I thought that since SWW 2012 is coming up, and everyone has voted on their Top Ten Enhancement Requests (right?) that I'd throw together a short list of the things that have been annoying me about the software lately. These aren't necessarily big hitters, but it's the small things in life that really have the tendency to torque me off. So here goes (in no particular order):
- S-Key Dis-Improvement: With the 2012 release the when you press the S-key the shorcut menu pops up as usual, but now the search bar becomes active. Previously when I accidentally pressed the S-key I could immediately press it again to get it to disapper. Now hitting the S-key again just puts an "S" in the search bar, forcing me to move my hand to the trusty Escape-key...which unfortunately is usually where it rests nowadays.
- Select Chain Inconsistency: In a sketch you can RT-click on a line and choose Select Chain. This is a nice feature if you want to quickly select a bunch of line in your sketch. However, if you choose Select Chain on, turn that chain into construction geometry, and RT-click on it again you can no longer Select Chain. No, Sir. I don't like it.
- End Spline: When drawing spline we used to be able to RT-click and select End Spline. Somewhere along the way in this release it has dissappeared, and I don't know why. This again forces me back to my trusty Escape-key. I love you, Escape-key.
- View Pallet Weirdness: When creating a new drawing the View Pallet dutifully pops up, but if I select a view to drag onto the sheet it just gets highlighted instead of actually moving. I have to first select in the View Pallet then drag-and-drop. Extra clicks for no reason.
- Width Mate "Tab" Selections: Does anyone else think that the Tab-key should work for the "Tab Selections" or is it just me?
- Rectangle Defaults: It would be nice to be able to change the default rectangle type to Centerpoint instead of having to accidentally draw the wrong type, curse, hit Escape 12 times, then select the right type and resume sketching.
- Part Placement in an Assembly: When you start a new assembly from an existing part the Begin Assembly manager pops up with the part highlighted...but it's not actually highlighted is it? If I click in the workspace to place the part nothing happens. Hit Enter. Nothing Happens. Deselect the part and reselect it then click in the workspace, and voila! That seems pretty intuitive...
- Sketch Relation Problems: If I freehand sketch some artwork that I want to get cut out of sheet metal I should technically be able to a single simple extrude. However, as the artwork gets more complicated and I add more and more curves, spline, lines, etc., SW forgets its brains and decides to throw mustard and ketchup all over the place for no reason. This forces me to break the model up into several features with less-complex sketches for no obvious reason.
I know these aren't exactly ground-breaking. There may even be enhancement requests started for some of them (I can't be bothered to search). These ones have just been getting under my skin lately. Anyone else have any little annoyances like these?
SolidworksGeneral