The following lists describe the changes that have been made to the ARRIS++ Enhanced Menus since the previous release (version 8.3 - spin 118, release 02), on March 14, 2006. Note that there are links in the following material pointing to more detailed information contained in the main documentation.
This changelog is divided into the following sections:
The following table lists general modifications and enhancements that have been made to the ARRIS++ menu system documentation.
| The master documentation was updated to reflect all changes reported here. |
The following table lists changes and additions made to the ARRIS++ menu system.
| PATTERNS: |
Pattern Menus
The pattern menus were revised to provide the following new features:
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Pattern Parameter Matching
Detailed investigations were conducted into how pattern parameters were to be matched and loaded and a number of changes were made to make this feature more predictable and reliable. However, to fully understand why things work the way they do, let's review how pattern styles are created. On the PATTERN CREATE menu, when the NEW command is selected, ARRIS prompts for a name and description for the new pattern style and then asks:
If YES is selected, then the current pen and color will be saved with the pattern style and automatically reset when that style is later loaded. On the other hand, if NO is selected, then no color or pen will be remembered and that style will use whatever the current color and pen happen to be.
In the image above, the solid fill patterns on the second row are all examples of pattern styles that were saved with their pen and color. Selecting these from the ARRIS Styles Catalog immediately sets the pen to 1 and the color to that shown. The first four patterns on the top row are examples of pattern styles where the pen and color were not saved. Therefore, they display in the menu using whatever the current color is (medium blue in this case) and will use the current pen and color when selected. This is all fairly straightforward with one exception. There is a special case where a pattern may be created with the pen and/or color set to none. The use of none instructs ARRIS to render that pattern using the layer's default pen and/or color which can be specified on the LAYER menu. The problem is that on the PATTERN SELECT menu, these styles are being displayed using the current color rather than the default color and this can lead to great confusion. For example, in the image above, the roof1 style did not have the pen/color saved, so when selected it will be placed on the drawing using the current pen/color values. However, the roof3 pattern was actually created with the pen and color both set to none. If this style is selected, the pattern will be created with the layer default pen and color which are probably not the same as the current pen and color. Go ahead and try it yourself! If you are not paying attention, it can be extremely confusing why the first style created a medium blue pattern while the second one did not! I mention all this to show that this odd behavior is inherent in ARRIS and is not a bug in ARRIS++! |
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| POINTS: |
Work Points
WORK POINTS Partial Overwrite Menu There was a bug with workpoints such that they could not be identified and erased using the POINTS menu ERASE command (or the :wpd or :wpda mnemonics) if the workpoints were placed while a work-angle was set. This problem has been corrected and workpoints should function properly regardless of the current work-angle setting. |
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| RI: |
Automatic Reset of Scale and Rotation
In the previous release of ARRIS++ a new option was added to the ARRIS++ OPTIONS menu that allows a user to choose whether the RI scale and rotation should be automatically reset to default values each time a new RI is loaded. In this release, this feature has been further enhanced by providing new menu buttons that allow this feature to be enabled or disabled at any time while working with repeated items. The revised manual section follows: In standard ARRIS, when a new repeated item is selected for use, the RI SCALE FACTOR and RI ROTATION remain at their current settings. Typically, these values are not appropriate for the new RI. If this behavior is not what you prefer, then there is option on the ARRIS++ OPTIONS menu that may be used to force ARRIS to automatically reset the RI scale back to a value of 1 and the RI rotation back to a value of 0 each time a new repeated item is chosen. The selection you make on the ARRIS++ OPTIONS menu determines the initial behavior when ARRIS is started.
Two new buttons have been added to the RI status menu immediately above the buttons that manually reset the scale to 1 and rotation to 0. These new buttons display the current automatic reset mode for these values. If the buttons read ON, then each time a new RI is loaded the scale for the new RI will be reset to 1 and the rotation is reset to 0. Clicking on either of these buttons will toggle this feature to OFF and the buttons will be displayed in darker color to indicate this status. In this case, when a new RI is selected, the scale and rotation will remain set to their current values.
These buttons can be used at any time to set the behavior that is desired. Regardless of how this is set on the RI status menu, the next time ARRIS is started it will use the default setting that you specified on the ARRIS++ OPTIONS menu. Example: During typical drafting work when random RIs are being used, it may be useful to set this feature ON so that as each new RI is selected the scale and rotation are reset to predictable values. Later, you might be working on something like and electrical drawing where all of the electrical symbols are being placed at 0.75 their default size. It would be inconvenient to have to reset the scale back to 0.75 after each new symbol is selected, so turn this feature OFF and the 0.75 scale will remain set as each new RI is used. Note that the automatic setting of the scale and rotation are either both ON or both OFF. You cannot set them independently. |
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RI Tools
REPEATED ITEM TOOLS Menu A new RI ARCHIVE button was added to execute the :riarch command which is used to archive all RIs in the current drawing to a new library which may be stored or exported with the database. |
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RI Scale Factor
When RI SCALE FACTOR is selected from the RI status menu, additional prompt options have been added.
Numeric selections for 0.10, 0.25, 0.50, 0.75, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 4.0 and 10.0 have been provided. |
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RI Plot Scale and Database Size
There was a bug introduced in the previous release of ARRIS++ that kept repeated items from being scaled when set for PLOT SIZE or DBASE SIZE. This problem has been corrected. |
The following table lists fixes that have been applied to existing sigmacs to correct problems and bugs.
:mn_xhatch
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Fixed various existing coding problems. |
The following table lists revisions that have been made to existing sigmacs in order to provide some expanded or new capability beyond that offered by the original command.
:mn_xhatch
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Improved some of the user prompt strings. |
| NEW COMMAND | CLASS | DESCRIPTION |
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:cj_xh_erase |
pattern | Erase one or more patterns from the drawing |
:cj_xh_move |
pattern | Move one or more patterns on the drawing |
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:cj_ri_atog |
ri | Toggle automatic reset of RI scale & rotation values when new RI is loaded |
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