Millions of Options

CAD programs seem to have millions of options to handle all those exceptions to the norm, or to make things just the way we want them. (This is something we manual drafters never needed to deal with.)

AutoCAD, for example, has the Options dialog box with ten tabs of options, sub-options, and branching dialog boxes. Plus, AutoCAD has the Drafting Settings dialog box with its four tabs of options -- and a fifth tab was added in AutoCAD 2009. The DimStyle dialog box has seven tabs worth of options. Several dialog boxes, like Plot and Hatch, have a "More Options" button that hide even more options.

I also work with Bricscad, and in V8 its Belgium designers put the equivalent of the Options, DimStyle, and Drafting Settings dialog boxes into a single Settings dialog box -- with a design that's different.

Instead of tabs, it uses an Explorer-style tree interface. Options can be listed logically in groups, or in alphabetical order. In essence, this one dialog box is a visual interface to Bricscad's 400+ system variables. A search field lets you find options related to specific terms, and shortcut buttons take you to the three major groupings: Drawing, Dimensions, Program Settings. The bottom of the dialog box explains the meaning of the option, often illustrated with a graphic.

Often, when a command has a Settings or Options option, choosing it opens the Settings dialog box at the point of the command's settings.

I like working with one dialog box, instead of three. But even this system isn't perfect. Earlier today, I couldn't recall the setting for turning on the tooltips for object snaps. In AutoCAD, I would have found it faster. But for many other settings, where I already know the name of the sysvar, the Bricscad approach is more convenient. Faster, too.

Comments

[Ragnar Thor Mikkelsen]

The explorer like list in Bricscad looks a bit unfamiliar at first, but I think it's a good choice for developers and users as we get more variabeles and settings. I remember an authorization test for AutoCAD R14 where the questions where like "on what tab in the options dialog do you find the setting for xrefctl" (or some other variable).