Comments on: Dimension Palette and Rapid Dimension Manipulator hate

By: News: Dimension Palette improves in SolidWorks 2010 SP3 | SolidWorks Legion

News: Dimension Palette improves in SolidWorks 2010 SP3 | SolidWorks Legion — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 13:42:00 +0000

[...] The people (i.e., SolidWorks users) have spoken and SolidWorks Corp listened. The infamous Dimension Palette now functions differently. The controversy surrounding the Dimension Palette started almost immediately after SolidWorks 2010 SP0 was released. People started posting heated complaints in the SolidWorks forums. I addressed many of those complaints in a previous article. [...]

By: Tom Helsley

Tom Helsley — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 17:54:29 +0000

I like the idea of a “banishment” shortcut on the keyboard very much. I see the benefits of using the dimension palette and the Dimension “Pie”, but they definitely get in the way at times. I think though that the shortcut should be persistent, so I don’t have to press it each time I select or create a dimension.

By: Steve Burke

Steve Burke — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 10:56:16 +0000

Its nice to see a SolidWorks person reading and replying to these blogs and comments

Thanks for the feedback Tom.

By: Tom Spine

Tom Spine — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 19:33:45 +0000

Hey everybody. I just want to say that I, and others at SolidWorks, are taking all of the complaints and feedback about the Dimension Palette and the Rapid Dimension Tool quite seriously. We are listening. We are responding, and will continue to respond, by making improvements in the software.

As Steve has already pointed out, we have released a temporary registry workaround in the SolidWorks Forums. This will completely disable the Dimension Palette.

Anyone who regularly reads the forums may have also noticed my call for people to meet with me (via phone and web conference) to give me hands-on feedback for our longer-term solution to the Dimension Palette (and the Rapid Dim tool as well). That offer stands – if you would like to talk to me directly, you will find how to contact me in the Dimension Palette thread in the SolidWorks Forums.

Alternatively, you can go to http://www.solidworks.com/usability, where you will find a link to a short survey to join our user research and feedback program. If you fill out the survey and put something like “attention: dimension palette” or “attention: rapid dim tool” in the survey’s Comments field, it will get my attention.

I also collected hands-on feedback from a number of attendees at SolidWorks World a couple of weeks ago. The changes we have made to the Dimension Palette will be in the next service pack. These changes eliminate the problem of it popping up in your way all the time. The Dimension Palette becomes much more of an “on demand” tool rather than “always there.”

Elizabeth, we have also addressed the problem of it disappearing that you described in your comment. I’m not aware of any other reports where the Dimension Palette cannot be selected to edit, however. If it is repeatable, please see that it is reported. Thanks.

Matt, I appreciate your comment that these functions “need to be smarter.” I believe you will see in the next SP that we’ve achieved that for the Dimension Palette. Now I am turning my attention to making the Rapid Dimension Tool smarter too. Your suggestion of a “banishment shortcut” is interesting. Thanks.

Tom Spine
Manager, User Experience Design
DS SolidWorks Corp.

By: Steve Burke

Steve Burke — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 18:03:30 +0000

Indeed. Well that registry fix appeared in SW2010 SP2. It will be interesting to see what SP or Major version it appears as a Tools -> Option setting.

By: fcsuper

fcsuper — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 15:59:07 +0000

Steve, thanks for the link. I’ve been watching that thread too. I’ll be posting the same solution here soon as well. I’m just wanting to see what SolidWorks’ more formal implementation will be first, since playing around with the registry is scary to many people.