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Customizing menus

If you always do the same types of work, or more importantly, never do certain types of work, you might consider customizing some menus to remove items that you never use. Customization applies to both the main drop-down menus and the context-sensitive RMB menus. To customize a menu, follow these steps:

1. Choose Insert⇒Customize Menu with a part document open. Note that Customize Menu is different from Customize.

2. Deselect the menu items Sketch from Drawing, DXF/DWG, Object, and Hyperlink (see Figure 2.50). Click anywhere outside the list to close it.

3. Click on the Insert menu to ensure that the deselected items have been removed.

Figure 2.50

Customizing the Insert menu

4. RMB-click the Right plane in the FeatureManager.

5. Select Customize Menu.

6. Deselect Section View. Click anywhere outside the list to close it.

7. RMB-click the Right plane to verify that Section View has been removed.

Changing interface colors

This tutorial does not depend on RealView capabilities, but later work will. To find out whether your computer is RealView capable, check your video card and driver version against the list on the SolidWorks Web site for system requirements. On the main page of the site, follow the link Support⇒System Requirements⇒Graphics Card Drivers.

Before starting this tutorial, make sure the RealView icon is disabled. You can deselect RealView by choosing View⇒Display⇒RealView Graphics or by using the gold ball toolbar icon on the Heads Up View toolbar.

Cross-Reference

For more information on RealView graphics, see Chapter 5.

Edit the colors used in the interface:

1. Choose Tools⇒System Options⇒Colors. Make sure the “Plain (Viewport Background color above)” option is selected.

2. Change the Viewport Background color, first in the Color Scheme Settings list, to a light gray color, then click OK and make sure the setting was applied.

3. Return to the Colors dialog box by choosing Tools⇒System Options⇒Colors, click the Save As Scheme button, and save the color scheme as Plain Gray.

4. Now select the Gradient option, and select the top and bottom gradient colors (second and third in the top list). Click OK and see how you like the gradient display. Adjust the colors until you are happy with them.

5. Return to the Colors dialog box by choosing Tools⇒System Options⇒Colors, click the Save As Scheme button, and save the color scheme as Gradient. Figure 2.51 shows the Colors dialog box.

6. Use the Current color scheme drop-down list at the top to change the color schemes between the newly saved schemes.

Adding hotkeys

For many users, hotkeys are an integral part of the everyday experience of using SolidWorks. You can easily assign hotkeys and manage the assignments by following these steps:

1. Choose Tools⇒Customize⇒Keyboard.

2. In the Search For text box, type Options.

3. Click in the Shortcut column, and type O.

4. Click again in the Search For text box, and type Customize.

5. Click in the text box next to the Tools⇒Customize entry and press Ctrl+C. Click No to the question of whether you want to reassign the hotkey. Press Ctrl+T instead.

6. Click OK to exit the Customize dialog box.

7. Press the O key to open the Options tab. Click OK to exit.

8. Press Ctrl+T to open the Customize dialog box. Click OK to exit.

9. Press Alt+F, and then click the Close button to exit SolidWorks.

Figure 2.51

The Colors settings

Combining macros with hotkeys

The following steps show you how to link a macro to a hotkey:

On the DVD

You can use the macro called rectangle.swp, located on the DVD.

1. Find your SolidWorks installation directory. By default, this directory is C:\Program Files\SolidWorks Corp\SolidWorks.

2. Create a folder called Macros in the SolidWorks directory and put the rectangle.swp macro in it.

3. Open SolidWorks.

4. Create a new blank part document.

5. Press Ctrl+T to access the Customize dialog box.

6. Click the Keyboard tab.