ASCENT Blog

A logical addition to the ASCENT Inventor lineup!

By Jennifer MacMillan

Drum Roll Please…. ASCENT’s newest title, Autodesk Inventor 2013 iLogic, is now available! I hope that this helps you to learn and teach your iLogic classes. I wanted to share the following few comments about the class:  

• From the opening chapter, the use of iLogic is presented as a progression through a workflow, and to do so I have included flowcharts. In chapters that cover concepts in the workflow, the flowchart is at the beginning of the chapter. This is to help learners see what they are going to be learning.

• The first chapter is an overview with the goal of giving students an understanding of the power of iLogic. When teaching, I always like to get students into the software as soon as possible. The challenge with iLogic is that students really need to know a lot before they can create a rule to drive change in the model. To allow for this, a part and assembly model that already has Rules and Forms has been provided. Using a Form, students drive change in the model. The aim is to have students say “Wow! That’s cool. How do I do that? ”. This exercise can also be shown as a demo, or you can do both.

• The Getting Started with iLogic chapter covers the interface, an introduction to functions, and the entire rule creation workflow. The exercise for this chapter enables students to review rules, run them, and  start creating new rules. The challenge with this exercise was that specific functions have not yet been covered in enough detail. Therefore, I used a simple iProperty function to change the material in the model. More information on iProperty functions is covered in Chapter 4.     
• Chapters 4, 5, and 6 are focused on part, assembly, and drawing functions. Exercises are provided in these chapters to practice using these functions. Chapter 8 also covers miscellaneous functions that did not fit with the flow of the earlier chapters.

• An entire chapter and exercise is dedicated to triggers and forms to teach students how to efficiently execute the rules and make parameter changes in the model.

• The final chapter in the training guide is a Project exercise. It contains three projects to provide extra practice with incorporating iLogic into part, assembly, and drawing documents. Each project provides background on what is required as well as limited instruction. Students are required to use the knowledge that they have obtained in the class to meet all of the specified design intent. Completed models are included with the Class Files. You will definetly want to become familiar with this before heading into a class because there is little to no hand-holding in the instructions.

• The iLogic Design Copy tool is covered in an appendix. There is no exercise, but you can use any of the completed class files to demonstrate this functionality.

• This course is meant to be an introductory iLogic training guide. External rules and VB.net training are not covered.  

As always, ASCENT welcomes any comments you might have regarding this or any of our training guides. Please let me know if you have any questions or comments (education@ASCENTed.com).

I hope that you like the course and have fun learning iLogic. It really is a logical choice for design automation. (Yes.. I had to say it!)

Jennifer

New Interface and Tools in Creo Parametric 2.0

Many user-friendly changes have occurred in Creo Parametric 2.0 and the new interface has improved the software's ease of use, accessibility, and efficiency.  There is a more intuitive and consistent interface, which results in fewer mouse clicks and options for many tasks.

The software now uses a ribbon-type interface, which enables you to toggle between tabs and
perform operations without canceling the current operation. This can be very useful when creating a feature. Commands in Creo Parametric 2.0 have been relocated to related tabs. The ribbons can be easily customized by adding and removing commands and tabs to improve performance to suit a specific need.  Ribbons can also be minimized to maximize the view window.    

Many tasks in Creo Parametric 2.0 require fewer mouse picks, fewer selections, and are overall faster than in previous versions of the software. For example, a cross-section no longer requires you to select a planar surface or datum plane.  The cross-section tool is now more interactive and uses the ribbon interface. You no longer need to create datum planes to create the cross section. You use the directional cross-section and select the X-, Y-, or Z-direction to create the cross-section. 

You can specify an offset value to locate the cross-section or dynamically change the location using the cursor to drag the arrow. You can also toggle on the 3D dragger to dynamically translate and rotate the section. In previous versions of the software, a datum plane would need to be created to achieve a specific position. 

Many additional options are available in the Section tab. You can dynamically detect any component interference in an assembly while creating the section and components can be excluded from the section. A separate window can be toggled on to display the 2D profile. 

Cross-sections also now display in the model tree. The cross-section automatically displays and the hatching can be toggled on using the visibility options in the contextual menu.

Creating a cross-section is one of the many tools in CreoParametr ic 2.0 that minimizes the mouse clicks and increases the ease of use. The interface and enhanced tools help make the experience of using Creo Parametric 2.0 easier and also increases productivity.