My mapkeys are trash yet again???

[whatttup_G]

Just installed Creo 2 and found that pretty much nothing from my config.pro works anymore. Well the background color took, and the secret #Modify popup menu still exists, but not much else. Even activate, the little checkbox looking thing, seems to have bailed too. Do we not activate window, instead of done, done/return, done-return, done done done anymore??

The internet picture that comes to mind is facepalm, and feeling I have is the GIF version that shows an endless loop of many facepalms. Not clear what I mean, search it up, page 1 is full of what I'm saying, click 'images' for a full serving. Thats me tonight, over and over, just frustrated beyond words. Into the garbage again, every shortcut that made me productive, every workaround that fixed what wasn't broke, every click reduction I invented to counter the click increase I was upgraded too, every single thing that made me more useful than the receptionist.

Well, today the table is leveled, now me and the receptionist have equal knowledge of where the picks are. In fact, I'd wager she has the edge on me because her untrained mind probably gravitates right to the correct command, where as my trained mind and years of experience in pro now punish my ability to work and find the command picture icon avatar I want. Is there a config option for weld_all_these_stupid_ribbon_tabs_back_into_a_useful_toolbar at all???

Why PTC, why must you hurt the ones you love? Its bad enough that Creo is a stupid name, why don't you show some bollocks and ditch the stupid ribbon, include a mapkey converter, and stop upgrading what isn't broken. Make your software easier, simpler to approach, less complicated to decode. Stop hiding picks, stop organizing buttons into categories, stop pretending this needs to look like Word.

You're getting your behind kicked in the marketplace, make this awesome software any harder and less intuitive to use and you will lose me too. Go purchase a seat of that pile and take note of how a context sensitive GUI works, and consider it deeply.

Am downloading Creo 3 now, I'm just going to walk away from 2 and pretend my dreams aren't crushed, hoping instead that version 3... pro 34... can be reforged into a tool I can use.

 

[bowlofnoodle]

It is pretty easy to learn and use really..

 

[moldman]

This is why I'm still on WF4. I don't think I'll ever "upgrade". I know where I'm at and what to do, so why make a bunch of work for yourself learning a different way. Designing is my job, not using a cad package. The majority of designing is thinking, not modeling. The cad package is a tool. You don't replace a tool unless the new tool has improvements. I haven't seen many improvements, just a bunch of changes. If I was still on version 16 where I started, I would be just as productive as I am now (except I'd have to relearn it). I think there are a bunch of people at PTC who think it's their job to change the software, and if they don't change it they have no job. A bunch of minions doing the bidding of some suit who has no idea about the ramifications of their decisions.

What's a ribbon interface anyway? I'm a luck man. It's good to be a dinosaur.

This is my first post since the new format. I know why they added advertising, but I see no advantage to the other changes in responding to a post. It's just a different way of doing things. Where's the improvement? Change for the sake of change is just stupid. If it's not broke, don't fix it.

 

[dr_gallup]

Much as I detest all things ribbon, change we must. We had the local community college give a 2 day update class. It's not that bad but there is much changed, not all for the good.

WF4 has been officially off support for some time now. I've had several problem models that PTC support confirmed were not working to spec. Their response is "Upgrade to a supported release", we can only verify that you are hosed.

I would not touch Creo 3 F000 with a 10 foot pole. There is always much grief & gnashing of teeth until at least M020, I waited for M100 with Creo 2. I don't think you will find Creo3 any easier to learn.

 

[michaelpaul]

Do we not activate window, instead of done, done/return, done-return, done done done anymore??

pressing CTRL-A is the shortcut for activate window. no need for a unique mapkey to perform the task.

 

[whatttup_G]

pressing CTRL-A is the shortcut for activate window. no need for a unique mapkey to perform the task.

actually I will disagree, a double letter like ww is a faster and simpler key sequence for me... crtl hotkeys are cool, but not as great as a double... not needing to activate at all would be the ultimate fix, but I digress

 

[whatttup_G]

Much as I detest all things ribbon, change we must. We had the local community college give a 2 day update class. It's not that bad but there is much changed, not all for the good.

WF4 has been officially off support for some time now. I've had several problem models that PTC support confirmed were not working to spec. Their response is "Upgrade to a supported release", we can only verify that you are hosed.

I would not touch Creo 3 F000 with a 10 foot pole. There is always much grief & gnashing of teeth until at least M020, I waited for M100 with Creo 2. I don't think you will find Creo3 any easier to learn.

The idea of change for the sake of change is likely my biggest issue with PTC over the last 10 years... stuff that was never broke keeps getting fixed over and over. The reworking of the modify function comes to mind. Before, modify plus a single click brought up dimensions. Now, you pick on screen or in the tree, right click for a context menu, then left click for either edit, or edit definition, then go about modifying whatever it was, given you took the correct fork in the road and did your screen picks as it wanted.

Before, life was just a mapkey named mm and one click, now, focus, think, click, click, think again, click... this is a classic PTC upgrade right there, this is why the guys at SW left the company and are smashing them in the marketplace.

For those who are able to say "what is a ribbon" all I can offer is, enjoy your ribbon free life because your day will come and when it does, you're gonna be pissed. I have a buddy who won't upgrade past 2000i and I can't fault him. Everything he needs was in version 17, version 20 was a decent upgrade with the sketcher fixes, and the 2000 series in my view, were just patches to version 20. Seems like the downhill trip began with wildfire, and with this new naming and ribbon nonsense, the slide is picking up speed.

I have always found pro/e to be one of the most capable and powerful modelers around, however I have always found that the updates and upgrades pushed out the door are typically one step forward and two steps back, and this software seems to be tested and debugged by people who don't draw for a living. This is easily the most confusing aspect of PTC to me, making the software harder to use while alienating your base at the same time simply confuses me.

If you want to talk conspiracy theory, you'd have to conclude that PTC sold the boys at Dessault 51% of the company, and this is all fodder for a grand daddy merge in five years.

 

[bowlofnoodle]

Much as I detest all things ribbon, change we must. We had the local community college give a 2 day update class. It's not that bad but there is much changed, not all for the good.

WF4 has been officially off support for some time now. I've had several problem models that PTC support confirmed were not working to spec. Their response is "Upgrade to a supported release", we can only verify that you are hosed.

I would not touch Creo 3 F000 with a 10 foot pole. There is always much grief & gnashing of teeth until at least M020, I waited for M100 with Creo 2. I don't think you will find Creo3 any easier to learn.

I think the ribbon is really good. All the buttons are located in the one general area. It is simple and accessible to use. It is really simple and clean. Other software interfaces that have icons and button all over the place look like a mess.

 

[whatttup_G]

I think the ribbon is really good. All the buttons are located in the one general area. It is simple and accessible to use. It is really simple and clean. Other software interfaces that have icons and button all over the place look like a mess.

It's in the way for me, but I'm an old user. My experience with it thus far is vastly negative based on WF5/creo 1.0/elements/parametric/???. I am still deciding if Creo 2 is to my liking, and although it looks better, I have yet to enter drawing mode and honestly I can see myself trying to mapkey my way out of needing to constantly look at the transmission to decide if I am in the correct gear. Creo 1 punished you for being in the wrong tab by refusing to select the model entity you wanted, I'm hoping that has evolved to something less stupid.

 

[magnusod]

actually I will disagree, a double letter like ww is a faster and simpler key sequence for me... crtl hotkeys are cool, but not as great as a double... not needing to activate at all would be the ultimate fix, but I digress

Don't know if you downloaded and checked out Creo 3.0 already but one of the news is automatic window activation. Also, knock on wood, it's been surprisingly stable and I haven't found a bug yet when playing around with it for a week, even connected to PDMLink.

 

[dross]

I went to a PTC seminar on Creo3 last week, managed to discover two bugs while I was there...
As for the ribbon interface, it is one of stupidest things PTC has ever done!! Why do you have to be in the "correct" tab for some things, but not for others?
For instance, I cannot add a row to a table unless in the table tab, but I can edit the text in the table from any tab.

 

[whatttup_G]

Don't know if you downloaded and checked out Creo 3.0 already but one of the news is automatic window activation. Also, knock on wood, it's been surprisingly stable and I haven't found a bug yet when playing around with it for a week, even connected to PDMLink.

LOL... thats encouraging actually, a change like that indicates someone bitched AND someone listened AND the result was an improvement to the software

this is potentially earth shattering

 

[whatttup_G]

I went to a PTC seminar on Creo3 last week, managed to discover two bugs while I was there...
As for the ribbon interface, it is one of stupidest things PTC has ever done!! Why do you have to be in the "correct" tab for some things, but not for others?
For instance, I cannot add a row to a table unless in the table tab, but I can edit the text in the table from any tab.

I tried to download F000 twice and did not succeed on either shot so I'm gonna punt on it, plus Creo 2 is enough for my plate right now, I'm still reeling from the loss of my mapkeys. Every couple moves now, my left hand reaches for the keyboard to input one, then I correct myself and do it the hard way. So far, I give this a mixed review. I still can't find everything without hunting, this is a simple failure of ribbon based life. The loss of my shortcuts, just no excuse for this, like most or all of it couldn't be filtered and recoded automatically. The fact that #Modify still works, that is funny, it proves the engine under the hood is still version 1. The new model approach and assembly stuff, I'm actually liking much of it really. The 3D orb thing that lets you twirl the part is pretty sweet, and even though I've been doing that with a control alt spin, the orb deal is cool. Mechanism, seems identical to pro 31, wildfire 5/creo. Modeling, well it depends on what you're doing.

On sketching, new things are easier to make, and seem more friendly, but the reference stuff is weird, not sure I like sketching a tiny little centerline vs having a big giant infinite one. Feature redefines, that still seems cryptic and stuck in the past and brings up a really valid complaint many of us have.

If you can begin a sketch in two easy clicks (an advertised feature) then WTF is the deal with redefine needing like five picks. You have to point out the feature pick, right click it, click an edit definition from the middle of a popup, then relocate to the placement tab, and again to the edit button before you get dims. Seriously, this gauntlet is as dumb as the ribbon itself. I already said "edit definition", what the hell do you think I want with a command like that? Suggested answer, how about the sketch and its dimensions in one click? I hope this is different in Creo 3.

yeah...

Anyways +1 on the ribbon complaint, why does my ribbon constantly need to be in the correct gear when I was told to use the ALT key to circumvent times when the ribbon is in the wrong gear. Its just retarded insanity...

Hey PTC, the ribbon design will never be intuitive nor context sensitive, but your pro/e needs to be. Take it from a designer, the ribbon as is, its not even close to the the solution you want, please fix or scrap ASAP. By design it feeds the user a subset of picks, and excludes everything else, surely you see the inflexible nature of this. Forcing users to all pick and click robotically the same is something you want to get away from, not hard code into your GUI. Since its too late I'm sure to dump the stupid ribbon, then automate it for us. The ribbon currently is like a manual transmission when all the gears are somewhere, but you haven't provided a memorable H pattern, the knob with a pattern on it, or any logical help in between. All the gears are there, but there is no predictable order like first thru sixth, and no predictable pattern to navigate.

Think about if your car acted like this. You hit the gas, but nothing happens because you failed to select the first gear tab. Then as you take off, what happens next... just stay on the throttle and concentrate on driving, or hunt for the second gear tab. How about separate icons for gas, shift and clutch, perhaps those should be in every tab, and we need six tabs for six gears... no wait, one tab for gas, one for clutch, one for shift between tabs... yeah... wait, what about the brakes, they need a tab, but they are more emergency level... perhaps that should appear in the top of the window, always accessible.

Mercy sakes, have I made my point yet... ok, sorry, still pissed about my mapkeys here...

 

[bowlofnoodle]

You just need to use it a number of times and it is second nature. You really can't just expect a comprehensive engineering CAD package to just do anything without practice and learning about it.

If you want to use the old mapkeys, you can install both versions on your machine and use both. Just remap the keys to make it how you want in the new version. This is a universal program, an international software, it is silly to design the software to just be suitable for 1 person. Using mapkeys to do all the task you need is not what every one needs.

'Edit' lets you edit the numbers, 'Edit Definition' lets you edit the complete feature.

Going to the tabs makes a lot more sense, than just search on all sides of the screen for a feature that is hidden within the menu that you can't be seen. How do you expect a new user to find it?. Visibility and position of the ribbons is much more common sense I my opinion.

There is the command search tool on the top right. The magnifying glass, click on there and type in the command, it will point out where it is for you. Type offset, section, family table, it will show you where it is. It can be difficult to find things if you are not familiar with the interface. But with more timing using the software, you will find where everything is pretty easily.

 

[dross]

@ noodle
You obviously are relatively new to Pro and don't know how much easier some of this stuff was to do prior to the ribbons. They have approximately doubled the number of mouse clicks required to do any given task. As for the command find, go type in variable to find variable section sweep, you won't find it. There are a few other commands that the name has changed on that it also cannot find.

 

[whatttup_G]

You just need to use it a number of times and it is second nature. You really can't just expect a comprehensive engineering CAD package to just do anything without practice and learning about it.

If you want to use the old mapkeys, you can install both versions on your machine and use both. Just remap the keys to make it how you want in the new version. This is a universal program, an international software, it is silly to design the software to just be suitable for 1 person. Using mapkeys to do all the task you need is not what every one needs.

'Edit' lets you edit the numbers, 'Edit Definition' lets you edit the complete feature.

Going to the tabs makes a lot more sense, than just search on all sides of the screen for a feature that is hidden within the menu that you can't be seen. How do you expect a new user to find it?. Visibility and position of the ribbons is much more common sense I my opinion.

There is the command search tool on the top right. The magnifying glass, click on there and type in the command, it will point out where it is for you. Type offset, section, family table, it will show you where it is. It can be difficult to find things if you are not familiar with the interface. But with more timing using the software, you will find where everything is pretty easily.

well, given my current license says version 33, and my first version was 12, that makes me a user for 21 versions, three name changes, countless datecode releases, the transition to version 17, the knowledge that 19 is the only backwards compatible version to 18, how sketcher evolved in pro 20, what i^2 means, how it was all mashed into wildfire, and now creo... and oh by the way, this includes the alligator wrestling regime of designing within PDM 3, intralink, and/or windchill... so this used to be second nature more than once

running dual versions would not work anyways for a litany of reasons, licensing is one, backwards compatibility is another

on edit definition, lets just say mapkey 'ed' has already been redone, its a paltry but critical first step back to my productivity, plus double clicking should become 'edit' and that pick should be removed from the popup... then again, should a model edit work in assembly mode here? it doesn't currently, seems like it should... anyways I fixed edit definition... again

33 versions and we still miss >edit>modify..

and tabs... tabs... tabs are in the way, I want my command, not a treasure hunt. if I am in the wrong tab, its a penalty, same level of pain as you described for searching for a feature that is hidden. when I read that, I'm thinking 'yeah, thats how tabs feel...' what is the point of organizing my stuff like this, the reason a tool sits on the work bench is because its in use... there needs to me more than just a 5s home for the wrench, it also gets used when not in its little foam hole... sigh...

anyhow yes the command search tool is pretty sweet and fairly useful, if it worked well it would be great. sadly it doesn't. as stated by dross, some commands like VSS is just missing... plus you have to retype everytime you search and pick wrong... and yesterday I was searching for 'sketch references' both in and out of sketcher, you'd think that would be easy to find... nope... unless you remember the funny icon its buried under, you won't be redefining the plane a sketch lays on... like I blathered on previously, feature creation is a lot smoother than feature redefinition.

not in reply to your post but, while I'm back in bitchmode, what century will we see inclusion of the reroute commands anywhere. seems like a no brainer to revamp that entire suite and instead of detatched popups that ask about rolling back the model, how about more dummy level stuff where you pick a place, or the end of a dimension, and drag it to a new place.. think how sweet that could be, extrude a circle on a plane, have a cut... drag the circle off its plane to a new place, now its like a revolve... all this could be RMB based, so easy... why PTC doesn't hire real engineers to preen their product is a mystery to me, so much of this could have been achieved before the fire

 

[magnusod]

not in reply to your post but, while I'm back in bitchmode, what century will we see inclusion of the reroute commands anywhere. seems like a no brainer to revamp that entire suite and instead of detatched popups that ask about rolling back the model, how about more dummy level stuff where you pick a place, or the end of a dimension, and drag it to a new place.. think how sweet that could be, extrude a circle on a plane, have a cut... drag the circle off its plane to a new place, now its like a revolve... all this could be RMB based, so easy... why PTC doesn't hire real engineers to preen their product is a mystery to me, so much of this could have been achieved before the fire[/QUOTE]

Not Drag and Drop yet but at least improved in Creo 3.0

 

[magnusod]

I went to a PTC seminar on Creo3 last week, managed to discover two bugs while I was there...
As for the ribbon interface, it is one of stupidest things PTC has ever done!! Why do you have to be in the "correct" tab for some things, but not for others?
For instance, I cannot add a row to a table unless in the table tab, but I can edit the text in the table from any tab.

Dross, can you tell us what the two bugs are? Would be good to know, especially if there are any serious bugs.

 

[dross]

Dross, can you tell us what the two bugs are? Would be good to know, especially if there are any serious bugs.

One was related to geometry patterns not being correct, the other to partial chamfers cutting through the entire part instead of the length of the selected edge (it would continue well past the end of the selected edge).

 

[whatttup_G]

not in reply to your post but, while I'm back in bitchmode, what century will we see inclusion of the reroute commands anywhere. seems like a no brainer to revamp that entire suite and instead of detatched popups that ask about rolling back the model, how about more dummy level stuff where you pick a place, or the end of a dimension, and drag it to a new place.. think how sweet that could be, extrude a circle on a plane, have a cut... drag the circle off its plane to a new place, now its like a revolve... all this could be RMB based, so easy... why PTC doesn't hire real engineers to preen their product is a mystery to me, so much of this could have been achieved before the fire

Not Drag and Drop yet but at least improved in Creo 3.0[/QUOTE]


haha.. awesome (not laughing at you, laughing with you@PTC... add [mapkey mm #MODIFY] w/o brackets to your config.pro and lol back at me)


against every fiber in my body, and every piece of advice ever received, I installed creo 3 F000 on my system and am so far amazed that it hasn't puked yet. I have to give them a little credit as the releases seem to get more stable as time goes by, and I am not shy on the mouse nor the keyboard, and I routinely pound the $%^& out of things on screen and that clicky pushy style in my opinion, leads to crashes not attainable by average mortals

then again, my mapkeys are trash again so I am working about as slow as possible since I have no shortcuts that work, and little clue what effing ribbon my command lives in now, so the clicky nature is no more. now I hunt around, hover the mouse and wait for the tooltip... is this picture what I want... is this picture what I want... and so far the most ridiculous thing so far is 'edit definition' looks like a ball and a pencil. umm, ok...

on the reroute command, I can't agree more. the 'do you want to rollback the model' message has got to be the dumbest code ever written. its things like that, that make me miss version 17, when clip/delete was navigable... anyways, now that we are on version 34, you get a little chain icon that lets you edit references without asking for a whole redefine dance, and it worked pretty well

i blew away an edge and the part hung off it failed, but upon redefine, the old reference was highlighted and rerouting it to the new edge was cake... i have to give credit on this one, finally, clip/delete has been improved... a full 17 versions, since version 17, finally we have (if you can find the little chain icon) a pretty quick way to reroute and fix things, without invoking a redefine... finally

so yeah finally something is better, but I am still suffering thru the improvements... changing windows is stupid now, I hate it... regens, well if you drag and pull only, they are kind of automatic... however if you edit dimensions by number, mess with cuts and surfaces and sides of things on parts, then go back to their assembly, you have to hunt down some micronic regen button that is always in the wrong ribbon, because you were in view, then left, then came back, except you need a regen, but that button is hidden because you were making a section... WTF guys, do you actually use or test this software with engineers before you 'upgrade' it???

oh and one more huge bitch, packaged with a compliment... 34 versions and finally I can use measure to find the long length of a slot, about flipping time

the bitch, on what planet did you guys decide that SHIFT and ALT and CRTL were necessary buttons for basic CAD life, with different uses at different times. basic elementary moves like assemble, measure, pan are now half cryptic like gang signs... what do you smoke at lunch??

for instance, in sketcher you can add references on the fly... err... that is if you pick line or circle first, then use ALT... if you just ALT around, all that gets tossed if you add refs first, then pick a shape... half cool, half stupid

again in info measure... err analysis measure... stupid ribbon.... just where did you decide that I have to add picks to my selection set, to derive the distance between two freaking points... FYI I am trying to measure here, most the time I dont have an edge leading between my points of interest, I want to go between two things... but no, I can only measure single entities unless I ask it for a click, and a second click, except this one has to be a CRTL click, so it knows I meant two things... really?!?! click and CRTL click?!?! you all saw that in a demo and clapped or what?? idioticy

how about assembling parts... neat when you click one part surface, then CRTL ALT drag the second part nearby and it starts snapping thru all the possible flats that it finds... but a PITA when you do that and later decide you wanted an offset, or maybe a different pair of faces... now that neat feature is a curse because you have to right click it, pick some other mode, then go fishing for the dimension box... meanwhile it has this little snapbox the whole while, that could have allowed you to just pick the damn thing up and move it, adding a dimension automatically, or how about this... tossing the reference altogether... drag em together, drag em apart... drag em close, poof a dimension appears... is this level of work beyond you guys? its things like this that prove you don't use this software before you change it. nobody that ever put two parts together, would choose your recipe as the 'new upgraded' way