CAD Tech News (#50)

▶ Tetra4D Update Enriches Creation of 3D PDFs

For Tech Soft 3D, the addition of export support for STEP AP242 format is another step toward the goal of perfectly packaged 3D data.

By Cyrena Respini-Irwin

Tech Soft 3D produces two types of offerings: one intended for developers, and the other for end users. The first category comprises software development services and tools such as the Autodesk RealDWG toolkit, the Siemens Parasolid geometric modeling kernel, and the HOOPS platforms, which power hundreds of applications behind the scenes. "More than 500 companies are licensing our SDKs [software development kits]," noted Tyler Barnes, vice-president of marketing for Tech Soft 3D.

The second category carries the Tetra4D brand and includes Tetra4D Converter, which converts native 3D CAD data from more than 20 file formats into interactive 3D PDF documents, and Tetra4D Enrich, which builds on the functionality of Converter with expanded creation capabilities. Enrich enables users to add view carousels and bills of materials to their 3D PDFs, and create their own templates for design change notifications, requests for proposals, parts catalogs, marketing presentations, and other 3D PDF documents. Templates can be created in any application that allows users to save to PDF format, including Microsoft Word and Adobe Photoshop.

Notably, this functionality is accessible to users without any programming knowledge. "Until now, this has all been too challenging and too expensive … requiring extensive Javascript programming and many man-hours on a per-document basis," said Jordan Opsahl, Tetra4D technical marketing specialist. "We've really simplified the user interface and the tools for creating these advanced documents."

A Heavy Communication Burden

According to a study conducted by Lifecycle Insights, engineers spend more than 30 hours per week on design communication tasks — creating drawings, answering questions or clarifying drawings, and generating additional drawing documentation. "The problem is, without access to 3D, communication often becomes unclear or challenging for a lot of users," Opsahl noted. "Unless you have a CAD seat, it's very difficult to share your design and 3D data, [both] inside and outside the organization." Read more »

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Cyrena Respini-Irwin is the editor in chief of Cadalyst.

▶ IMAGINiT Tricks Tutorial:
Configure AutoCAD Electrical 2017 Databases for Use with Microsoft SQL

Follow these simple steps for quick configuration.

By Alex Karan

To start, create and configure on the SQL server the Microsoft SQL instance AECATALOG. Note that the Microsoft SQL version should be 2008 or later.

Next, install Autodesk Content Migration Utility, which is not installed by default. Select "Install Tools & Utilities" in your installation wizard and Install "Autodesk Content Migration Utility." Read more »

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Alex Karan is a senior solutions consultant for IMAGINiT Technologies.

▶ WHAT’S NEW

Override XREF Objects That Are Not Set to BYLAYER
Have you ever tried to change the properties of an object within an external reference that is not set to BYLAYER? If so, you know that just doesn't work! In this video tip, Lynn Allen shows you how the XREFOVERRIDE system variable can come to your rescue. Watch the video »

Bentley Site Design Software Speeds Completion of World's Largest Yogurt Plant
SITEOPS software helps design 200-acre site to facilitate delivery of a 1-million-square-foot project within tight time constraints. Read more »

Style Library Manager Migration Fixes for Inventor 2016
IMAGINiT Tricks Tutorial: When using the Style Library Manager to migrate a previous version style library to Autodesk Inventor 2016, the resulting migrated Style Library will be set to Read-Only, preventing the copy of styles across two different libraries. This tutorial discusses two solutions. Read more »