analyzes and classifies entire buildings in a few seconds.
IFC import/export ensures optimal cooperation with other disciplines and applications.
Modeling commands:
BIMDRAG: Main editing tool for 3D Solids which resemble walls and slabs. Geometry of 3D Solids is analyzed on the fly.
Depending on this analysis and on which face is selected, BIMDRAG allows you to easily perform following operations, which can be toggled on the fly by pressing the CTRL key:
Drag a single face to extend a wall or slab over a distance or to a point in the model.
Automatically connect to the nearest solid.
Select any solid(s) to connect to.
Move an entire wall or slab, specifying the distance relative to any other wall or slab in the model, dragging along faces of connected walls or slabs.
Modify the thickness of a wall or slab.
BIMCONNECT: accepts a selection set of 2 solids, and will try to create an L-connection between the two solids.
Press enter to accept the suggested connection or tap the CTRL key to switch to alternative connection types.
This command works for walls and roof slabs, or any other set of 3D Solids for which a connection can be found.
BIMINSERT: inserts a window or door (see below on windows and doors).
BIMWINDOWUPDATE: updates the opening made by a window or door in a solid, in case the definition changed in such way that the opening was not correctly updated automatically.
Windows and Doors:
Windows and Doors are native .dwg files which can be inserted in walls or slabs by the command BIMINSERT.
Using Dynamic UCS, a window will automatically align with the 3D Solid Face it is inserted on.
A 3D Solid in the window drawing on a layer named "BIM_SUBTRACT" will be used to automatically create an opening in the wall, keep the window in its position in the wall, and keep the opening associative with the window.
Optionally, the window drawing can contain 2D symbols.
These 2D symbols will either replace the actual 3D Solid section of the window, or be added with the 3D Solid section, depending on their layer:
symbols on a layer with prefix 'BRX_2D_' will be used to replace the geometry resulting from the actual section,
symbols on a layer with prefix 'BRX_2D+_' will be added to the section result.
Only those 2D entities in a plane parallel to the section plane are considered.
BIM Classification: At any time, any dwg entity can be classified as a Building Element and get a name and an internal guid (a globally unique identifier).
Specialized types of Building Element are :
Wall: applicable to any 3D Solid
Slab: applicable to any 3D Solid
Column: applicable to any 3D Solid
Beam: applicable to any 3D Solid
Window: applicable to any Block reference
Door: applicable to any Block reference
BIMCLASSIFY: this command allows to classify an entity to any of the above elements. Each type is separately available in the Quad when an applicable entity is highlighted.
Automatic: BIMCLASSIFY has an option to automatically classify a set of entities. Currently automatically classified elements are walls, slabs, windows and doors.
Unclassify: Any classified element can be unclassified, removing all BIM data from the entity.
IFC: BIMEXPORT exports the model to a .ifc file containing all 3D geometrical and BIM related data.
Entities which were not classified, or were classified as Building Element, are exported as Building Element Proxy.
Others are exported to the corresponding IFC element.
COPY: added REPEAT option to the copy command, which allows array-like repeat operation.
DELETETOOL: system variable to control whether 'tool' entities ( subtracted entities ) used during the SUBTRACT command are deleted or retained.
By default tools are deleted.
DIRECT MODELING:
DMEXTRUDEMODE: system variable which determines the behavior of the DMEXTRUDE and DMREVOLVE commands when their 'Auto' option is used.
Depending on the DMEXTRUDEMODE, material will be subtracted or added to existing solids depending on the extrusion/revolution direction. Auto is the default option.
DMEXTRUDE command can now create extrusions with a taper angle using dynamic input or the new 'Taperangle' command option.
DMEXTRUDE, DMREVOLVE and SMFLANGEBASE commands can now be applied to boundaries detected when the Boundary flag of the new SELECTIONMODES setting is active.
DYNAMICS: added dynamic dimensions for RECTANGLE, MTEXT, BOX, CYLINDER, SPHERE, AI_SPHERE, WEDGE and CONE commands.
SR37186, SR37924, SR39544, SR44502, SR44836, SR44972
DYNAMIC BLOCKS now can be edited in-place using following grip types:
Point
XY
Linear
Polar
Rotation
Flip
Visibility
SR47921 - FILEOPEN command: always operates on the command line, ignoring the FILEDIA setting.
HIDEOBJECTS, ISOLATEOBJECTS and UNISOLATEOBJECTS commands
HIDEOBJECTS: hides the selected objects.
ISOLATEOBJECTS/ISOLATE: hides all but the selected objects.
UNISOLATEOBJECTS/UNISOLATE/UNHIDE: unhides objects that were hidden.
These commands are controlled by a system variable OBJECTISOLATIONMODE:
OBJECTISOLATIONMODE = 0: hide objects for the current drawing session only.
OBJECTISOLATIONMODE = 1: hide objects persistently over multiple drawing sessions.
HORIZON: for perspective views a horizon background is now displayed when no specific view background has been set.
The horizon background is fully configurable through following new settings:
HorizonBkg_Enable: enables or disables the horizon background. Default = enabled.
HorizonBkg_GroundHorizon: color of the ground near the horizon.
HorizonBkg_GroundOrigin: color of the ground near the origin.
HorizonBkg_SkyHorizon: color of the sky near the horizon.
HorizonBkg_SkyLow: color of the lower part of the sky.
HorizonBkg_SkyHigh: color of the higher part of the sky.
SR22262, SR27499, SR27511, SR33172, SR35812, SR36759, SR36865
LAYERP (Layer Previous) command: undoes the most recent change or set of changes made to layer settings.
LAYERPMODE: system variable to switch tracking of changes made to layer settings On/Off (for use by the LAYERP command).
LIBRARIES:
REDSDK engine was upgraded from V3.2 to V3.4.0.9
TEIGHA library was upgraded from V3.9 to V4.0. Teigha V4.0 contains hundreds of fixes and improvements for the processing of dwg files.
WxWidgets library was upgraded from V2.9 to V3.0.1
LOOKFROM CONTROL:
The new LookFrom control can be docked in one of the corners of the graphics window and allows to set the desired view orientation in a fast and intuitive way.
Detailed configuration possibilities are offered in its right-click menu.
This control replaces the former LookFrom toolbar.
POLYSOLID command to create wall-shaped solids.
Separate option: if set, each edge of the base polyline will generate its distinct solid.
Dynamic option: if set, after entering the base polyline is concluded, dynamic dimensions are displayed allowing to set the values for height (stored in the PSOLHEIGHT system variable) and width (stored in the PSOLWIDTH system variable).
Dynamic Justification: tapping the Ctrl key during the end stage of the command will toggle the Justification option between Left, Middle and Right.
RENDER MATERIAL LIBRARY:
The MATBROWSEROPEN command opens the new render Material Browser, which can be docked next to the drawing display.
It shows an overview of available high-resolution render materials. The MATBROWSERCLOSE command closes the dialog.
The BricsCAD installer contains only previews of the available materials, clicking the download button will actually download and install the selected materials on your machine.
This approach was chosen to avoid having to download a monolythic 6 GB installer containing the high resolution definitions of 600+ Redway rendering materials,
while for a typical discipline only a small subset of these will effectively be needed.
The Redway high-resolution material definitions are used exclusively by the Render command. For real-time display, lower-resolution dwg-compatible definitions of the same materials are used.
A list of material definitions contained in the current drawing is shown in the upper part of the browser.
Assigning rendering materials can be done by simply dragging and dropping them from this list onto the desired entities.
After a material definition has successfully been downloaded to the local library, the download button next to the material will no longer display, thus indicating the status.
Use the 'Add material(s) to drawing' option from the right-click menu to add selected materials from your library to the current drawing, thus making them available for assignment to entities.
A search field allows fast filtering of the list 'as you type'.
To sort the list, e.g. on 'Downloaded' status, it suffices to click the head of the corresponding column.
FYI: the library functionality will be extended to also support user-defined render material definitions.
RIBBON: besides menus and toolbars, BricsCAD now also supports the Ribbon user interface.
It is individually configurable for the 2D Drafting, 3D Modeling, Mechanical and BIM workspaces.
SELECTION: 4 new commands, available from the Quad in the "Solid/Face Selection" group, allow to select 3d solid faces or 3d solids which are related to an input face:
SELECTALIGNEDFACES: Selects all faces which are coplanar with the input face.
SELECTALIGNEDSOLIDS: Selects all solids which have a face which is coplanar with the input face.
SELECTCONNECTEDFACES: Select all faces which are overlapping with the input face.
SELECTCONNECTEDSOLIDS: Select all solids which have a face which is overlapping with the input face.
SELECTIONMODES system variable: controls selection mode of Edges, Faces and Boundaries.
Edge: if activated, edges of 3d solids can be selected directly.
Face: if activated, faces of 3d solids can be selected directly.
Boundary: if activated and a closed boundary surrounding the cursor is found,
it will become highlighted and selectable.
Only linear geometry, curves and planar faces of 3d solids are taken into account
during boundary detection.
SELECTIONMODES toolbar: shows the status of the Edge, Face and Boundary selection mode flags and allows to toggle them.
SHEET METAL DESIGN:
New commands were added to convert 3D solids to valid unfoldable sheet metal parts:
SMBENDCREATE: converts hard edges (sharp edges between flange faces) into bends.
SMCONVERT: automatically recognizes flanges and bends in a 3D solid.
SMDELETE: removes a junction by restoring a hard edge between two flanges; creates a hard edge in place of a bend; removes a flange with all the bends adjacent to it.
The adjacent flanges are extended up to a junction configuration with the flange being deleted.
SMDISSOLVE: dissolves sheet metal features
SMFLANGESPLIT: splits a flange along a line drawn on its face.
SMJUNCTIONCREATE: converts hard edges into junctions.
SMRELIEFCREATE: makes proper corner and bend reliefs.
Corner reliefs are built on corners which have three or more adjacent flanges. Bend reliefs are built on flange edge start and end.
SMRETHICKEN: restores the 3D solid model of a sheet metal part by thickening one of its sides (all thickness faces become perpendicular to flange faces).
BENDING TABLES: global Die width parameter can be set in Mechanical Browser for sheet metal parts with attached bend tables.
This global value is applied to compute the deduction for all bends, which do not have local Die width parameter set.
CORNER RELIEF: the SMFLANGEEDGE command automatically creates a Corner Relief feature for adjacent edge flanges.
It allows to automatically adopt the size of the square relief to future changes of part thickness and bend radius.
SMEXPORT2D: exports unfolded representation of a sheet metal body as a 2D profile in .dxf/.dwg file format.
SMEXPORTOSM: command to export a sheet metal solid to the .osm file format.
FEATURE DIAGNOSTICS: invalid sheet metal features are automatically marked in red in the Mechanical Browser.
Clicking an invalid feature results in displaying a diagnostic message in the status bar.
VIEWBASE:
Added possibility to generate a view corresponding to the current view in Model Space.
'Preset' option allows to generate sets of pre-configured Mechanical and Architectural views.
VIEWDETAIL: command to create a viewport showing a detailed view of a Drawing View created with the VIEWBASE or VIEWSECTION commands.
WORKSPACES:
Menu-, toolbar- and ribbon settings can now be stored in Workspaces.
The new 'Get Started' dialog allows to select the initial Workspace when starting BricsCAD.
A new Workspace Toolbar and Combo control have been added.
When switching between Workspaces, additional actions can be configured by customizing the On Switch section of the Workspaces.
WSAUTOSAVE system variable: when switched On, upon switching to another workspace, the toolbar positions of the current workspace are saved in the CUI file.
In BricsCAD, the default value for WSAUTOSAVE is On, so current toolbar positions will be saved and restored after switching.
Fixes
SR44413, SR46357 - SMFLANGEEDGE: The command 'SMFLANGEEDGE' did not work with all edges of a flange.
SR46036 - MECHANICAL STANDARD PARTS: The standard parts in the mechanical hardware library were sometimes displayed wrong.
SR49462 - ANNOTATION SCALES WARNING: The dialog that warns about many annotation scales in the drawing can be too small on some distributions. Allow manually resizing the height of this dialog as a workaround. Such resizing is needed only once since BricsCAD remembers dialog sizes.
SR50197 - ORBIT: On some mice, shift+mouse wheel dragging cannot be used to orbit. Mouse wheel dragging triggered mouse wheel scroll events, which in turn caused involuntary zoom operations. This has been fixed by ignoring mouse wheel scroll events while shift is down.
SR50913, SR50935, SR50937, SR50939, SR50944, SR50949, SR50965 - LICENSING: The BricsCAD licensing system was entirely broken after an update of the OpenSSL library.
