Activate Component. What is it used for and perhaps a better implementation?

[O.Tan]

IdeaStation link: http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/fusion-360-ideastation-request-a/activate-component-improvement/idi-p/...

CaseExample:

Take for example, this bunch of cubes, right now what activate does is only highlight the "activate" part and the rest just dims. If I were to measure the length, I can't do it as those "dimmed" part is obstructing, I got 2 options:

1. Use isolate command

2. Hold + Left Click to pop up the layered selection tool.

So right now, at least in my opinion, activate isn't that useful.

My Suggestion:

1.

 

Activate part takes higher selection prior it then dimmed parts. If I want to select the dimmed part I must use the layered selection tool (hold+left click)

Eg: measure the active component to the edge, when I use the measure tool, I can just click the edge of the active component without having those dimmed component obstructing and to select the dimmed edge, in this point the edge of the cube, I'll have to hold + left click to select it. 

Take note that this work with other tools as well, if I select move face or extrude, it'll prioritize the active component, to select the non-active component I'll have to hold+left click to select it.

2. 

Allow multiple selected components to be active. 

Eg: select the components (this includes assembly* and or parts*) I want to prioritize my edit, right click and select activate or just toggle the activate button of one of the selected component in the component tree.

To leave this environment, just activate the most top assembly level (usually project name)

Take note this is to allow the user to edit a few things at once (those needed to be changed) without having to hold+click all the time and clears up the clutter of a big assembly. How it should function in this environment is the same as mentioned in point 1.

*assembly: a component containing multiple components

*parts: a component containing single component 

I hope Autodesk will deeply consider such implementation as personally I find it doesn't change too much on Fusion component workflow (no assembly, no part distinction) and it seems to mitigate some workflow issues I find with Fusion. For those who don't know me, my background is I've used Inventor, SolidWorks and SolidEdge (main CAD software)

Thanks.

Don't forget to vote in the idea station and kudos this post. 

[Anonymous]

A good useful idea!  (and an interesting object there 🙂 )

Jesse

[O.Tan]

Thanks, I just love the component color generator and didn't expect how pretty it looks when I activated a component.

Btw, this idea will likely be the closest to a part based edit as found in traditional CAD (if you look at my model above, let say you want to use the measure tool, you can just point it towards the active component and it'll highlight the necessary part, unlike now where you'll have to hold+right click to "get to" the activated component) and in my honest opinion, it's slightly better then traditional part based edit as you can edit a few "parts" at once.

Distributed design (x-ref) is a different thing as it's more catered for assemblies, and I don't want my data panel to be filled with individual parts, rather to keep them in assemblies like they're now.

[jeff_strater]

Very nice suggestion - well thought out and explained and adds to the ease-of-use without completely changing the workflow.  I can't guarantee that we will implement it - lots of other factors go into those decisions, but it definitely makes sense to me.

I can explain a bit about what Activate is for, and how it came to its current form.  From the start, we imagined Fusion to be a very free modeling environment:  less restrictive than having fixed parts and assemblies, or having to open a different document to edit, etc.  So, we wanted users to be able to create features in any component at any time.  Fillet an edge from component 1, then put a hole through components 2 and 3, all without having to switch enviornments, open new documents, etc.

However, we hit a small snag with this plan:  Where should "new stuff" go in terms of ownership?  If you create a sketch or a work plane, there are times that you want that object to be owned by a particular component (so that it moves when the component moves, is visible when the component is visible, etc).  So, we added component activation.  That's all that activation really does:  It says who the owner of new stuff will be.

One thing it does not do (which some folks have suggested a change for) is dictate the "scope" of a feature.  So, if you activate a component, create a hole, and the hole punches through other components, we allow that to affect even the non-active components.  That is controlled by visibility - the hole will only affect visible components or bodies.  We have many times thought about changing this, because it is a valid concern and admittedly subtle behavior.  However, in the end we didn't want to restrict the freedom to operate outside of the active component.  It would be a pain if you had to de-activate a component to add fillets outside of it.  We have also thought about adding another concept (active and maybe "enabled"?), but that gets very messy for users in terms of the number of concepts to keep straight.  So, for now, we've tended to just leave it as is.  I expect to have this discussion more times as we get more input.

Thanks again for the suggestion.

Jeff Strater (Fusion development)

[O.Tan]

Aah, thanks for the explanation on how activate come about, I always wonder what is its usage.

Also, that's the reason why I suggested as such cause I understand that the ability to edit a few "part" at once is a good feature, however this feature in my opinion is only useful for up to 3 components probably 10 the most.

I can't see how this will benefit those who have 100 components. To me it's more of a nuisance when the assembly gets larger as I now have to turn off and turn on parts to prevent it from doing changes to those parts, isolate sort of work but if the sub assembly itself consist of 100 parts and viewing them while doing the change is important, then the isolate idea falls apart.

Now that I understand why there's an activate command, I guess in an environment where a few components has been selected to be activated, the user is able to probably click the radio button on the side (of activated component), lets call this "enable" to tell Fusion that any sketch or feature added will be placed into this component. So the user is still able to do everything like what the Fusion team envisioned for yet still retain control.

An exception to this rule would be if the user modify an existing component that is not "Enabled", such things are the move tool and extrude as it's not creating a new feature but instead is modifying an existing one.

Another advantage of my suggestion is it'll allow smart selection filter to be implemented. Something that I know a few seasoned forum members wanted and talked about

1. If in main assembly nothing is activated - selection filter will turn on components whereas bodies (and related) will be turned off
2. If only 1 component is activated, it'll turn on body selection and components will be turned off
3. If multiple component is activated, "enabled" component will have selection filter to be body selection whereas the other activated (non-enabled) component will result in a component selection

This will solve those issues where people moved the body in a component but what they actually want to do is to move the component. And again this idea is non-intrusive as it still allow users to enable or disable the current selection filters depending of needs.

[promm · Accepted solution]

O.Tan,

Thank you for posting to the ideastation and giving an in depth explanation on the workflow that the added functionality would provide.  Jeff provided a great explanation of reason to activate the component.  The second part of your suggestion has to do with situations where you would like to work with multiple components within a larger model.  In the last release we added the ability to insert referenced geometry.  Using this new functionality, you can break a larger model down into smaller assemblies and then insert them into the larger model.  I would suggest exploring this workflow as another method to use as you design.  Also know that new distributed design features such as in place edit are being developed where you would then be able to edit the referenced components inside your model.

Cheers,

Mike Prom 

[O.Tan]

I guess you missed this point I made:

Distributed design (x-ref) is a different thing as it's more catered for assemblies, and I don't want my data panel to be filled with individual parts, rather to keep them in assemblies like they're now.

[promm]

O.Tan,

I understand the workflow that you are trying to accomplish.  My goal was to give you an option for a workflow with the tools that we have today.  Thank you for the clear explanation of your Ideastatioin request.

Cheers,

Mike Prom

[O.Tan]

Thanks for the suggestion, but this is exactly why I created this suggestion cause I've been thinking for awhile how to have a solution that allows sort of "part edit" but doesn't break Fusion workflow and its single environment advantage.

Distributed Design works well for assemblies or sub assembly but it doesn't make sense to have a lot of sub assembly consisting of < 5 parts, it'll only end up giving us a messy workflow/components tree.

But thanks for the suggestion!