How do I set (reestablish) "primary instance of context" in a Part Studio that has an assy content?

StephenG

I do not know how it happened, but I lost the ability to update the assembly context. I get the following error msg:


Can someone point me in the right direction?

MichaelPascoe

Hey @StephenG, I've run into similar issues a few times. The help documentation for this does a better job explaining it than I could: 
In-context primary instance.


Also, if you have lost the context link to your assembly, you may have to re-insert the part studio back into the assembly then edit in context again to reestablish that link. In other words, if you were editing your part in context, but it never actually used the context, it is possible to loose that link because it wasn't ever "fully established". This may be fixed now, but it was the case when I tried it last.

For more specific help, please share a link to your document.

StephenG

Thank you. Your response got me moving forward again. I apologize for this late reply/thank you, but I have been spending a lot of time experimenting with Assembly Contexts to get a better understanding of how it works. I have been taking copious notes and as I do this I am amazed at how many times I have had to go back and rework the wording of prior observations to correct or clarify my observations. 

The help page is helpful but was written by someone who doesn't know how much he knows, therefore, it is missing important background information (context) in explaining what Assembly Context does and how it works. I think I have a better understand of quantum entanglement than I do of the assembly context relationship between of an assembly part instance and the part's part studio. 

Assembly Context is one of those things that is conceptually straight forward to grasp, but the mechanics and nuances of how it does the magic is still a mystery to me. There are a multitude of unique flag icons and subtlies in informational and error messages that one needs to be fully aware of and understand to fully leverage the power of assembly contexts.

To any Onshape developer reading this....
Asside from my own confusion about the mechanics of using Assembly Contexts, my biggest problem/complaint is not being able to change/update an assembly context while a part feature is being created/edited. I can control the visability of other elements in the part studio (ex. parts, sketches....) but cannot switch "midstream" to another context. The only thing allowed it the RMM menu "Hide context instance(s)".