Match command wierdness

[jamie.q.white]

I'd like to use the match command.  I think what I am trying is quite simple, so I don't understand what the problem could be.  The resulting surface is always twisted wierdly.

The T-spline edge is almost the same shape as the solid, so I don't understand why it won't match.

Here is a screencast demonstrating the issue (embed STILL does not work): 

http://autode.sk/1HgxIcW

Here's the downloadable file: 

http://a360.co/1LrlFJG

Thanks!

-jamie

[Phil.E]

Jamie,

Thanks for posting. I'll work with your file and provide some feedback today. I'm actually working on improvements to Match right now so thanks for the great user case!

Here is how to embed a video:

Step 1:

Get the right link from Screencast.

Step 2:

Paste the link into the HTML view of your post.

Result:

[Phil.E]

Jamie,

Do you have an earlier version of the model? The one you posted is already deformed. I have no way to undo this.

[jamie.q.white]

Hi Phil,

Thanks!  Sorry about the corrupted file:  here is a link to a previous version:

http://a360.co/1FDa4zY

It should be downloadable.

Here is a screencast of me trying to embed a screencast.  It is STILL broken.  I am using a Mac.  Could that be the issue?

http://autode.sk/1GKFTe5

-jamie

[keqingsong]

Regarding your screencast issue, I just tested embedding your screencast to a reply on my machine and another colleague's mac  and both instances the preview worked fine. I may be an issue with your account. Send me an email at keqing.song@autodesk.com and I'll help you get this sorted for you. 

[Phil.E]

Jamie,

Thanks for posting this you have found a bug!

The face/edge you are trying to Match up with is the problem. If I replace the face, the Match command works well. The easiest way to do this is extrude the face -1mm to cut it, then extrude it back +1mm to the original position. Now there is a new face and edge in the same location and Match is happy.

I really need to know how you created the face/edge in question. Without any parametric history, it's very hard to tell. But if I knew the workflow I could test against any other places where a user could create this situation. Any help you can provide is awesome.

Here is the face I'm talking about, and the workaround.

[Phil.E]

Jamie,

Good news, in the builds I'm testing for Match improvements do not have this bug. The Match simply works just as you expected it to. The good news is this next update should be in only a few weeks.

I would still like to know how you made the face so I can test around the workflow.

Thanks again! Great find.

[jamie.q.white]

Hi Phil,

The body was created by extruding from the sketch "TT inner diameter".  

I tried your fix and it did not work!  However, I re-extruded from the same sketch profile and the T-spline matched nicely with the new body. Wierdness.

Here is a screencast: http://autode.sk/1eJFO1g

I don't use the timeline for a number of reasons:

1 It is really, really slow.

2 It is really, really hard to organize.

3 It is really, really hard to figure out what is linked with what.

4 It breaks ( Yellow and red "X" and "!" errors with cryptic error messages all over the place that leave me flummoxed).  In the past, Fusion "lost" entire sets of timeline features. ie Save file, shut down, go to bed, come back next day, open file. No timeline features.  Gone.  Poof.  Days of work.

5 It causes F360 to crash. A lot.  My Fusion 360 is really slow so each time I crash it takes a long time (20-min to an hour) to re-load and get back to where I was. I can only take so many coffee breaks.

It is disappointing because I can really see the advantages of the timeline.  It is just not there yet.

In general I feel like I am just clicking randomly on things and sometimes they work. Why should re-extruding suddenly work?  How should I know to do this?  It would be really nice to understand some of the intentions and concepts behind Fusion 360.

-jamie

[keqingsong]

We have a solution in the works for the screencast embed issue - it has to do with user accounts and how some are able to embed and some aren't, which is just wonky. We will keep you posted as soon as it is fixed and ready to be 

[Discussion_Admin]

Until then please continue to just use the add a link method to use your screencast's in your posts.

Thanks
Discussion_Admin

[Phil.E]

Jamie,

Thanks for the feedback.

First, addressing the specific problem you found, there are some things I want you to be clear about.

When you attempted to perform the workaround I showed you, there was one key error. I asked you to extrude the face as a cut, then extrude it back into position. You used Press Pull. There is a huge difference in these tools.

In this case, Extrude was used by me to remove the error face. It literally cuts it off the model. By replacing this face I gave the Match command a new target face. You used Press Pull which can do a lot of things, but in this case Press Pull preserves the face. In fact, Press Pull tries, in this use of it, to preserve the input of the face you are press pulling. It preserves the body/face/edge tagging in both PM and DM space. Tagging helps commands know what geometry is what.

Press Pull is multi-purpose, it launches a command that is appropriate for the input you give it. This is why you can Press Pull on a sketch profile and it launches Extrude. You can use it on an edge and it launches Fillet. In this case it launches Offset and offsets the original problem face. It keeps the bad "tag" for the face. Your results at 2:12 in your latest video show that the original face was still being used by Match.

You state "In general I feel like I am just clicking randomly on things and sometimes they work. Why should re-extruding suddenly work?  How should I know to do this?  It would be really nice to understand some of the intentions and concepts behind Fusion 360."

I want to point out that you found a bug. This is not an intention of Fusion 360! So there is no way for you to know how to do this, and as soon as possible we will fix it. Nobody expects you to know these things. I figured it out by giving Match command different input. If input A doesn't work, doing it over and over is futile. Try input B instead. The match worked at a long distance, and not at a short distance. I started by removing 10 mm of tube thinking the Match command needed more space. I then figured out it didn't matter the distance so long as I removed the original face. The rest you know.

A couple notes about Timeline and your list of reasons. First, if you can operate well in DM space, keep doing it. This is why Fusion has both PM and DM. It's up to you, each has differences that make them useful as opposed to the other. So what ever works for you is just fine.

By the numbers:

1. Okay. Can you elaborate?

2. By "organize" it, what do you mean? You can group things but they must be seqential. If you move timeline nodes you are actually re-ordering the "time" that operations happen relative to each other. Typically you would only do this if you absolutely have to, for a modeling purpose.

3. If you right click on anything in the browser, modeling window, or timeline, you'll find a menu that helps you "Find in timeline/browser/canvas". This has improved lately, so maybe you could try it again.

4. It's supposed to break. This shows you that a parametric reference is either sick or gone. It's common to have features downstream that depend on upstream features. The warnings are to help you fix your model if you made an edit that breaks things downstream. You will learn by fixing the ones you break.

I haven't heard about any corruptions, or loss of data you mention in many months. If anyone else is seeing this lately, they need to contact me immediately via email.

5. I think this has also improved, but would likely be related to all the red and yellow features in your timeline. We've done a lot to improve the stability of sick timelines.

If you want to learn and have time for videos, I recommend the following:

This playlist is best practices: You could just watch all of them.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmA_xUT-8UlIh4hHJDCEDLPi3wQiMrPRY

On this playlist, you might benefit from the following:

Resolve errors and warnings:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ef1k-uDl3WU&index=2&list=PLmA_xUT-8UlIh4hHJDCEDLPi3wQiMrPRY

I hope this helps! Please continue the conversation if you have more questions.

[jamie.q.white]

Hi Phil,

Your last post is really helpful.  Thanks!  One thing that keeps me going when I get discouraged is the consistently constructive help I've gotten on the forums, both from Autodesk employees and other users.

Your explanation of the profound differences push-pull vs extrude was really useful for me.  I always thought they were pretty much the same thing, because Fusion brings up push-pull in a lot of different circumstances.  It would help to have this sort of information in multiple locations; the command help files & the training. Some of the command help instructions are so basic they are useless. 

I've been using F360 for a while (when I started with it, there was no timeline).  I've been through the training videos several times, but not recently. I think the last set I went through came out with the February release. If the latest are significantly different, I should probably go through them again, but sometimes I just want to get stuff done, not spend time on the forum or working through training sessions.

One particular thing that has been very helpful is Taylor Stein's videos on youtube where he uses F360 to design something from start to finish.  I would like to see more of these.

I can elaborate on the other issues.

1 It is really, really slow.

I experience many of the same problems documented here, but they existed prior to the June update: 

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/design-and-documentation/performance-and-usability-issues-with-fusion-...

2 It is really, really hard to organize.

The timeline is just clutter. I would like to group things by function or object.  I design bicycles, so what I do in F360 must be relatively simple compared to what others are doing, but the timeline accumulates hundreds of items. I try to give things sensible names, but I get tired of hunting around.  I want to be able to put all the timeline items for the headtube in a group/folder/cluster called "headtube". I don't work sequentially.  Sometimes I discover I need to change something about the downtube that changes the headtube, so I go change the DT and then get back to the HT.  This intersperses DT and HT timeline items.  Clutter.

3 It is really, really hard to figure out what is linked with what.

Fusion 360 creates constraints between different objects, often automatically.  There is not clear way to figure out what is constrained by what.  I have to remember. I try to indicate this in item names (ie naming something "downtube center position constrained by BB in component XXX") but it gets cumbersome. Sometimes I miss noticing when F360 creats an automatic constraint that causes what appears to be bizzare behavior (if you don't know there's a constraint).

4 It breaks ( Yellow and red "X" and "!" errors with cryptic error messages all over the place that leave me flummoxed).  In the past, Fusion "lost" entire sets of timeline features. ie Save file, shut down, go to bed, come back next day, open file. No timeline features.  Gone.  Poof.  Days of work.

I had a forum discussion with Nate about the timeline items disappearing.  In the end it was a bug that should have been resolved in a subsequent update, but it took weeks for the update to come out and in the meantime it was quicker to just re-do the design.  Once bitten...

In theory, the timeline should allow me to go back and adjust a dimension (a tube diameter, say) and have the design update to incorporate the change.  In practice, what happens is that the change breaks a whole bunch of things, which I then have to go through error-by-error and fix.  It is literally faster to work without the timeline, make the change and re-do everything since the change.  If I keep copies of intermediates at each step, it is easy.

5 It causes F360 to crash. A lot.  My Fusion 360 is really slow so each time I crash it takes a long time (20-min to an hour) to re-load and get back to where I was. I can only take so many coffee breaks.

If the stability has improved significantly, then maybe it is time I try again. I'll have a look at the new best-practices videos and give it another try when I start a new bicycle design. It would be great to get the timeline to work like it should.

-jamie