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ZeroLengthCurve  
#1 Posted : Thursday, February 29, 2024 11:25:35 AM(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve

Rank: Senior Member

Joined: 5/15/2008(UTC)
Posts: 989

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For those interested, I'm still on SharkCAD 12. At the moment, I cannot afford to upgrade as I've bougt too much hardware and other stuff.

I'll revist snd clean up typos/grammar as I find mistakes.



Short version:

So, now, one file I've been editing is at 270 MB saved. It'll now push around 290 MB if i save after doing show-all.

In terms of RAM, my machine in the task manager shows my files using around 900 mb to 3 GB. One or two times, due to heavy by-hamd movement of objects and doing lots of hide/show-all, I onve hit around 8 gb, and another time went off the scale, and so I don't know how much RAM was consumed. But, that has never crashed SharkCAD v12 on me.

I have well over 5,000 layers in my files withing months of starting or repurposing my files. It has over 20,000 curves/lines/splines/circles/polygons/bits of text. It has some 8,000 surfaces and solids.


Part 1.

I can't use the Navigator/Gumball since it instantly tears and prevents use of my screen. I reported it in 2022, but nothing became of it.

Occasionally, when I use the Gripper, whether early in a session (hours) or the files been open for days, clicking on a handle andndoing rhe slightest move boldens the dialogue box text, does something weid to the color tool palette, and prevents any further refeesh. I used to experience this in v9 (32 and 64 bit) and lost a lot of work (using a single screen, that of the laptop). Sometime in 2019 or 2020, because I was using multiple displays (PCLinux OS hosting win7 in VirtualBox) realized that I could STILL do alt-tab. I used to try it, but since the dialogue box was unreadable, I saved at the risk of trashing a file. Under two or 3 screens setup, I got into the habit of keeping the tool pallets onthe lower right small screen and file manages on all three, and Shark on the 27-i ch screen. This lets me copy the current file, suffix-ename it as "post-gui-crash lre-save", then hit Ctel+S and watch the file save. 99%of the time, that works, even though it hair-raising, heart stopping, and incredibly stressful. I always thank the Lords of Kobol wvery time I get to walk away from that. I also learned that computers and apps have feelings. It sems that 99% of the time I intensively curse Shark for some featue shortsightedness, the app will spontaneously crash on me as if it heard me and wanted to punish me. So, I take a deep breath, get up, wak aeound, and save-as before a crash can happen. Seriously. I'm saying this as if under oath.

I also reaffirm that since a file can crash at any time (and while I have fewer than ~10 files corrupted since ~2008, I DO every few days experience crashes. There's no warning, and no recovery of lost work since I turned off auto save. Since I frequently have to keep open one or two, sometimes 3 reference files, each of which is a saved-as 70 MB to 150 MB, it would be intolerable to open them all in one solitary instence of SharkCAD. My system operates offline, never shared with others, not in any factory, and I don't use activation cheats. So, I feel that under this constrained scenario, I can be forgiven for running as many instances as needed on the sole machine (not virtualized) as I can in the 48 GB it has.

Another major reason it'd be unfair to insist users do everything in one instance is there's still the stressful issue of the zoom decrementing with every shift-tab between files. When I set a zoom level, I need it to not arbitrarily change. I resolve this vexatious issue by running a second instance of Shark. I figure this out before 2015, and got no traction to fixing this issue. As I constantly do pickoff measurements of images or other files I created, and use a plastic scale to avoid getting out of a select or a tool mode, I absolutely can't tolerate shift-tab. Alt-tab is my friend in these cases.

It would be incredibly useful if Tim would nuke whatever matter is preventing him and team from maturing the layer tree management. This is 2024, and nobody out there should have 20+ year patent grips on common, basic, useful, sane, easy-to-implement user-friendly features — regardless of the app or the OS.

Anything in any layer should be draggable to anywhere except circularly into itself. Files between instances should be copy-and-paste capable , and if this is implemented, without dropping the objects' associativity or even the related tree. I resorted to ESWBS-like numbering just to get a grip on layer hunting. It would be nice if the Concept Explorer, Layer Manager, and Inspector had hot-jump buttons to help users erangle, search for, and manage layers. There for maybe 1 version, maybe v6(?) where it was possible to actually enter a search string to find layers. Then, it went away. If that went away because of external IP claims threats, I curse the name of amy eho offensively and perniciously use/abuse patent law or litigious behavior.


Cheers


.....

Part 2

Long version


My install of SCv 12 runs on an HP Victus I bought in October 2022. I upgraded ot to around 48 GB of RAM. It uses an SSD. It has a 15-inch display, which I don't use. I instead use an external adapter to connect a 27-" LG and two 21-" HP displays. I simply cannot wok on anything other than that visual setup given the scale of my ships and the enormous details — especially the curves, surfaces, and somids, much of which has associative links.

I had since late 2007/early 2008 forayed into ship design (hobbyist/dilettante, not a real marine engineer nor even a naval architect). As I've been too secretive about some of the inner details (blame it on a mix of paranoia, slowness, teust issues, and wanting to be a first-mover-advantage junkie).

I have pushed my files for years and only experienced few corruptions. Since I do a save-as either every 1 to 5 hours, and save-as with a new suffix, I can tolerate some occasional crashes. Srill, surprisingly, I've had fewer than 10 files go corrupt ever since 2008. The most recent corruption was a few weeks go, but I saved-as and didn't test my save before moving on.

My save-as results in thousands of copies of around 8 to 12 variations of my drawings. I draw the hull, decks, bulkheads, proxy machinery and furnishings, fuel and slop and waste and water tanks, and more. I've even finally since ~2022 designed 3 different types of propellers that earlier in-privacy dogged and demoralized me since 2011. I had to watch a dozen or so external-app YouTube videos in anything from Blender, to Rhino, toothwr apps to apply techniques to fill in my lack of knowledge or misuse of SharkCAD's tools to figure out a new angle of attack in Shark.

One disappointment tho is that moving the shaft, hub, struts, bossings, and blades results in the blades flying off int 3D space dosens to hundreds of meters apart. This has something to do with using polar arrays. I'm sure I reported it. I won't know of any fix until I one day upgrade. It seems the polar array when used at or near origin magnifies the blade separation by the time my shaftline is pulled aft to some 130 meters where it needs to be.

Part of the file size stems from not using external references. I quit using that feature because I integrate file changes too frequently, periodically fork the file, restructure my file arrangements, and eventually break or ruin links. Also, the huge disadvantage of making objects into symbols is that that step flattens the layers, collapses all the objects, removing the solids/surfaces associations. And, still, since the layers in a branch cannot be moved into another branch, I can't cooy and paste associativity from one file into another. So, all I can do is do excerpted exports of selected objects, remove unwanted layers, compact the file, then import inth the current working file. The disappointing thing is that my drawing looks like a lunatic creates it because it's simply maddeningly impossible to rationalize and as-necessary reorganize my drawing.

Since I can't drag and drop outsice of branchesor trees, I'm forced to live with related layers being scattered up and down the layer manager. By necessity, layer and object names grow, and the Inspector still, in v12, is not resizable sideways, and there's no hotlink or linked jumper to get Shark to overcome unreadable long names except the prefix the object or layer with letters or symbols to make the stand out in the Concept Explorer.

I will be selling my drawings, and I feel sorry for my victims. But, they'll have the benefit of being able to cherry puck and if necessary go to a competing app if layer management weakness unnerves them.


In terms of RAM, my machine in the task manager shows my files using around 900 mb to 3 GB. One or two times, due to heavy by-hamd movement of objects and doing lots of hide/show-all, I onve hit around 8 gb, and anothr tome went off the scale, and so I don't know how much RAM was consumed. But, that has never crashed SharkCAD v12 on me.

Something does make Shark crash. After or during an intensive session, I'll save-as, then go to do a compact before doing another saflve-as (to guard against damaging a file and being unable to step backwards one revision). As soon as I compact, BOOM, the app unceremoniously blows up. In 2022, that foeced me to retuen to timed periodic saves. Such saves are ok when my file saves-as to under 100 MB. But, when bigger (withine weeks or months of editing a new file), the save time starts to take about 1 to 1.5 minutes. As fast as I sometimes move around in my file, this has forced me to disable the automatic saves. Now, the one minute saflves serve to remind me to stand up and stretch. Perhaps the crashes occur when sone stack or heap or whatever loses links to something below, and a compact just pushes the app over the edge? It's only once or twice a month, depending.

So, now, one file I've been editing is at 270 MB saved. It'll now push around 290 MB if i save after doing show-all.

As for my screen hardware, I can't use curved screens. I need to sometimes place a physical kit model hull to the screen, and screen curvature would mess up attempts to measure things. I don't clone the kit model hulls. I reference the hull as a "parent hull" to make a new child hull. This is what real naval architects (as professionals) do, and it limits or prevents predatory lawsuits, distractive litigation , loss of customers (who don't want as a design firm one that gets mired in litigation drama), and so on.

Cheers
thanks 2 users thanked ZeroLengthCurve for this useful post.
damhave on 3/4/2024(UTC), memphisjed on 3/21/2024(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve  
#2 Posted : Sunday, March 3, 2024 8:43:59 PM(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve

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Some images of a propeller. It took me (working in solitude, struggling from 2011-2016) and resorting to YouTube when my own methos just utterly sucked):


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thanks 1 user thanked ZeroLengthCurve for this useful post.
damhave on 3/4/2024(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve  
#3 Posted : Sunday, March 3, 2024 8:50:32 PM(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve

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Some of my more recent propeller hubs, blades, and struts. Creating at origin and then using polar array, and then pulling them aft to where needed flings rhe blades out.

Edit~~>>

Blades don't fling apart if I first convert the arrays to copied-and-pasted solids, dissociated from their original or parent.

Note, though, that as for the steuts, filleting is kinda ok. But, I'm not designing for actual build or fabrication.

The 180941 image with many blades represents various positions of the blades. I thought I'd get cute and make the file enable the user to iterate through animation of the blade pitch changes. This could be if a script tuened layers on and off. I *think* Shark can do it, but I also want to make the blades rotate. Blender can do it, but, I haven't used or tried to use Blender since maybe 2008. Also, I don't like mixing geometry between apps. So, all my work is in SharkCAD.

The blades get their sculpting when a spline (of your choosing) onto a solid you build also from splines, or a solid you build to have tapering.

I with mixed success can change blade properties just by manipulating the solids or their underlying curves.

Edited by user Sunday, March 3, 2024 9:11:08 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

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ZeroLengthCurve  
#4 Posted : Sunday, March 3, 2024 9:18:16 PM(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve

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Joined: 5/15/2008(UTC)
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Object counts:

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ZeroLengthCurve  
#5 Posted : Sunday, March 3, 2024 9:26:25 PM(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve

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Hull curves:


I really, really, REALLY wish SharkCAD had porcupines like in Free!Ship/Fre!Ship Plus:

Edited by user Sunday, March 3, 2024 9:43:49 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

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ZeroLengthCurve  
#6 Posted : Thursday, March 7, 2024 7:35:26 AM(UTC)
ZeroLengthCurve

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As of 2200 last night, my saved file is now at a saved size of 333 MB. RAM hovers between 2 GB and 3 GB. My system has ~48 GB physical RAM and runs on an NVM card. It's blazingly fast when my SC files are under 100 MB.


Open time is about 2 minutes. Saves take about 2-3 minutes. Probably the only hiccups are when:

— the Gripper sometimes induced a crazh, or

— a compact after save causes a crash (or was already at the point of inevitably crashing, but I luckily saved at the right time), or

— SC for some reason treats color changes as physical moves, srutters, and tells me it can't complete the operation, and then reverses the change. If that happens, based on experience last year, I do Undo at least two or three back steps and then do a Save-As, close the file, and reopen.

(Sometimes, before exiting the file, I'll open a second instance of SC to test the saved file, in case I need to cinfir the save is clean. That way, if the file broke because of *me*, I can do a few more Undo steps. I rarely need to do this, but, it underscores the absolute need and utility in being able to open more than one instance of the app — especially if a file goes crash-y and the user is in *no* mood to have a wacky file blow up the whole session instance with other files already open.)


Strangely, importing a 1.8 mb file of just curves, surfaces, and 2 solids and saving the file (any file, even a blank file used as an import base file) makes it show ~"This file is damaged ... At position (9-digit number). Then, the dismissed error message leaves a blank drawing space qhile the Layer Manager shows all the layers with zero geometry or text of those layers.

However, I can successfully import, save-as, and reopen the 333 MB or any other file when I import a 49 MB saved-state-size file. Eventually, when I stop adding geometry, I'll export, say, just the solids and surfaces with no associativity etc) and text annotations. That brings the file down to something respectable like less than 100 or 150 MB when saved.

Stripping down the suspect 1.8 MB file (it's a lazy representation or placeholder for the Mk (mark, not em-kay) 15 CIWS doesn't resolve the issue. I suspect that when I last year exported the CIWS geometry from a previous still-now-good parent file, then compacted it and ripped out all the other trees, some tainting occurred. (The file itself opens and closes and is editable. It just is bad for use as an imported file or the basis of importing into it.)

If I recall correctly, I removed all the geometry and added just a single line, saved-as, then imported it into a blank file and into a test cersion of my still-going-steong 333 MB file. So, it seems definitely the case bad pointers ended up in the smaller file.

The good 49 MB file has over 800 objects (hull and underlying curves and surfaces snd solids) and 20x as many layers, and imports just fine. (So, another reason to suspect the 1.8 MB file got tainted weeks ago or months ago or last year.)


I wonder if Tim will chime in and disclose the largest file size he's had successful re-opens with, and is able to tell us what a hard limit on file size is.

I already know that 999 layers is (in 64-bit at least) not a hard limit that if breached trashes any file. I'm well past 5,000 layers. Most hold geometry or text. Some are placeholders filled with rules or hyphens for visual separation of zonal or purpose separation in the Layer Manager. (Some, due to the crippling, heart-rending limitations/disabilites/inabilities around reorganization of layers, are dashes and hyphens and crazy alpha or numeric visual aides by way of label, so I can find out where the heck I am layer-depth-wise, since there no longer (since maybe v6?) a way to on-pallet (or anywhere) enter more than one letter to find a layer.)

I wish there was a way have a hot key or built-in functionality to click on either the Concept Explore, thr Layer Manager, or the Inspector to temporarily make the other two speed zoom-shoot-scroll to a layer.

I wish the Inspector would be stretchable. Super-long layer names that all start with the same first 20 characters (common in nomenclature and WBS/SWBS and when ordering supplies from, say, a government suppy or logistics chain) even after gymnastic hoops-jumping to shorten the names makes it still impossible to make the Inspector be useful regarding finding layers. Even if all the layers have short, distinguishable names, in the name of consistency and empathy, the Inspector should be left-right resizeable.

I hope this novella is useful.

thanks 3 users thanked ZeroLengthCurve for this useful post.
GARLIC on 3/7/2024(UTC), damhave on 3/7/2024(UTC), MPSchmied on 3/7/2024(UTC)
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