Category: SWW11

Drawings Top Ten list from years past: SWW2011

This entry is part 1 of 4 in the series Past Years Drawings Top Ten

Each year, SOLIDWORKS World has a top ten enhancement ideas countdown.  For a couple of months before SOLIDWORKS World, ideas are submitted by users to the SOLIDWORKS World Top Ten idea forum (login required). Starting in mid-December, users have the opportunity to vote on the ideas they most want.  This gives SOLIDWORKS a clear snapshot of what our customers need at that moment in time.  The top ten vote-getters are shown on the big stage at that SOLIDWORKS World. The list varies from year to year as new enhancements are implemented or as customers’ needs change. Some ideas also reappear on the list over several years.

Dan Herzberg has compiled a list of these top ten lists, including when the ideas where implemented and how many times an idea appeared on the subsequent lists.

There is no focus on particular areas in the top ten list. The top ten highest vote-getting ideas are combined from parts, drawings, assemblies, and other areas.   Since my main focus area on the SOLIDWORKS brand is “drawings”, it seemed like a nice idea to show the results for just the submissions for drawings.

We can show just the top ten Drawings ideas.  Drawings includes topics such as BOMs, annotations, dimensions, etc. The first year we can look at is SolidWorks World 2011.

SolidWorks World 2011 Top Ten Drawings Ideas

  1. Ability to Filter BOMs
  2. Print Selection – make it more like cropping a picture
  3. On drawings: add function to allow users to apply capitalization of text, implemented in SW2013
  4. Assign watermark function to drawing sheets, implemented in SW2013
  5. Allow Multiple Exploded Views per Configuration, implemented in SW2013
  6. More control over angle dimensions, implemented in SW2015
  7. On drawings: Allow option for resizing of drawing view outline
  8. Directly editing notes with properties in Drawing, implemented before SW2013
  9. Broken-out Section in Section, Detail and Alternate Positions Views
  10. Better line selection in drawings, implemented in SW2014

The implementation rate for the SWW11 drawing list is 60% to date.  None of these ideas had enough votes to get onto the official SolidWorks World 2011 Top Ten list, unfortunately.

There is still a couple of days to add new ideas on the current SOLIDWORKS World 2015 Top Ten list.  Voting starts on the 15th, so go back and vote on as many ideas as you wish!  Just remember, you have to logon to submit, see and vote for ideas.

SolidWorks World 2012 comes to a smartphone near you

SolidWorks World 2012 has several high quality applications for various devices.  SolidWorks World 2012 is available for the iPhone and the iPad on the iTunes store, and for Android devices on the Android Market.  (At SolidWorks World 2011, the mobile application was only available for the iPhone.)  The 2012 version is loaded with practically all the information you’ll need to navigate the conference.

  • Full conference schedule
  • Log on to your SolidWorks World 2012 attendee account
  • All sessions, including descriptions, maps of how to get to the assigned room, link to speaker’s bio, and the ability to add the session to your agenda
  • All speakers and their bios
  • Floor maps for each level
  • Partner Pavilion directory, map, and other information
  • General conference information, such as overview, hours, food, and special event
  • Location of important points of interest
  • Info about Dassault Systemes, including information other mobile applications

Additionally, there are links to SolidWorks related accounts on Twitter (tweet updates on the #sww12 hashtag), Facebook (SolidWorks World page, [not the SWW12 page]), Flickr (SolidWorks photostream including SolidWorks World 2012 group with uploaded photos by SolidWorks and attendees) and Youtube (SolidWorks related videos).

As a bonus, there’s a feature to scan QR codes of badges from other attendees to start building your contact list.

SWW12 Attendee -> Press -> Presenter -> Employee

The first SolidWorks World that I attended was 2008 in San Diego, as an attendee.  My schedule was full of breakout and hands-on sessions, from which I learned a lot.  I also remember attending focus groups, the beautiful San Diego days, seeing lots of cool stuff at the Partner Pavilion, fun at special event in the Gaslamp District, the free iPod (still using from time to time), General Sessions, and meeting a lot of new friends.

For SolidWorks World 2009, something strange happened.  When you are a regular blogger of SolidWorks and CAD related topics, there’s a chance you’ll be invited to come to SolidWorks World as Press.  You don’t get “press credentials” or anything.  You simply get a badge that says “Press” and the right to go just about anywhere at any time in the conference.  This happened to me.

Being Press at the conference was somewhat surreal in 2009, 2010, and 2011.  The experience is completely different.  I never had time to attend more than a couple of breakout and hands-on sessions.  Instead, my time was spent at news conferences, interviewing important SolidWorks employees, quickly meeting special keynote speakers (Gene Kranz [smart guy], James Cameron [loved the campy Dark Angel show], Dr. Mike North [so sad his show got cancelled]), actually blogging, visiting historical locations, press events and other socializing.

At SolidWorks World 2011, I did double duty as a presenter.  Presenting a breakout session isn’t as hard as it might seem.  Being a great presenter isn’t the expectation that most people have of you.  Knowing your material is most important.  Being a presenter also gives you a new and unique experience at the conference, though arguably attending as Press is the most unique of all for people who are not employed by SolidWorks.

Well, this last year, something else strange happened.  I was hired as a SolidWorks employee and started my job in June.  Not only that, but my position has a significant number of responsibilities at SolidWorld World.  So, this year, I’ll be attending SolidWorks World 2012 as a working employee of SolidWorks.  Yet again, this will afford me the opportunity to see SolidWorks World from a completely different perspective.  To complete the circle, the conference is again in San Diego.

I’ve gone from presenting one breakout session to now presenting 3 sessions (1 breakout, 2 hands-on).  As if I wasn’t social before, I’ve got to be even more so now, talking to as many customers as possible, I’ll be running two focus groups, conducting product tests, and other behind the scenes tasks.

Unlike Mike Puckett, who has had a similar experience with changing rolls at SolidWorks World, I will not be presenting on the main stage during the General Session.  However, I will have a chance to see the response to my changes to SolidWorks by attendees during the What’s New for 2013 presentation.

If you are attending SolidWorks World 2012, try to find me.  My cell is 40…hmmm, yeah, just try to find me instead.  I’ll be looking for you to talk to! 🙂

Bertrand Sicot makes progress to CSWP

During an event at SolidWorks World 2011, Bertrand Sicot, new CEO of SolidWorks Corp, made a declaration that he would earn his CSWP status by SolidWorks World 2012 (February 13, 2012) .  He recently posted on update on his progress on the SolidWorks Blog.  I cannot do justice to Sicot’s own great words by restating them here, so I invite you to read his article without any further introduction.

SolidWorks World 2011 Top Ten requests

Each year, SolidWorks users vote on the changes they’d most like to see included in SolidWorks.  This year, voting was conducted in a special area on the SolidWorks forums.  For the amount of attention this list gets, it should be noted that the top vote-getter on the Top Ten List didn’t get much more than 120 total votes.  There are several important requests in this year’s list.  There are also some that leave me wondering, “what’s the big deal?”

Top Ten Freeze FeaturesTop Ten List

  1. Angle mates that don’t flip at random (Yes, we need this!)
  2. Better utilize processor cores (Yes, of course!)
  3. Option to dangle instead of deleting (A cool option that could be useful.)
  4. SolidWorks should cleanly uninstall itself (Done! …supposedly in 2012.)
  5. Freeze Features (Again, done! …supposedly in 2012.)
  6. Enhanced Equations Input & Editing & Linking (Again again, Done! …supposedly in 2012.)
  7. Convert a Solid Body into a Surface body without having to delete, offset, or knit faces (Ok, cool idea, but aren’t there more critical changes needed?)
  8. Make the ideas section (in the forum) available all year, not just for SWW (huh?)
  9. File compatibility between versions (Every year this is on the list.  Every year this is not implemented.)
  10. Pressing Escape key should immediately return control of the interface (This ESC key request again?  Yes, but let’s move on already.)

What’s New? for SolidWorks 2012 (a most tasty & complete list from SWW11 )

2012Some say the world will end in 2012.  There are a lot of books being rushed to market right now that make some amazing claims about what’s going to happen just 22 months from now (Dec 21, 2012).  SolidWorks Corp seems gleefully oblivious to all of this hoopla, as they have put a lot of effort to bring new capabilities to SolidWorks 2012.  Here  are some highlights.

There’s a few generic user interface capabilities to be added:

  • A pushpin function will be added to allow users to put choice drawings, models or assemblies in a quick access flyout menu.
  • Users can now switch between units of measure via a selection tool added to the status bar.
  • A new command filter search will be added to allow users to search for SolidWorks commands on-the-fly (has opposed to stumbling around the Help file).
  • Selecting an item in the graphics view will highlight it and zoom to it within the feature tree (finally!).

Sheet metal will see several improvements:

  • Users will be able to choose faces to ignore in flat patterns.
  • Swept flange feature will be available.  They will be flattenable.
  • Tangent Flange position function.
  • Users will be able to set flanges parallel to a sketch.

Improved equations dialog boxBig news about equations:

  • Improved equation editor, with solve order and sort.
  • Global variables are now editable via the equation editor window.
  • Auto-rebuild for immediate implementation of changes.

On drawings:

  • BOMs will be insertable without having a pre-selected view.
  • Exploded views will be an option in the View Pallet.
  • Balloon order sequencing will be available, with the ability to number around a view from any start location.
  • Magnet Lines!!! (someone at SolidWorks Corp. was listening)
  • Unused View Label letters will be automatically reused.
  • Ability to add center marks to entire view.

Assembly will have a new Design Review mode that allows users to open and explore large assemblies without all the overhead lag.  This function will include the ability to conduct walk-throughs.

In an apparent extension of functionality added with SustainabilityXpress, SolidWorks 2012 will give users the ability to conduct manufacturer part costing.

New motion sensors will be added for actuator forces, baring loads and travel limits.

And now, the much hyped changes to be made in SolidWorks 2012:

  • Feature Freeze (they are going to try implement it again).
  • Complete Uninstall, with new options that allows for more control.  Also, uninstall function will be available from Admin Image.
  • Files will be cleared from memory when they are closed.
  • Dual monitor support will allow SolidWorks to span across two displays in a logical manner.