Modeling Interface

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Modeling Interface Overview

It mainly includes all the components of CrownCAD: function command, feature tree, file management, view window and so on.

Number	Instruction	Number	Instruction
1	Navigation bar	6	Document list
2	System management	7	Feature Management
3	Toolbar	8	Document location
4	View toolbar	9	Graphic area
5	View Management	10	Feedback on questions

Navigation bar

In the CrownCAD navigation bar, you can do project Settings, new documents, import/export.

ICONS

Click on the icon anywhere to return to the project management page.

Project setup

Click on the project name to display the Settings screen for the project, as follows.

• Project type：Public, Private. Private items can only be viewed and modified by the current user, and Public items can be viewed or copied by other users.

• Project Name：Modify the name of the project.

• Archive mode：Submit the document for the activity, you cannot edit the project after archiving.

Create a New document

Create a new document, pop up the create document interface, enter the document name, select the type, you can create, the type includes parts, assembly, engineering drawing, folder.

Import/export intermediate files

Can support common file formats, such as IGES, STEP, etc., specific instructions can see the data exchange related content.

Import/export CrownCAD files

To import and export CrownCAD files, click Export to Local in Import/Export and Import CrownCAD File. You can determine whether to export the CrownCAD file including engineering drawings, standard parts, and templates. The exported files can be imported to the CrownCAD file.

How to use:

Export to local:

1. Select [Export to Local] from the Import/Export drop-down box.

2. Set the check box to control the special content to be included when exporting, including drawings/standard parts and templates.

3. Select Nested View/Flat View to set whether to indent the files in the file list according to their affiliations.

4. File list, check what you want to pack.

5. Number of documents: Displays the number and total number of selected documents for each category to be packaged.

6. Document structure: Select the exported document structure.

7. Compressed package name: Enter the compressed package name, which defaults to the project name.

8. Click Export, select the template to be exported, support the user manual search or the system automatically search according to the selected document.

9. Click OK.

Import the CrownCAD file:

1. Import, click the Import/Export drop down box and select Import CrownCAD file.

2. Package the model file along with the referenced template file.

3. Confirm the import, the system automatically recognizes and uses the template file.

Instructions:

• When exporting the template file, the template file and model file are packaged as a zip compression package.

• You can upload the template file as an unpacked file or as a ZIP package, but you cannot upload the template file together.

Version management

Click to manage the branches and nodes of the current document. See Versioning.

Print

Click , Parts and Assembly to print the current viewport image.Engineering drawings preferentially print the selected drawing content.

Save

Click , you can save the current operation history, save location will appear "save time" or "successfully saved".At the same time, in the version management, you can see a blue five-pointed star mark in front of the time node.

• Click Save, the right side of the viewport can open the save record, you can view all the saved records.

• Click the rollback after a time node record to open the rollback dialog box. After confirming it, it will directly jump back to the model status of the time node, and the navigation bar will update the latest save time.

Packing

Using the Packaging feature, you can package and copy parts, assemblies, drawings, and associated documents.

How to use:

1. Click the Pack command that saves the drop-down menu.

2. Set what to pack, whether to include drawings, standard parts, etc., in the dialog box.

3. Change the packing location by browsing.

4. Add prefixes, add suffixes: Type text into the input field after checking, then press Enter to add uniform prefixes to each new name.

5. Click Save to complete the corresponding packaging.

Save the document

You can save the current open document as a new document by using the [Save As] fuction.

How to use：

1） In the open document state, click the Save document option in the drop-down menu of the Save icon.

2） Set the name of the new file to be generated in the Save As dialog box.

3） Set the location of the new document you want to save.

4） Set whether to "contain all reference documents": tick, and copy both the current document and referenced documents: don't tick, just copy the current document. The assembly and schematic documentation can be used by this item.

5） Set whether to "save and open":Check to open a new document after copying;Do not tick, just copy without opening the new document.

6） Click "Confirm" Complete the save document.

Save as template

Click Save as Template in the drop down box to save the current document and its property Settings as a template.

System Tools

System tools include the following aspects:

Multi-window

With the multi-window function, when multiple documents are opened, multiple documents can be displayed tiled under one window and can be operated normally.

How to use:

1. After selecting any document to open, click [Window] button in the navigation bar.

2. Click the drop down button and select the tile effect [horizontal tile] or [Portrait tile].

Instructions:

• No more than 32 documents can be opened.

After refreshing the web page, keep only the last activated documents.

Command search

The command search function quickly finds commands. Enter the name of the command you want to look for in the Search command window to quickly find the command. You can either tap the name directly to launch the command, or tap to locate the command.

Give a like

Click to like the current document and to see the number of likes.

Task

Tasks are used to record upload, download, file conversion progress and other processes, and its interface is as shown in the following picture:

Comments

Comments can be shared with other users through links or user Settings. Comments and replies can be made here. The interface is as follows:

The control description is as follows:

• Current: The add comment dialog box is displayed without comments, and the add order is displayed from bottom to top when there are comments;
• All: Displays all comments;
• Voice : Click to switch between voice input and text input. After switching to voice input, hold down the left mouse button to record.

• Label : you can pick up the graphic element of the viewport to add a mark;
• Screenshot ：Capture the entire graphics area of the software, and can crop, mirror, rotate, comment, filter and other operations on the screenshot of the picture.

• When a message is received, the number of unread messages will be displayed in the upper right corner of the comment icon.Click on it to reply to the comment, click on the image to see a larger image, click on the white box next to the question comment, and check it to close the question.

Share

Sharing can be shared with other users, teams, and activities through links or user Settings, and set permissions (edit or read only), its interface is as follows:

For specific functions, refer to Sharing collaboration.

System Settings

See Settings for System Settings.

Help

Refer Help for details.

Switch theme styles quickly

Refer to Switch Theme Styles for details.

User Settings

Refer to User Settings for details.

Toolbar

The toolbar displays the available function ICONS, supports the display of ICONS or graphic display, mobile and other user-defined, can be set in the System Settings-Toolbar.

View toolbar

Adaptive

Click to display all unhidden elements in the current document in the viewport.

Focus on designated area

Click and select an area in the viewport box to focus the viewport on the area selected in the box. Right click "Focus to the specified area". To exit focus, click or right click "Exit Area Focus".

Render Mode

Set the render style of the parts, the render style is shown as the following image, the default display is coloring.

Display and hide tool

Unified management size, constraints, coordinate system, origin and other display state.

Control elements are shown in the following table:

ICONS	Name	Remarks
	Sketch constraints	Drafts and engineering drawings take effect within, and are not subject to overall explicit and implicit control
	Sketch size	Only take effect within the sketch, not subject to overall explicit and implicit control
	Origin
	Reference point
	Base line
	Datum surface
	Reference coordinate system
	Curves
	2D sketch
	3D sketch
	Current document MBD annotations
	MBD annotation for parts	Assembly only
	Comments
	Thread line
	Center of Mass

Cutaway view

Click to open the cut command and display the cut view of the model.

Description of each control:

• Select the cutting plane： Select one or more solid planes, planes, datum planes.

• Keep the top color： Different cutting planes show different colors.

• Show the cut line：The cut plane is shown as a cut line.

• Show the cut cover: Display the profile effect in a specified color. Leave this option unchecked to see inside the model.

• Display Outline: Displays the edges of the model's cut plane after it is cut.

• Cross areas: The partitioned display is defined by the intersection points of the selected datum or plane and the boundary boxes of the model. When not selected, the plane of the profile view is displayed.

• Exclusions: The selected entity will no longer be cut.

• Included items: The selected entity will be sliced. No other entity will be cut.

Click again to exit the cutaway view.

• Cutting measurement: Create a section view in parts and assemblies, and support the use of measurement commands to pick up points, edges, cross section elements generated by cutting.

How to use:

1. Create a section view in parts, assembly.

2. Open the Evaluation [Measure] command and pick up the point, line, and surface elements generated by the cutaway for measurement.

Dynamic Highlighting

Click to open the dynamic highlighting command. When the mouse moves over the model, the corresponding element is highlighted and the mouse changes to the selected state.

View Direction

Click , the view dialog box will pop up, you can quickly find the camera view through the view direction, to achieve a quick switch of the viewport direction.

Selective filter

How to use：

1）Click the icon to bring up the "Select Filter" toolbar.

2）Click the icon of the element type in the toolbar to highlight it, controlling that only the highlighted elements can currently be picked up.

3）Click the highlighted element again to make it unhighlighted, and select Filters to automatically deactivate when none of the elements are highlighted.

4）Click the Control function icon in the toolbar to "activate/deactivate filters, Clear all types, Select all types."

Function description：

• Filter rules:

  • Do not start the command, only the elements belonging to the filter type can be picked up.
  • Start any command, and the command is in the state to pick up a specific element (such as the stretch boss to pick up the sketch or to pick up the draw direction), if the specific element overlapped with the element set by the filter (such as the filter selected the axis), then only the overlapped element can be picked up (that is, only the axis can be selected, no other direction elements can be selected); If the specific element does not coincide with the element set by the filter (such as the filter selects the entity), the filter does not take effect (that is, any direction can be picked up elements).
  • Start the measurement command to pick up only elements that belong to the filter type.
  • Elements that are originally hidden or cannot be picked up due to occlusion can still not be picked up after "Select Filter" is set.

• The filter toolbar can be hidden while the filter is activated, please note that the filter is still in effect at this time.

• Default shortcut keys: F4- Explicit Select filter toolbar, F6- Activate/deactivate Select filter.

Render Styles

Click the icon to modify the model rendering style.

Note：Real rendering and cartoon rendering cannot be enabled at the same time.

Capture

This tool is only displayed in the sketch environment.

You can filter the points that need to be picked up and manipulated during the drawing process.

Face the sketch

This tool is only displayed in the sketch environment. Quickly restore the view plane to face orientation.

View Management

Quickly realize the view direction conversion, and can realize the rotation of the view, along the axis rotation, etc.

Multiple Viewports

How to open：Click the "View Orientation" icon on the toolbar of the leading view or press the space bar to open the "View" dialog box. Select the number of viewports in the dialog box to open the multiple viewports.

Description：

1. Under the multi-view interface, each view can be individually reoriented or rotated when the linked view is not open.
2. When the linked view is open:

• The link icon is displayed in the view for differentiation, the non-orthogonal view is not in the linked state
• All orthogonal views are zooming and panning in an associated state, i.e. zooming or panning at the same time, at which point the view cannot be rotated through the mouse
• When you rotate the view out of the orthogonal direction via view orientation, the link state is automatically broken, and vice versa when you change the view to the orthogonal direction, the link state is automatically changed
• The link state can be turned off individually under each viewport

3. Drag the divider bar to resize each viewport

Note：This function is not currently supported when editing parts in assembly

List of Documents

View documents in your project, create new documents, search documents, Show parts, assembly, drawings, or all, sort by creation time, name, type, last edited time.

List Display

Display all documents in the project as thumbnail + type + name. You can choose to sort by creation time, sort by name, sort by type. You can choose to display parts or assemblies.

New document

Click and create a new document, including parts, assembly, drawings, folders.

Feature Management

Feature management includes two parts: feature panel and view panel.

Feature panel

• Filter box: You can filter features by name.
• Part composition: solid, surface, curve. Foldable display.
• Part material: Right-click on the material, you can edit the part material; Double click "Material" to quickly open the Material library..
• Datum plane, origin: standard three datum plane - front, right, up.
• Feature list: Show sketch, feature from top down, can be suppressed or rolled back; Double click sketch to enter edit sketch, double click feature display driver size.

View Panel

Contains a list of basic views, a list of custom views, and PMI, with an interface like the one below:

• Basic View: Right click on one of the views to display "Active", "Directed only". "Active" means that the viewport is currently positioned in this view, and smart dimensioning or labels are displayed in this view.
• Custom view: Record the view created through View Orientation or MBD-New view, right click on one of the views to display "Active", "Orientation only", "Rename", "Delete", "Show associated PMI", "Hide Associated PMI". Views cannot be deleted when they are active.
• PMI: Displays smart sizes and labels that have been created under the current view.

Graphic area

Display the graphics area where you can manipulate parts, assemblies, engineering drawings.

Origin

The model origin is shown in black, representing the (0,0,0) coordinates of the model. When the sketch is activated, the point is shown in blue, representing the sketch's (0,0,0) coordinates.

Right-click provides shortcut keys such as "Show all", "Hide origin", "Adaptive", etc. Right-click at different positions to display different shortcut operations, as explained below.

Right click on blank space

Right-click on any blank space in the viewport (without picking up any elements) to bring up a list of functions, as shown in the image below:

• Show all：When there are elements in the hidden state, you can click Show all, then display all hidden elements.

• Hide the origin： click to hide the origin of viewport coordinates, after hiding, you can also display the origin again.

• Adaptive：Adjust the enlarged or reduced viewport range to see the entire model.

• Focus on the specified area：After clicking this command, the box will select the area to zoom in, and the viewport will zoom in on the area.

• Rotation：After clicking the rotation, the left mouse button of the viewport can control the rotation of the graph, and click to cancel the rotation will return to normal.

• Translation：After clicking to translate, the left mouse button in the viewport can control the movement of the graphics, and clicking to cancel the translation will return to normal.

• Open the drawing：Open the drawing of the current document.

• Recent command：Record the last 3 operation commands in the current document, click to open the command again (This item is not displayed when the command operation is not executed).

Right click on datum

Right-click on the datum plane to bring up a list of shortcut functions, as follows:

• Floating box： Sketch, Show/Hide, Face up, Vertical, Adaptive.

• Menu bar： Parent-child relationship, Hide Other/all datum, reset datum, Adaptive, Focus (zoom in on the current right-click feature), rename, focus on the specified area (zoom in on the selected area), Recent Command.

Right part button

Right-click on the part and a list of shortcut functions will pop up as follows:

• Floating box： Edit features, Sketch, suppress, roll back, Show/Hide, Set appearance, Face to face, Vertical to, round corners, chamfer, Adaptive.

• Menu bar： Father-son relationship, Hide Other \ All Parts, Adaptive, Focus, Rename, focus specified area, Edit features, Recent commands.

Right click on document name in Feature panel

Right-click on the document name at the top of the Features panel to bring up a list of shortcut features.

• Part Document

1. Floating box: adaptive, transparent, set appearance, open engineering drawing.
2. Menu bar: Document properties, Custom properties, Collapse project.

• Assemble Document

1. Floating box: Adaptive, Hide all instances, transparent, Set appearance, Fit, open drawing.
2. Menu bar: Reverse selection, Insert new subassembly, Document properties, Custom properties, Collapse project.

• Drawing Document

1. Menu bar: Document properties, Custom properties, Collapse items, Rebuild.

Right click on entity in Feature panel

Right-click on the feature panel entity to bring up a list of shortcut functions.

• Floating box： Edit features, show/hide, set appearance.

• Menu bar： Parent-child, Delete, Focus, Create new folder, Rename, Reverse selection, Material, Isolate.

Right click on the datum of the feature panel

Right-click on the datum of the feature panel to bring up a list of shortcut functions.

• Floating box： Sketch, Face on, Vertical on, Show/Hide, Adapt.

• Menu bar： Parent-child, rename, Focus, Hide Other \ all datum, Reverse selection.

Right click at sketch of Feature panel

Right-click on the feature panel sketch to bring up a list of shortcut features.

• Floating box：Edit feature, roll back, suppress, Show/Hide, Face on, Round corners, chamfer, Adaptive.

• Menu bar：Parent-child relationship, Delete, Rename, Focus, Create New folder, Reverse selection, Add to Knowledge Base.

Right click on the feature panel feature

Right-click on a feature in the feature panel to bring up a list of shortcut functions.

• Floating box： Edit feature, rollback, suppress, Adaptive.

• Menu bar： Material, document properties, custom properties, collapse items.

Assemble blank space right click

Right-click on any blank space in the assembly graphics area to bring up a list of its functions, as shown below:

• Hide the origin: Click to hide the origin of the world coordinates, after hiding, you can also display the origin again.
• Display all： When an instance, origin or datum is hidden, you can click Show All to display all hidden elements.
• Hide All： Click to hide all elements of the viewport instance, origin, datum, etc.
• Display hidden parts： When an instance, origin or datum is hidden, click to display the hidden instance, origin or datum, and do not display those that are not previously hidden.
• Rotation： Click to rotate, the left mouse button in the viewport can control the rotation of the graph, click to cancel the rotation will return to normal.
• Translation： After clicking to translate, the left mouse button in the viewport can control the movement of the graphics, and clicking to cancel the translation will return to normal.
• Open the drawing： Open the drawing of the document.
• Recent Commands： Displays the three most recent operating commands in the assembly document.

Right click on the assembly viewport datum

In the assembly feature panel, right click on the datum surface to display the function list as follows:

Right click of assembly sub-parts

In the assembly, right-click the sub-part to display the function list as follows:

Right click on the datum of the assembly feature list

In the assembly, right-click the datum surface in the feature list to display the function list as follows:

The assembly feature list matches the right click

In the assembly, right-click the feature list to match the relationship and display the function list as follows:

For specific functions, refer to Assembly-Instance list-right click function.

Quick confirmation

Provide quick confirmation function in multiple functions of sketch/parts/assembly/engineering drawing.

Sketch：Use the "Straight line, Polygon, spline curve, cross curve" command. Right-click while drawing to add [Create, Exit] option in the function list, click "Create" to create elements but not exit the command, click "Exit" to create elements and exit the command.

Parts/Assembly/engineering drawing：When the mouse is operating in the viewport, you can quickly switch the next pick box or quickly create features.

• For commands that have multiple pick boxes, the mouse displays as when the pick completes the contents of one pick box.Right click at this point to switch to the next pick up box.
• When the required elements of the feature are set and can be created, the mouse will display as.Click the right button to create the feature.

TAB Pages

Display all open documents in the current project in a browser window, switching documents through the Documents TAB at the bottom of the page.

Smart Shortcuts

In different scenarios, the corresponding menu content is displayed. There are four shortcut keys, namely "ESC", "space", "S" and "D".

Shortcut key "ESC"

The ESC key is used to exit the current command and cancel the pickup operation.

• Close the dialog box. Include: Project Settings (click project name within the document), branch, task, comment, Share, system Settings, each command dialog box (stretch, etc.), new dialog box (you can also close when you do not enter a name);
• ESC can not exit the sketch.

Shortcut key "Space bar"

The space bar pops up view orientation bar: You can save the current camera view as a custom view at any time

For details, refer to 5 Modeling Interface View Direction.

Shortcut key "S"

Press the "S" key under Sketch, entity, Assembly scene to bring up the shortcut menu.

• The shortcut menu position appears preferentially in the lower right corner of the mouse.
• If there is insufficient space in the lower right corner of the mouse (for example, the mouse is located on the far right of the screen), the shortcut menu can be displayed in the lower left, upper left, and upper right of the mouse according to the actual situation. It should not exceed the screen and cause failure to click.

Shortcut key "D"

In the parts (other than sketch)/assembly document, select a single point/line/surface and press the D key to pop up the related elements panel of the element, showing the parent elements of the element in turn.

• The selected point/line/surface can be an element of a solid/surface/curve or a reference element, but cannot be a sketch element.
• Level: Assembly at all levels → parts → solid/surface/curve → Features → points/lines/surfaces.