Solid, surface, multi-body icon change in 2019

[Anonymous]

In the What's new for 2019, I ran across this:

Can someone please explain how this is an improvement?  I find it to be a step backwards.

When it's at Full Mode, I'd like to know the differences.

[Mark.Lancaster]

@Anonymous

Someone was questioning the info as stated here: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-forum/what-s-new-for-inventor-2019-pdf/td-p/7887612

Not sure if @jeanie.wayker was able to find out anything..

[corym]

When I first read the What's New, I assumed they used the wrong screen shot.

The more I look at it, the more worried i get.

Autodesk - please comment - is the screenshot shown above correct? Do the browser glyphs for surface parts, solid parts, and multi-body parts look identical in the Full mode browser in 2019?

[ChrisHall]

Jim

Thanks for the feedback!  Can you provide additional context of the importance of the icons representing solid, surface or multi-body in your workflows?

Regards

[corym]

Hi Chris,

Does that mean the screenshot is correct in the Whats New document?

[SBix26]

That's the way it is in Build 131, anyway.  Content Library parts and sheet metal parts still have their distinctive icons, but surface parts and multi-solid parts look just like any other part icon.

Sam B
Inventor Pro 2018.2.3 | Windows 7 SP1
LinkedIn

[ChrisHall]

Thanks for sharing the feedback that this concerns you

Yes, the image is correct

Could you provide additional context how this change worries you and the impact on your everyday workflows?

Regards

[corym]

You are kidding me! How is this a new feature? It seems like a bug or regression.

If we can no longer differentiate between part types in the browser, what is the point in having a glyph at all? Why not just put the filename there?

If this stays like this, it makes upgrading to 2019 not worth it - it is light on tangible improvements as it was - this tips the balance the other direction as far as I am concerned.

Please explain to us what value there is removing it.

At the very least, it is too embarrassing to put it in the Whats New.

[ChrisHall]

Goal of my response here is to listen and understand what the impact of this change is, here are some questions:

• Does this impact productivity?
• What assembly task does knowing if its a body, surface, multibody help?

As 2019 is coming online we want to have a good understanding of changes impacting you upgrading.  Our goal for each release is to add functionality, improve workflows etc, not impact your productivity or you upgrading.

Chris

[corym]

As you know Chris, I use master sketch modeling all the time. I make extensive use of surfaces in my masters. I also drive multibody masters with surface masters which in turn drive assemblies that contain different part types. If I am unable to tell what kind of parts I am working with in the browser, without opening them to look, it is going to slow me down a great deal.

Impact of this change: It makes 2019 not worth the upgrade for us (and as you know, I have ALWAYS been one of the first to upgrade).

[corym]

I forgot to answer question 2: It helps me understand which part I need to make my edit to.

[admaiora]

For us it's not an improvement.

We have a lot's   of surface construction and some rules body related.

We would like to see easily what it's a surface and what it's a solid body, in part and drawing enviroment.

[ChrisHall]

Cory

Thank you for sharing the workflow impacts to productivity!  

Chris

[SBix26]

---

@ChrisHall wrote:

• Does this impact productivity?
• What assembly task does knowing if its a body, surface, multibody help?

---

Yes, this impacts productivity.  As Cory describes, I use surfaces and multibody parts extensively in my modeling, and having different icons makes it much quicker to visually scan the assembly browser to find what I'm looking for. 

Even if I'm not actually looking for a surface part or multi-solid part, they are still markers that break up the browser and allow me to find things without having to read the names of every component.  The other distinct icons (sheet metal, assembly, content library) all help with this, too.  Once I have my assembly browser ordered the way I like, I can quickly locate the component I'm working on because I know it's two down from the multi-body part that's right below the two surface parts.  Pattern recognition, much faster than locating component names, which may be very cryptic (just a part number, for example).

Sam B
Inventor Pro 2018.2.3 | Windows 7 SP1
LinkedIn

[ChrisHall]

Thanks Sam!

[Neil_Cross]

Surely this has got nothing to do with Express Mode or Full Mode, I'm baffled by the misdirection of this being presented in that context.  Look.

What's happened is the surface & multi-body icons have been removed from assembly mode entirely... irrespective of whether express mode or full mode has been enabled or disabled, this is a 1 part assembly in 2019 and the browser node is a default part icon.

I intentionally left this out of my Whats New Video because when I read it, I didn't have the foggiest idea what the heck it was implying, it definitely looked like the icons had been deleted but I thought no... there's literally no logic in doing that, I'm misunderstanding this and missing the point so I'll just leave it and move on.

But no, this has really happened?

What should have happened is the correct icon should have been displayed in Express Mode... ammiright?

Asking for a business case as to why this should be reversed... isn't that like making all the ribbon icons for all the commands a big red dot and then asking the customer base to justify why they needed them in the first place?

[Mark.Lancaster]

My take on this (and just my opinion - so don't shoot the messenger )

First I've never really compared browser icons between express mode and full load.  So I really didn't notice in prior versions of Inventor

The way I read this..  The Inventor development team has been trying to standardize across functions and most likely was trying to standardize here on browser icons between the two (2) modes.  Perhaps the standardization went right instead of left 

 

[corym]

Or wrong instead of right...

Cory

[Curtis_W]

This one has me scratching my head as well. The "real world use case" for me, would be something like this.

         One or more multi-body parts are often used as "base" parts from which other parts are derived using the Make Components tool. I prefer to add these base parts to the assembly (as reference parts) so that they can be tracked and updated easily ( it would actually be nice if there were an option in the Make Components tool to do this step automatially ). 

         In the example below the 15-1247-L is the base multibody component from which the other parts are created/derived. The multi-body icon provides an easy visual clue to the user who might update this assembly months later ( long after file names and part numbers have been forgotten).  

         So the multi-body icon is the indicator which signals the user to make the updates in this part file in order to have geometry, and parameter updates push through to update the parts and assembly. 

I hope this helps,
Curtis

[jeanie.wayker]

@ChrisHall  @Anonymous Chris or Hans, can you respond to this query?

Thank you,

Jeanie