Should design intent mimic manufacturing intent?

[spm_no]

Being fairly new to CAD, I was wondering if there should be any relationship between design intent (generating a 3D rendering in the software) and  manufacturing intent (materializing  the rendering into a physical object in the real world).  For example, if I want to make a tenon, I would take a piece of wood at cut the tenon on my table saw, i.e. start with a whole piece and remove material.  Now, if I want to do a 3D rendering of the tenon with the intent of making  a parts list (how much wood to buy), does it really matter whether I start with a component and then remove material (mimicking the actual process) versus starting with a shorter component and then extruding out the tenon?  Either way I arrive at the same rendering.  Just curious on people's thoughts.  The same idea applies to making a mitered box.  Does it really matter if I use the 'joint' option since it mimics the actual gluing of the joint versus constraining the two pieces together via a sketch constraint?

[etfrench]

I'd say it depends on the manufacturing process.  You need to design to the process.  Your part may need a pocket two inches deep. A 3d printer would have no trouble with this, but a milling machine might if your longest bit was only one and a half inches long   The technique you use to make a model makes a lot of difference if you need to make modifications or build a series of parts with different sizes.  Well designed joints allow you to use parameters to change part sizes without having to redesign the model from the beginning.