Improvements to Onshape - September 11th, 2019

Roy_Mutalik

Our first release of September comes with some highly-requested drawings improvements. Let's take a look. 

CAD IMPROVEMENTS

HOLE TABLES

You can now create Hole Tables to show on your drawings!

https://onshape.wistia.com/medias/62yugqna1z

REPLACE MODEL & DRAWING REFERENCES

With this release, you can now replace a model reference on a drawing even after views have been created.

https://onshape.wistia.com/medias/0ur0l9kkl8

There are many use cases for this functionality. Some include:

1. Replacing views of a Part Studio (which you had created accidentally) with the correct Part reference
2. Changing Configuration of a Part shown on a drawing
3. Replacing a Part with an Assembly
4. Duplicating a drawing, and changing the reference (for a similar part)
5. Switching all view references between a Workspace and a Revision/Version.

O-RINGS IN STANDARD CONTENT

ISO 3601-1:2012 and SAE AS568D O-rings have now been added to the Standard Content Library.

CHANGE UNITS OF MESH DATA

You can now dynamically change the units of imported Mesh data. The changes automatically update, resizing the mesh in the Part Studio where it was imported.

SKETCH SELECTION AS REFERENCE FOR HOLE FEATURE

A few releases back, we introduced the ability to select an entire sketch as a reference for a Hole feature. The Hole feature parametrically updates if vertices are added or removed from that sketch.

After receiving feedback from many users, especially on the forum (thank you!), we have made some additional improvements. Most notably, certain points from the sketch will no longer be automatically included in the selection. These points include:

• The center point of a center-point rectangle
• The three points used to define a three-point circle
• The edge point created by the inscribed polygon
• The center point of a circular pattern

Note that any of these points can still be used as a reference location for a hole if selected manually in the Hole feature.

We would like to take a moment to continue to thank our active and vocal users for providing us with valuable feedback. We'll promise to always listen, and make Onshape great together!

STANDARD CONTENT APPENDIX

A Standard Content Appendix has been created in the Help Documentation. The Help is searchable, so you will be able to find the appropriate hardware easily without having to dig through the Standard Content Library from the "Insert" feature in-app.

DRAWING TABLE PERFORMANCE

You should expect to see improved performance and responsiveness when dragging, snapping, and generally navigating tables on Onshape Drawings (General Tables and Bill of Materials).

RESET PROPERTIES

In a Part Studio, the properties dialog now has a "Reset all" button which will clear all editable part properties of the selected parts. This does more than it appears at first: As the tooltip indicates, it will also reset some properties you can't see in the dialog (appearance, material, tessellation quality), and, unlike just clearing out the fields manually, it fully clears all manual applications. This allows values calculated by custom features (which are normally overridden by those manual applications) to take effect.

PROFESSIONAL IMPROVEMENTS

CLONE A RELEASE CANDIDATE

You can now create a new Release Candidate by directly copying a previously created one. All elements (tabs), as well as the comment history is copied to the newly created Release Candidate.

https://onshape.wistia.com/medias/ufb9yvi7g0

TEN-DIGIT PART NUMBERS

You may now enforce a minimum Part Number length of up to 10 digits.  

ENTERPRISE IMPROVEMENTS

SSO USING AZURE AD AND ADFS

Onshape Enterprise's Single-Sign-On (SSO) now supports the use of Microsoft Azure Active Directory (AAD) and Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS).

FEATURESCRIPT IMPROVEMENTS

EXTERNAL REFERENCE UPDATE DIALOG

Feature Studios will now show an external reference update icon (similar to those shown in the feature tree) and include a similar update dialog for managing versions of external references.

LEARNING CENTER IMPROVEMENTS

TECH BRIEFING - MANAGING AND USING ONSHAPE ITEMS

A new Tech Briefing has been published on how to manage items as a company admin, and add items to your BOMs as a company member. 

Please take a moment to try out these new features and improvements and leave your comments below. For a detailed list of all the changes in this update, please see the changelog.

Remember: The updates listed here are now live for all users when creating new Documents and over the next few days these features will also be available in Documents created before the date of this update.

adrian_vlzkz

Very welcome addition of the Release Candidate Clones... not sure why is not just called "Resubmit" or "Re-release" but still, this is a big step in the right direction for Data Management

john_mcclary

VERY NICE!

Long awaited updates! Hole tables and Replace model in drawings! Wahoo!

Thank you for listening with hole sketch points I'll have to play around with that again
I already am happy you were able to ignore the center points of patterns and center rectangle! that's something I always HATED about solidworks hole wizard. Good job!

sebastian_glanzner

Very nice update!
I'm going to use Replace model & drawing references a lot!
Thanks, very useful!

emagdalenaC2i

Great improvements!!!

owen_sparks

Onshape: "You’re gravely mistaken, you won’t convert me as you did my father.”
SometimesWorks: "I am your father!"

FERNANDA_RAMIREZ

Very nice, Hole tables and replace model in drawings helps a LOT!

Thanks!

john_mcclary

Why is your Onshape logo a Fishbowl??

Jason_S

@john_mcclary That's in enterprise

philip_thomas

@john_mcclary - Onshape Enterprise users can upload their own logo.
Would you like to upgrade?

(The real reason is that the QA group works in a glass area of the office that is called 'the fish bowl' - now you know )

john_mcclary

Nah, i'll just have @MBartlett21 hack my css lol

jonathan_sessa

Wow this is all super cool stuff! I can't wait until you guys add mirroring in assemblies! 

hayden_morgan_nz

Awesome, thanks for the update.

owen_sparks

Wow I'd have been happy with just one of these:-

(a) SKETCH SELECTION AS REFERENCE FOR HOLE FEATURE

(b) STANDARD CONTENT APPENDIX

(c) FS EXTERNAL REFERENCE UPDATE DIALOG

To have all three in one update is wonderful; heartfelt thanks from over here

If you could find the time to add images to the Standard Content looker-upper then it'd be perfect.

Thanks folks,

Owen S.

EvanReese

Nice work folks! I'll be using the replace reference a lot in drawings. With that capability being able to duplicate a sheet would become a lot more valuable, since you could lay one out and then make additional sheets for different configurations (for example). 

Also, good call on the standard content appendix. In just taking a quick look at it I noticed that there is a lot more there than I realized! I made my own configured spring pin model at one point, but I noticed that I don't need it anymore because of the appendix. Standard Content it's such a handy tool.

brucebartlett

Thanks for the update. Replace model in the drawing is going to be really handy, I have often wished I could do this, especially after major changes to a part studio tree where part references change, it also means drawings should be able to be reused more often rather than creating from scratch.  I am also enjoying the updates to Release Management making it more usable. 

nbennett

This is a great update, hole tables are especially useful for us so thanks a bunch. Everything works as expected and updates smoothly, making changes a non-issue. On the feedback side, has any thought been given to adding text and tolerances to hole series? Would including the ability to add a tolerance to the hole feature at the part level make sense, that way the information isn't lost if the table needs to be redrawn or modified? I'm wondering if that could also facilitate tolerances for hole callouts as well.

This and the ability to remove exclude entire hole series rather than just individual holes is the only way I can see this getting any better, but this is exactly what we needed. Great work all around, thanks again

PeteYodis

@nbennett Yes, you will continue to see us improve holes and hole feature.  We know these are important and we are definitely thinking and have thought about the best location to do each one of these activities.  We certainly don't want to go down a path where we silo information solely within a drawing.  

nbennett

@PeteYodis That works for me, glad to hear this is all getting attention. Looking forward to it!

3dcad

Thanks a lot for those holy tables

Song_Yikun

Cloud line

neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed it

NeilCooke

@Song_Yikun - you need more people to vote: https://forum.onshape.com/discussion/8811/cloud-line-for-revision

john_mcclary

Holy Crap!

Why didn't you mention this one!!

sebastian_glanzner

john_mcclary said:

Holy Crap!

Why didn't you mention this one!!

OMG! When was this implemented! Best update!

NeilCooke

@john_mcclary @sebastian_glanzner - not sure how this missed the forum post, but this is a prime example of why it's always a good idea to review the changelog 

owen_sparks

Or if you're tagged on the issue (via a support ticket rather than an IR) then the nice people at Onshape email you to tell you it's been done How groovy is that?

Owen S.

john_mcclary

I thought I was tagged on that one, but the emails come when they come. Sometimes it's nice to have a surprise like that while doing some of the more tedious parts of a job.

Yea, I always forget to read up on the change log.

sebastian_glanzner

@NeilCooke I read the changelog, but somehow I missed that feature! Maybe I stopped reading after "metadata" 

"New reset for part metadata in properties dialog"

Roy_Mutalik

@john_mcclary @sebastian_glanzner

Definitely my oversight for not including Reset Properties! 

Glad you guys found it and love it - I've added it to the forum post so others may enjoy!!!

As always, thank you for your feedback!

MBartlett21

@Roy_Mutalik
Is another update coming soon?
This update is no longer pinned.

NeilCooke

Depends on how you define "soon".