Suggestion for a future release.

[Adam]

I think it would be good if you could have windowed viewing in mastercam. In other words an ability to view and work on several parts in mastercam at the same time by using windows. Being able to shuffle through. Something like what Autodesk Inventor does, its just a quick menu click to switch to the other part. It would really help in mold making. It would be alot less clutter and it would use less system resources than running multipull instances of mastercam.

 

Just my 2 cents.

[3R!< W3NG3R]

I think this has already been asked for.

I was told there was a very good reason for the way it is now. Don't know if they plan on adding it (may not be feasable).

[Guest]

This has been sort of beat up,leaned on and I think mostly denied, the biggest issue being there are guys that can work a session of MC over in a big way, guys start having several files going in a session of MC, they are going to be HUGE complaints about performance.

 

BTW, I have a tool path crunching right now that has my system just about stopped, I can't imagine trying to run another and if it was available, someone would surely try.

 

[ 01-05-2007, 06:50 PM: Message edited by: John Paris @ CDES ]

[Thee Rickster ™]

Would the autosave get severly confused

by having windowed viewing?

 

Does it gets confused enough when

having 2 or 3 separtate MC sesions open?

[Jack Neelands™]

The autosave doesnt get confused with multiple sessions (thank god) ....but to have windowed viewing ..that would definately be a cruncher...tool paths going on one level and modelling on the next......that is why i use the merge files when doing big jobs with lots of different parts ...I split up the assembly into different Mc files and then put them back together when finished.

[William Grizwald]

"......that is why i use the merge files when doing big jobs with lots of different parts ...I split up the assembly into different Mc files and then put them back together when finished."

 

An assembly based cadcam system allows one to work on parts. No breaking them out of their assemblies into another system to machine. While more complex to maintain (for some situations), they really shine in this area. It also allows the implementation of a fully featured machine simulation model which can be added just like a bolt or a screw.

 

--

Bill

[Jack Neelands™]

So if I had an injection mould with say 6 or 7 inserts and about 10 core/cavity slides...then electrodes to boot and i try to process all of the 3D toolpaths at once...wouldnt I need an add on feature to extinguish the fire that breaks out from the puter underneath my desk?

 

 

...sorry bad joke ...but i just finished a job with exactly that and had to jump back and forth to each piece while they were being machined in 2 machines...the brutal part was that I had to have not only 2 pieces open in case of last second edits(as they are one offs)but 2 others as well so that I was ahead of the game.

 

Im not sure if you could ask a software to crunch and crunch ...and then crunch some more all in one session without it balking

 

 

but like John said...It makes me think whether we should be flogging this dead horse?

[Guest]

You know Jack, maybe that's something Smartcam could handle batter than MC?

 

 

or maybe you could just tell me I don't know Jack

 

[CNCme]

Good night,

 

John,

You are right about the toolpath crunching... I

Rotate between 3 workstations sometimes, mostly

15 to 30 minutes each.

 

AND Would viewsheets qualify for windowed viewing?

A new feature in X2 MR1. This allows saving

views with different levels and re-calling them

instantly by clicking on displayed tabs on the bottom of the graphics area.

 

Tony G

CNCme Engineering LLC

X Beta Site

SO Almost Employed Senior Programmer

N.E Massachusetts - Southern New Hampshire

_________________________________________

End mills and tooling are like The "AMMO"

And coolant and chips are like the enemy

Under your boots as you advance in the

Manufacturing Battle

-------------------------------------------------

[CNCme]

Good Day,

 

BUMP

 

Would viewsheets qualify for windowed viewing?

 

Tony G

CNCme Engineering LLC

X Beta Site

SO Almost Employed Senior Programmer

N.E Massachusetts - Southern New Hampshire

_________________________________________

End mills and tooling are like The "AMMO"

And coolant and chips are like the enemy

Under your boots as you advance in the

Manufacturing Battle

-------------------------------------------------

[Thee Dragracer1951]

multiple sessions works just fine for me. But i'm just a little guy.

I'd like to see parametrics myself. But I've already said that.

[kunfuzed]

Personally I would love to see windowed viewing of multiple files, like solidworks does. I certainly wouldn't be expecting to process multiple toolpaths, just switch back and forth between files for reference. Wouldn't that be better on the system then multiple sessions?

[Guest]

I too thought this was something that would be great, then after having explained why, and having some rather large toolpaths, began to see why.

 

If they did try, perhaps it could be a function of limited use only to be available while in Design.

 

Once a machine def is activated, no access to the feature.

[Adam]

Well I dont see the problem these days with processors over 5GHz, and the ability to link 4 8 or even 16 cores up on 1 mobo. Computers can rip MasterCAM up. I dont think there is a reason why it wouldnt work now.

 

Its all in your price point, I think alot of people would utilize the feature to some extent.

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

CATIA works in this way, hence the name Crash And Try It Again.

 

I'm going to have to say if I had to sacrifice stability to have this feature... I don't want it that bad. Don't get me wrong, I like the way CATIA has Part, Product, Drawing and Process files that can be linked together but are seperate . Unfortunately when you have software that "works" like that, things tend to get more finicky. If you don't do something EXACTLY right, you crash.

 

It has almost nothing to do with Processor Speed, sure if you have a slow system and you run software like CATIA, UG, Solidworks, Pro/E, etc... you're going to be one pissed off person, so that's not the whole issue.

 

JM2C

[3R!< W3NG3R]

I agree with James on the stability issue.

 

It's not like we can't run more then one file already. I would also love to see windowed viewing, but not at the cost of stability.

 

Viewsheets sounds interesting, but I'm not quite sure what that is. (not a beta tester)

[Guest]

Soon grasshopper,

 

You must have patience

 

[PeterM]

Windowed viewing of multiple files should be a switchable feature if implemented, then users could evaluate their own needs, coupled with the computer equipment that they have, and choose weather or not to use it

[ToolMan184]

Something that would be very nice to have is in analyze to have a section under the XYZ that converts the units to mm. We have lots of metric drawings and program in english. Would save having to convert everything with a calculator.

[Guest]

toolman184, can't you just switch to metric in the screen configure to analyze and then switch back to english to program.

[Guest CNC Apps Guy 1]

quote:

---

...Windowed viewing of multiple files should be a switchable feature if implemented, then users could evaluate their own needs, coupled with the computer equipment that they have, and choose weather or not to use it...

---

Oh, is that all Peter .... why didn't you say so??? That's real easy............. to type and say. Stability AND switching???? While I may be a novice (and that's being very generous) coder, I do understand the complexity of what is involved for such a task. As a CNC Programmer I can;t see a real tangible benefit to adding that feature and it would be adding a feature that in all likelihood could break a bunch of other stuff. Not exactly where I would want CNC putting their development dollars if I had a say in it (which I do not I might add). It's not that I don't want them to push the envelope because I truly do. But, I do want them to push it in areas that will seriously make in impact in how we work. I honestly don't think for all the work that would be involved for that project that we would not see any huge benefits that's all.

 

JM2C

[ToolMan184]

del,

 

that would work, actually didnt even think of that. I think my brain has crashed the past week.

[Chris Parish]

Jim:

 

CATIA.... that just too funny, never heard that one before

[Thee Dragracer1951]

What I'd like to see is, a way to tell what level a toolpath's geometry is on. I have 50 meg files with geometry on 35 different levels, and I'm easily confused.

[Guest]

concise level description names helps me immensely on this point.