What are we missing?

coleman · January 2019

The development cycle of OS is great. An update every few weeks is incredible.
What functionality / improvements are you missing?

Here is my list in no order:

Performance improvements. When documents get large....performance suffers. Im not talking about graphics. Sketches can take several seconds to "open" and switching to in context can take minutes to update. At times....onshape can slow to a crawl. This has to keep improving because onshape becomes virtually un-usable at times.
Assembly configurations
Fix the hole callout tool in drawings! Its been almost two years! 1. Hole through multi-part, blind in last--> in drawings the hole callout doesn't work. 2. If I deepen a counterbore in the hole tool (to actually make the SHCS sit below the surface and not flush....the hole callout doesnt work. Im getting frustrated here, mostly because its been 2 years!
Auto inference the edges of cylinders when sketching. Im growing weary of launching the USE command, projecting the edge, then constraining sketch entities to the projected edge....THEN create another constraint because the projected sketch isnt constrained (which it should be). I feel like I have to use the USE command way too frequently.
Fix the damn jumbled up mess on the screen during sketch patterns. This is beyond craziness. Give us a nice pop up window to enter the inputs in AND make changes after we committed the entry. As it is now...its just a complete mess and a major point of frustration. Its been like 5 years.
Selective part merge
Sketches in drawings. Full sketch functionality with constraints....and the ability to accurately dimension those sketch entities. As it stands now...you can create false dimensions (I guess because of scale issues). These "false dimensions" shouldn't be allowed...or at-least should be red.
Auto inference points that are not on the active sketch plane.
Axis tool set
Tangent plane
Weldments
Sheet metal flange on part of an edge. The move face tool doesn't always work. Flange from single line sketch would be fine.
"Slice" at active sketch plane (section view)
Make the in context parts transparent....they are ghosted out but we cannot see through them (to see other ice components). This is another key frustration for me.
Mating flat head (counter sunk) fasteners is a pain.
Mate connectors on an angle other than 0,90,180,270 is also an issue that should be addressed.
Tolerance definition at the part studio level. Makes sense....right?
A measure tool....measuring, especially in assemblies isnt easy.

coleman · January 2019

And surfacing tools....we really need those.

MBartlett21 · January 2019

I actually prefer Onshape sketch pattern over Solidworks' implementation of it
I find it quite intuitive.

coleman · January 2019

@MBartlett21 interesting you say that. I think it is extremely difficult to find what I need to select and then to select it because it is overlayed over the other entities on the screen in a jumbled up mess.

THEN after I commit the selections, how do I go back and edit it later?

Same scenario with offset. I find myself selecting two edges that aren’t continuous....then canceling the command to start over again to fix the issue.

I thank a seperate box window with selections, direction and dimension, and the ability to unselect would be helpful.

I will post a screenshot to represent what I am referring to.

Cris_Bowers · January 2019

I'm in agreement with just about everything you have listed.

Performance is the biggest thing for me. Onshape really suffers with many of the DXFs I have to import and use for geometry. I've had refresh times in excess of 15 minutes in some cases. No issues in Solidworks with the same DXFs being imported.

Need native beam/weldments tool with identical parts auto-recognized and combined, and cut lists created.

Sheet metal improvements like being able to add countersinks, counterbores, and scribes.

TimRice · January 2019

Chris, if you haven't already, please submit a ticket on these docs so we can take a closer look.

Cris_Bowers said:

...Onshape really suffers with many of the DXFs I have to import and use for geometry...

Cris_Bowers · January 2019

@TimRice I have submitted support tickets and been in contact with several members of the support team regarding the issue. My understanding is that I have a unique case. I am in the sign industry so I deal with a lot of logos and word art that is cut out of whatever material the sign is made from. I have to export the art from Corel to a .eps file. That is imported into LED Wizard, which is the program we use for determining our LED layouts and converting .eps to dxf. I will clean up a lot of the art within LED Wizard, but once it is exported to dxf it can still be pretty messy. Smooth curves can turn into multiple adjoining arcs that aren't tangent and sometimes will be made of lots of little straight lines. I do my best to clean up the rest and reduce the line count in AutoCAD, but it's pretty hard to get it perfect. Sometimes I'll still be left with hundreds of lines making up the art, which Onshape also doesn't like. I've run into a few issues where arcs have such large radii they appear as straight lines. This has caused the importing geometry to fail because the centerpoint of the offending arc is outside of the Onshape sketch limits. Then I have to hunt through the dxf to find these arcs and convert them to straight lines. It's very tedious. Once I do get the dxf imported and working in Onshape, some of the lines will not be perfectly joined which can cause extrudes to fail. Or even if the extrude works, offsetting the extruded geometry to create shoulder cuts will fail, so I have to go through and manually join all the points, which can take hours.

michał_1 · January 2019

@coleman forgive me distraction I could cause, but I "must" replay @Cris_Bowers.
Cris, what a ridiculous workflow you are using?
Why it's a linear process Corel>LED Wizard>AutoCAD>Onshape> ...and let me guess Corel again>CAM/CNC?
I work in the POS/POP industry which in most part is nothing different from sign making, so I know most of your problems.
In my opinion, we don't gain anything with a linear process, it's not parametric but it suffers from data translation.
I would propose a parallel workflow, where the design is primarily done in Onshape, whole model without logo "cuts".
From Onshape you exporting faces which should contain cuts (or extrusions), as DXFs.
These DXFs you importing into Corel, add logotypes (also with all required fillets and offsets done in Corel).
You remove Onshape faces outlines and reimports only logos with offsets into Onshape as DXF.
You must match the scale and coordinate systems, but it takes less than 30min to test with DXF format to use and how each tool (Onshape and Corel) sets the origin.
After importing DXF into Onshape (it will contain only lines and bezier curves, so no worries about a circles center points) you fixing all sketch entities.
In a parallel "line" same Corel design is send to LED Wizard.
Further steps depend on how you cut your design, most likely you will reassemble design from Onshape in Corel, but just outlines and flat patterns.
I could be more insightful I could see some of your designs and know better your workflow and toolset.

dick_van_der_vaart · January 2019

@michał_1
Very basic solution for this would EPS inport in Onshape

michał_1 · January 2019

@dick_van_der_vaart choice of file format is a secondary problem, what is to be avoided is constant translations of same design/data. A solution is to work in parallel translations. For whatever reason LED Wizard is doing circular interpolation for curves (in Corel everything different than a line is a bezier curve, even an arc) where original Corel file exported in proper format will contain beziers. If you know how to match scale and origin, rest of work is to lock the sketch so solver doesn't have to actually solve anything.

Cris_Bowers · January 2019

@michał_1 I don't disagree it's a ridiculous workflow, but it's one I had to adopt when I started working here, and if I knew of a better way I would use it. You are close in your assessment but our art department, which is separate from the CAD department, makes our proposal drawings which the customer then has to approve. Weeks or months later a work order is issued, and only then do I find out about the job and get to start on CAD.

michał_1 · January 2019

Change nothing, you still have to rebuild design in CAD. My way is to build from measurements everything but logotypes, these I will bring in CAD as DXF.

chrisjh777 · January 2019

@coleman

I agree. This is my response to your post:

1. Performance Improvements. Regenerating a multi-page drawing can take time. I have learned to issue the command to regenerate multipage drawings, then go and make a cup of coffee.

2. Blind in Last Hole Callouts currently, are useless. I have learned not to use “Blind in Last”, rather I create individual concentric holes in each part so that hole callouts are correct. Takes more time but results in correct callouts on drawings for workshop.

3. Sketches in drawings. I would like to be able to sketch points so I can dimension to them. Currently this is not possible.

4. Tangent Plane. I use Featurescript Tangent Plane. Works great. Try it.

5. Weldments. As much as I hate it, I use Solidworks.

6. Make in context parts transparent. This is related to the IR “Make parts in assemblies transparent”. Currently the 5th most voted IR. Vote for it here: https://forum.onshape.com/discussion/1762/make-part-transparent-in-assembly#latest

7. Mating countersunk screws is a pain. Need to be able to tangent mate CSK screw face to CSK hole face.

Mirror Parts in assemblies. Currently the 10th most voted IR. Vote for it here: https://forum.onshape.com/discussion/5763/mirror-feature-for-assembly-workflow#latest

famadorian · February 2019

I would say that a feature/bug tracker is above all these points and any other points you can think of;)

What are we missing?

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