Sketcher tutorial

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chrisb
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by chrisb »

MrWhoopie wrote: Wed Aug 11, 2021 12:48 am If I understand the FreeCAD lingo, SW users seems to encourage using a layout sketch.
Thanks you very much for the praise. We refer to such layout sketch as a "master sketch" and we indeed encourage to use it too. It is a good idea to include this in a future version, thanks for this!

Do you know if "layout sketch" is a frequently used notion?
A Sketcher Lecture with in-depth information is available in English, auf Deutsch, en français, en español.
MrWhoopie
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by MrWhoopie »

Thanks! Quite excited to be "here!" I am newly retired, and have had a Python yearning for months. If I can, I hope to get up to speed ASAP, and aspire to someday be one of the people pushing this forward! Other than the computers from college, my first project was in Fortran on a mini computer with 8K of RAM! (Not a typo!) Most of my coding professionally has been in KAREL, a language used by Fanuc robotics.

The phrase "layout sketch" is what I have seen in "the other guy's" tutorials. Cumulatively I think you could measure my leisure-time study of the other guy in weeks, not just hours. I hope to learn the differences and grow from there.

I hope to search out things in the many resources I see are available. (Kudos to all of you for apparently many man-years of contributions) I will ask if you could direct me toward any topic addressing what is appropriate / legal regarding input from other systems. I don't want to step on my other foot while trying to discuss in future communications.

Thanks again, to you and everyone making this a reality. Free is important somewhat because of the price, but far more important because of what it stands for!

Mike
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JoeKundlak
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by JoeKundlak »

Hi Chris,

first and foremost - thank you for this huge undertaking that is the Sketcher Tutorial! Just started printing it out to read and learn FreeCad and reference it as I move forward (have an Epson EcoTank inkjet, so ink is luckily basically for fractions of an Euro cent on a page for me).

And I have two questions:

1. When a common layman like me prints this out with default settings (i.e. someone who did not calibrate his printer to nearly/fully reproduce what he sees on his screen), many of the included screenshots may not correctly reproduce some of the green lines, making them hard to stand out vs. the background. This might also be due to the default FreeCad background being a gradient fill and not a solid color. In one of the Youtube FreeCad tutorial series the author mentioned he changes his FC background to a solid color due to the recording result being more easy on the eyes. I know there are A LOT of screenshots in your Tutorial, so the question is - could this be perhaps applied generally on the whole document, or at least going forward?

2. Do you plan to replicate the document on the Wiki (https://wiki.freecadweb.org/Sketcher%20reference)? If you would need external help for that (as we all have our private lives the available time is limited, for me as well), I can offer my help in slowly filling in the Wiki and keeping it updated as you update your Sketcher tutorial.

Thank you again and keep at it!
Joe
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translating into SK: https://wiki.freecadweb.org
chrisb
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by chrisb »

Hi Joe, thanks for the feedback.
I am rarely using a color gradient in the current document, but you are right that the screenshots should be improved. Currently I am rather concentrating on contents, but I have this on my list.
There are different background colors used in the document, are there some of them better?

And yes, I may include it in the wiki, and I also would like to make a series of small video tutorials.
A Sketcher Lecture with in-depth information is available in English, auf Deutsch, en français, en español.
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JoeKundlak
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by JoeKundlak »

Hi Chris,

As per the Wiki version - do you then prefer to do it yourself, or could I help out?

To the images, to give you an idea:

page 9 - the green line is barely visible on my print.
page 10-20 - these are fine, I see mostly (exclusively?) darker gradients
page 21 - the lighter green is again barely visible
page 25 and 26 - the green is more or less visible, but due to the gradient the green itself also "feels" like a gradient, even though it is not and therefore is harder to see
page 28 and 31 - the same goes for the large images
page 34 - the same for the upper picture
page 37 - the green is not that readable

Please note this is all "as printed by me", so might not apply to other folks with different printers etc. etc. To give you an example of the "extremes", attached two photos - page 9 and page 40. The quality is mediocre, but you can see the color contrast there.
page_9.jpg
page_9.jpg (123.72 KiB) Viewed 5554 times
page_40.jpg
page_40.jpg (142.06 KiB) Viewed 5554 times
Joe
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translating into SK: https://wiki.freecadweb.org
chrisb
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by chrisb »

Thanks for the feedback!
I will contact you, if you can help - thanks.
A Sketcher Lecture with in-depth information is available in English, auf Deutsch, en français, en español.
vorrias
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by vorrias »

Hi @chrisb
Some years ago December of 2018 ( FreeCAD 0.18 I think) I had some time to spare and started reading your excellent pdf on sketcher. I learned a lot but other obligations took me away of FreeCAD. I came back after that time to continue FreeCAD learning since I have build a CNC machine and FreeCAD knowledge looks absolutely necessary. One way road.
Being in FreeCAD 0.2 and with grate pleasure I found the sketcher lessons was revised for ver 0.19. Upgraded ta a Lecture and that is GOOD!.
Now my question is can I trust the lessons and the knowledge learned for V 0.20? Is any folow up goinf=g to happened?
Since I am not a full time CAD user but in occasions, I need to have a reference and go back to it after some time when most of the knowledge forgotten. Your sketcher PDF lecture does that. Bring you back the memory in a clear way for knowledge learned some time ago.
Thank you again for this grate piece of work done here for everybody.
Take care

Vasilis
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chrisb
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by chrisb »

Thanks for the feedback.
vorrias wrote: Sun Apr 02, 2023 10:37 am Now my question is can I trust the lessons and the knowledge learned for V 0.20? Is any folow up goinf=g to happened?
Sketcher has indeed seen some changes, so the first pages about the GUI are indeed outdated.
But the important things, i.e. the Elements and the Constraints are still working exactly as described - with one exception: in 0.21 we have now more constraints working on B-splines too.

As the facts about the elements with their addition of degrees of freedom and the constraints reducing them are rather universal, they should still be valuable.

There are some more changes:
1) The wording of the solver messages have changed
2) As soon as parts of a sketch are fully constrained, they turn to a light green color.

And finally: yes, there will be an update for the next official version of FreeCAD, I wait for things to settle.
A Sketcher Lecture with in-depth information is available in English, auf Deutsch, en français, en español.
jp-willm
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by jp-willm »

Hello chrisb and thank you for all the work you do for FreeCAD !

I just published a video in French "Sketcher (special beginners)" :
https://youtu.be/ZD-i5HhHC2I

In the following tutorial, I would like to further explain the use of Sketcher.

Could you possibly tell me where I could find information about this "Select Feature" window that opens when creating a new sketch?
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sketch_select_feature.jpg
sketch_select_feature.jpg (45.9 KiB) Viewed 2112 times
chrisb
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Re: Sketcher tutorial

Post by chrisb »

jp-willm wrote: Tue Apr 18, 2023 10:36 am ould you possibly tell me where I could find information about this "Select Feature" window that opens when creating a new sketch?
https://wiki.freecad.org/PartDesign_NewSketch
A Sketcher Lecture with in-depth information is available in English, auf Deutsch, en français, en español.
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