Send (Variable) Feature To Top / Folder

james_sleeman

As we know, variables are within the feature list but I imagine that I am not alone in always wanting to have features at the top of the features list.

It would be EXTREMELY useful if you could "send feature to top (of features list)", or even "send feature to folder", where "folder" is an existing folder in the features list.  Currently the only way is to drag-and-drop, which if you have hundreds of features is a real pain.

Alternatively you can "roll to feature" somewhere, create your variable, and then roll back to where you were, but this is quite inconvenient especially if you were already working in a rolled state since you have to remember that, or you have two windows open on the project one creating a sketch and one used for creating variables on the fly (until such time as we can create variables on the fly from within a sketch, having two windows is a quite workable solution) since if you roll in one window it also rolls in the other which is not desired.

john_mcclary

this has been brought up before. As it turns out, having all your vars at the top of the list is more of a slow-down than a convenience. 

every time you edit something on the tree it will need to regenerate everything below it.
so having all your vars on top means every edit will need to generate the part studio every time.

it is much more efficient to put the var immediately before it's first use in the tree.
then just type "var" in the search bar, it will then filter the whole tree and give you a nice easy list.

owen_sparks

If it makes you feel better I attended that webinar, understood the content and still put variables at the top of the feature tree for ease of use and because not doing so feels wrong.

Was wondering about putting them in the correct place as John describes but driving them with configuration variables so you get a nice interface at the top. Dunno what that would do for performance?
O.S.

konstantin_shiriazdanov

yes, position of variables in history gives the ability to control the scope for regeneration. but since variables are really something important among other features we could have a default label in feature search bar

konstantin_shiriazdanov

owen_sparks said:

If it makes you feel better I attended that webinar, understood the content and still put variables at the top of the feature tree for ease of use and because not doing so feels wrong.

I beleve in the future there will be a "reference scope" area of the UI in feature three or somewhere else, and it sould be a good place to have variables category there among other special objects

owen_sparks

@konstantin_shiriazdanov that sounds good to me.

Owen S.

NeilCooke

@owen_sparks Configuration variables are much more efficient than regular variables - they only regenerate a Part Studio from the point at which they are used. For example, if a configuration variable is referenced in the very last feature and is changed, only the very last feature is regenerated. However, if you use a lot of variables, your Feature List will get very small very quickly. Trade off.

MBartlett21

@NeilCooke
Could we have a "send to just before when this variable is referenced" feature?

owen_sparks

Thanks Neil.

john_mcclary

The other down side to config vars is you will need to set defaults every time, or remember every value when inserting into an assembly or drawing.
to me that is a huge negative to config vars in lieu of tree vars.

NeilCooke

@john_mcclary good point - didn't consider that

owen_sparks

john_mcclary said:

The other down side to config vars is you will need to set defaults every time, or remember every value when inserting into an assembly or drawing.
to me that is a huge negative to config vars in lieu of tree vars.

True, but if you create a 2nd Configured Partstudio that only has a single pick list of configs that drives the 1st PS then you can have a list of "favorites" to drop into an assembly

john_mcclary

That seems pretty complicated just to avoid typing "var" into a search bar... 

owen_sparks

Yeah, but if you have a file with 10 variables it means you don't need to set them every time you insert a common variant