REPLACE COMPONENT WITH ALREADY OPEN FILES

DeerSpotter · ‎07-14-2017

REPLACE WITH OPEN FILES.png

Too many times i have to go look for a part that I already have open. I just need to quickly replace it and move on with my life. Finding the folder with that file gets complicated quickly when all you are doing is this 24/7.

Copying a file to the assy. also gets annoying as you dont want to lose your mates/constraints.

I think as a community we all know why this would be important to have.

Please forgive my crude art work. I know Autodesk can make it look better. 🙂

Thanks!

DRoam · ‎07-14-2017

Great suggestion. We also need the same thing in the Place dialog box. Here's a related suggestion for that: Placing Recent Items

karthur1 · ‎07-17-2017

Totally agree. In the meantime, there is an app in the Inventor app store named "Visual Replace" that is an absolute gem. I think it will do what you are asking. I use it quite a bit.

Thanks,

Kirk

DeerSpotter · ‎07-24-2017

karthur1 wrote:

Totally agree. In the meantime, there is an app in the Inventor app store named "Visual Replace" that is an absolute gem. I think it will do what you are asking. I use it quite a bit.

Thanks,

Kirk

Kirk,

Thanks for that, that has helped a lot. But not as much as this feature request would. I am still coping the part to the model space to replace it. If i didn't have to that would such a good tool.

Thanks,
DeerSpotter

etaCAD · ‎07-25-2017

I made an add-in that exactly fits your needs.

It is very easy to use: Just use the copy command in Inventor or any file browser like Windows Explorer to bring an Inventor-file into the clipboard. A valid path as simlpe text is also accepted.

Then use the smartReplace command and replace the selected occurrence(s).

Watch the video here.

The app is available in the app-store.

Please try it and leave me a comment.

Thanks,

Andreas

DeerSpotter · ‎08-03-2017

etaCAD wrote:

I made an add-in that exactly fits your needs.

It is very easy to use: Just use the copy command in Inventor or any file browser like Windows Explorer to bring an Inventor-file into the clipboard. A valid path as simlpe text is also accepted.

Then use the smartReplace command and replace the selected occurrence(s).

Watch the video here.

The app is available in the app-store.

Please try it and leave me a comment.

Thanks,

Andreas

Andreas,

Thank you for that addin, i don't think this will work. Sure it's close to the idea, but that's not the point i am trying to make.

The point is, not looking for the part, not leaving your work area to bring back the angle or baseplate to work on it.

Don't we have 6S and 8S programs? Where everything is near you so you dont have to go out of your way to build something? This should be the same way. When i go to replace a part it should be really easy to do so. So easy that i don't have to pull my hair out just looking for it.

Thanks,
DeerSpotter

etaCAD · ‎08-04-2017

DeerSpotter,

did you already try smartReplace? I know this is not excatly what you request but it simplifies replacing a lot because it avoids the annoying File-Open-Dialog completely.

Nevertheless I understood your aim and think I can inplement this in my addin. Actually I'm very busy with some other projects, but I put this issue on my to-do-list. When available, I'll post the news here again.

Give smartReplace a try. Probably it works better than you expect.

Thanks,

Andreas

etaCAD · ‎08-17-2017

DeerSpotter,

i updated the smartReplace-add-in and added your idea: When there is no suitable content in the clipboard it shows the open parts/assemblies in a dropdown as source.

Please have a look at the prototype video if it works as you expect and let me know your comment.

When you agree with the workflow I check for bugs and publish it in the app store.

Thanks,

Andreas

DeerSpotter · ‎09-08-2017

etaCAD wrote:

DeerSpotter,

i updated the smartReplace-add-in and added your idea: When there is no suitable content in the clipboard it shows the open parts/assemblies in a dropdown as source.

Please have a look at the prototype video if it works as you expect and let me know your comment.

When you agree with the workflow I check for bugs and publish it in the app store.

Thanks,

Andreas

Andreas,

That is amazing!!!

I love it. Please update.

Thanks,
DeerSpotter

etaCAD · ‎09-26-2017

Dear all,

the new version, where you have the possibility to select from open files as ource for the replace command, is published in the app store.

You can get it here.

All participants of this topic can write me a PM to request an extended trial license. I need to know your Inventor version(s) and your full name or company.

Have fun with the app

Andreas

DRoam · ‎02-28-2019

Similar idea: List of opened assembly files when inserting to a presentation file

Bert_Bimmel · ‎06-02-2019

I would appreciate a very simple enhancement of the "replace component"-command: Open the file-Dialog with that folder preselected, in which the part to replace resides. The substitute part almost ALWAYS resides in the same folder. Instead, you get an open dialog with a more or less random folder-preselection (i.e. the folder from which you've placed a new part the last time), and have to browse manually to the appropriate folder, which can be very tedious.

I had allready written a macro for myself to do so long time ago, but since the change from 2012 to 2016 the functionality is gone, as the file-open-dialog nowadays ignores the path-argument when beeing called from the API!

😞

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