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18. Once the dimensions are brought in, you need to move some of them from one view to another, which you can do by Shift+dragging the dimension from the old location to the new location. Ctrl+dragging predictably copies the dimension. You can move views by dragging an edge in the view.

Sheet versus Sheet Format

With new and even experienced users, there is some confusion around the Sheet versus Sheet Format issue. Part of the confusion is due to SolidWorks terminology. SolidWorks names the two items Sheet and Sheet Format. In this book, I simply use the terms Sheet and Format to avoid linking the two items with a common first name. It would be better yet if Format were changed to Border or Title Block so that the name more closely matched the function.

In a SolidWorks drawing, you are editing either the sheet or the format. When editing the sheet, you can perform actions such as view, move, and create views, but you cannot select, move, or edit the lines and text of the drawing border. When editing the format, you can edit the lines and text that make up the drawing border, but the drawing views disappear.

Often, users save a template that already contains a format, and save themselves some time every time they create a new drawing.

While you cannot change templates after you create a document, you can swap and update formats and change sheet sizes.

Summary

This chapter helps to lay the foundation for the more detailed information that will follow. The chapters in Part I include recommendations and answers to questions that help you to develop an intuition for how SolidWorks software operates, which is the most crucial kind of knowledge when troubleshooting a modeling or editing problem.

This chapter has glossed over many of the important details in order to give you a quick overview of the basic functionality in SolidWorks for the three main data types: Parts, Assemblies, and Drawings. Later chapters expand on this information significantly.

Chapter 5: Using Visualization Techniques

In This Chapter

Customizing the view

Using View tools to view parts and assemblies

Organizing information in the DisplayManager

Using Display Pane in parts and assemblies

Adding specific color to features

Apply Edge setting to create boundaries

Applying Visualization techniques tutorial

Visualizing geometry is part of the overall mission of SolidWorks software. Visualizing 3D CAD data is more than seeing shaded solids or shiny surfaces; it includes being able to see the interior and exterior at the same time and using sections, transparency, wireframe, and other tools or techniques. SolidWorks takes it so much further than just being able to see things in 3D; you can look at some parts of an assembly in wireframe while others are transparent and others are opaque. You can see a part with a reflective appearance. You can create section views in parts and assemblies to visualize internal details.

My aim with this chapter is to show you important capabilities that will expand how you can use SolidWorks, and maybe even change the way you use the tools or look at modeling tasks. At the same time, these techniques may provide some of the awe and wonder we sometimes experience while using incredible 3D tools to do actual work. If I sound a little enthusiastic about this topic, it is because visualization is the part of this software that really brings your imagination to life. It can be the source of real inspiration and allows you to communicate geometrical ideas with other people that might not be possible any other way.

Manipulating the View

One of the most important skills in SolidWorks is manipulating the view. This is something you'll do more frequently than any other function in SolidWorks; so learning to do it efficiently and effectively is very important, whether you look at it as rotating the model or rotating the point of view around the model. The easiest way to rotate the part