Ellipse cannot be properly constrained.

[Anonymous]

Ellipses in Fusion are broken. You cannot constrain the center of an ellipse and be able to dimension an angle to it's axis. This is considered overconstrained. It is also not intuitive how to manipulate the ellipse. You cannot drag the ellipse to size via the axis endpoints; you must grab the ellipse itself. This is buggy. 

[jeff_strater]

This seems like a bug.  I'm looking into it.

Jeff

[Phil.E]

Thanks Jeff for letting me take this.

Investigation shows a few key things that are all working together to make this experience.

1. A bug can be seen at precisely 1:07 in your video. When you drag the center of the ellipse to move it, the dot turns black, indicating it thinks it's fully constrained, which it's not, which is a bug and is now logged. When you then drag it to the origin, all the construction lines turn black indicating they are fully constrained. Nothing will drag when it's fully constrained.

2. There is an existing bug that is also bothering you. If you have a completely un-dimensioned ellipse and the center is constrained, you cannot drag the axis points but you can drag the curve. If you add a dimension to one axis you'll find you can drag the axis points. In your video, after adding the dimension, you did not try to drag the axis points, instead only dragging the curve. So while this is being fixed (which will take a few weeks at the soonest), simply add a dimension to your ellipse axis and you can drag the end points around. This is an incomplete workaround if you require the drag for both axis. If you could show us how that completely blocks a real workflow, i.e. in your model not just a sketch, I can ask for higher priority on the fix (no guarantees here, just making a case for you).

3. I logged an improvement that asks for sketch axis to be driven by angle dimensions. Currently you must add construction lines to your ellipse to give it an angle, see video below.

*For your workflow where the ellipse must be anchored at the center, you must apply the angle dimension and then use a coincident constraint. This is part of the bug case I mention above.

[docara]

Hi,

I'm BATTLING to try and learn 360 and this ellipse issue has been a right royal PITA!!!

Why doesn't the prompt just cycle through with TAB like all the other functions (so far) have done? It is illogical that after typing in an axis size required you THEN have to click the mouse button to bring up the other axis (counterintuitive).

Also, why is it after both axis have been dimensioned, both angles have been set and the X and Y centres (from surroundings) have been nailed - the ellipse is still blue??

This has been flagged up since 14/07/16 - over a year

Thanks - (rant over)

M

[Phil.E]

@docara

Thanks for posting.

It sounds like you may have a new problem. Can you post a video showing this? I can't reproduce it in a simple test, I must be missing something. Thanks!

"Also, why is it after both axis have been dimensioned, both angles have been set and the X and Y centres (from surroundings) have been nailed - the ellipse is still blue??"

[Anonymous]

Now it's even more broken. When I try to constrain any part of this ellipse, Fusion 360 will crash on me. I've sent at least two crash reports working on this.

[laughingcreek]

Ellipses have always been problematic.  Many complaints so far over the years regarding their behavior.  I hope with enough post like these, AD will eventually do a deep dive into them and really fix them.

[Anonymous]

My work - around was to simply recreate the ellipse, but with more complex
projects I can see that being a significant nuisance. Complaints
notwithstanding, I love the software. Kudos to the developers for a great
program!

[Phil.E]

@Anonymous

Sorry to hear this is continuing to be a problem for you, thanks for the kind words.

I looked into your crash reports. There was one related to the sketch constraint system, and one that may be graphics related. The report shows you are using only Intel HD graphics with drivers almost a year old. Can you confirm this by running the graphics diagnostic tool, found in the ?Help menu? You can paste the results here.

They are currently testing fixes for the sketch constraint crash. Can you post a video showing your workflow, perhaps I can help you work around the problems.

Thanks,

[Anonymous]

That's bizarre. Must be a power setting or something. I want fusion 360
running on my GTX 1060. I wonder if that would solve my issues?

[Phil.E]

@Anonymous

Can you please use the Graphics Diagnostic tool, and paste the results here? This tool is more accurate than our CER reports. It's possible that your machine is not using the dedicated card, or it's possible that the CER reports aren't parsing the system info correctly.

[Anonymous]

Here it was as I was using it at the time of the crash:
[GPU Information]
GPU Device: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060
GPU RAM: 3072 MB
GPU Driver API: DirectX 11.0
GPU Driver Version:
w\S.ystem32\DriverStore\FileRepository\nvmii.inf_amd64_8d8d9e1d94103396\nvldumdx.dll,C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\Fi:22.21.13.8528
GPU Driver Date: Unknown

[Graphics Effects Settings]
Anti Aliasing: On
Ambient Occlusion: On
Object Shadow: Off
Ground Shadow: On
Ground Reflection: On
Selection Display Style: Normal
Transparency Effect: Better Display

[Limit effects to optimize performance]
Off


So... I'm curious why your error report says I was using intel HD. I have
all my settings set to use NVIDIA at all times when plugged in (which I was
at the time). I'll update everything just for the heck of it, though.

[Phil.E]

"...possible that the CER reports aren't parsing the system info correctly."

Sometimes we find that the nature of the crash can affect the system info collection. The graphics diagnostic is correct, nothing for you to worry about.

Thanks for checking.

If you have time, perhaps it would help for me to see your workflow. Autodesk Screencast does a great job of recording Fusion 360, right down to commands and keyboard events.

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/community/screencast

Regards,