[quote user="Marc Thomas"]Placement by centreline is an existing option.[/quote]
Yes, it does, but the problem is that centreline is not persistent or available for follow on manipulation. In this age of BIM, where parametric manipulation is a necessity for keeping productivity levels high, the inability to get back to how the component was place in an intelligent way is a big omission. This seems to is a general flaw with Aecosim tools inherited from Belgians way back in the swinging 90's. Time for a re-boot.
[quote user="Marc Thomas"]Centrelines can be generated on the cut plane in drawings when selected in reference presentation or if pre-set in the Drawing Seeds.[/quote]
Again, this is not the functionality that we are looking for here. The centreline generation you refer to is a post processing task for annotation. And yes... there is plenty of room for improvement there as well.
Any ways, some of the newer tools like the Profile tool have a more productive relationship with its linear work path, because it is exposed.
Some functinality that the 'function' or 'workline' should have:
1. Provides the Wall elements a 'control line' mechanism. This is very useful 'abstraction' as it can be used to:-
a. Provide a logical means to build up / substitute a Compound wall; or a beam or roof rafter etc... even something generated by PCS or GC (curtain walls). They would all subscribe to the 'work or 'reference' line' as an input.
b. The abstraction also comes in handy when dealing with copings and cutbacks. You see these with the structural beams tool. See BricsCAD BIM which has generalised this to slabs and wall forms. Very useful. The way we model partition walls has always been incorrect as the do not allow for the defection head gap at the top of the wall and tend to model the bottom of the wall from FFL level when it will really extend down to SSL most times... for example.
It is also necessary for multi-ply walls, where the some plies will have T- join relationships while others L-join or gap/break or X-join relationship.
c. The abstraction would also provide the user a way to tell Aecosim how to clean up and resolve wall junctions, in conjunction with priority tags. If the worklines connect then it would be a prompt to the system to unify or look at the wall component priorities.
d. The abstraction would allow constraints solving engine introduced by CE to work on 2d geometry as a working set, solve the constraints wothout having to flex the 3d Forms around until the end. Hopefully, we will be able to have parallel walls in ABD. Even Vectorworks has this functionality and costs a quarter of what Aecosim costs.
e. The reference or workline would also then be able to function as 'root' element that can be used to drive multiple components created by different tools. A wall could be made up of a Compound Wall and several Profiles for the skirtings/moulding trims, a balcony railing component and a section of curtain wall generated by PCS or PFB or GC. Without a 'root' element, there would be 'callback hell' as all the elements would have no idea who would need to fire first.
f. It would also provide a more natural entry point for converting 2d lines to BIM walls, beams. columns etc. I bet all those airport and rail authorities have masses of old dwgs that they have spent a lot of money to database.
2. Allow all the 2d modification tools available at platform level (including the new constraints tools) to be leveraged.. at arm's length.
3.It would also benefit those who need to dimension to the centreline of the walls (US) on a regular basis.