What's New in SA 2010-07-01

 Note: Changes marked with  are the result of our user's suggestions from the SA User's Group held in Williamsburg, VA on 04/13/2010.  Thank you!

Surface Backside Coloring

Instead of surface backside dimming, you can now assign a unique color to the back (negative) sides of surfaces to more clearly distinguish them from front sides:

Unchecking the Highlight Surface Back-sides checkbox will cause the back of surfaces to render in the same color as the front.  Note that both the front and backsides of surfaces are now rendered with full lighting.  This allows you to more clearly see the contour of surface backfaces while in solid render mode.

Important:  If surface backside coloring does not seem to be working for you, you may need to update the drivers for your graphics hardware.

Note:  Some surface types, such as solids, already have defined "inside" and "outside" faces.  These surfaces cannot be reversed manually unless you dissect the surface into its component surfaces using the Construct > Surface > By Dissecting Surfaces commands.

Plane Bisection

A new command has been added that will construct a plane bisecting the area between two planes.  The command can be found in the Construct > Plane(s) > Bisect 2 Planes menu item:

Keep in mind that the normals of the source planes have an effect on the resulting plane that is created.  The resulting plane will face the same direction (in general) as the first selected source plane.

Dynamic Report Improvements

• While dragging a report item to a different location in a Dynamic Report, the report will autoscroll if you drag near the top or bottom of the window.
• The old "SA Reports" option in the User Options > Reporting tab has been replaced by Dynamic Reports.  Quick Reports and report templates are now generated as Dynamic Reports instead of "SA Reports".  (The Excel and SA Doc options are still available to you).
•   Any overlapping items in a dynamic report are now automatically adjusted by default so that there is no overlap.  To disable this feature, deselect the Auto Vertical Overlap Adjust option in the Global Reporting Options for dynamic reports ().

• You can now export dynamic reports directly to Excel using the Export Report to Excel CSV button ().
• Automatically remove excess vertical whitespace in your reports using the Auto Adjust Report Whitespace button ().  Any excessive blank space on your report is removed by shifting items upward.

Surface Normals on CAD Import

Depending on the way an imported CAD file is defined, some models are brought into SA with some flipped normals.  There is now a CAD import mode setting that allows you to account for the way surface normals are defined in some CAD packages.  There are two Surface Normal Modes: Mode 1 and Mode 2.  If you find that some of your normals are not flipped in the correct direction upon import, try changing this setting to the other option.  This setting is saved as a machine configuration, and can be found in both APEX and Classic CAD import:

GD&T: Force Surface Feature

In prior versions, planar and cylindrical surfaces that were associated with GD&T datums were exclusively treated as planar or cylindrical surfaces.  However, in some cases, it may be desirable to treat a cylindrical surface as a general surface instead of a cylinder.  GD&T Datum annotations now have a property called ForceSurfaceFeature.  When checked, the associated surface will be treated as a general surface instead of a strictly planar or cylindrical shape.

GD&T: Amount Out of Tolerance Only Shown when Tolerance Exceeded

The "Amount Out of Tolerance" column in GD&T results is no longer displayed if a feature is within tolerance:

NRK Feature Checks: Hole Check Improvements

If the number of measurements associated with an NRK Hole Check is equal to the number of holes, the points are assumed to be hole centers.  This will bypass the filter volume provided by traditional NRK Feature Checks and will associate each point to its hole by proximity.

Working Color Improvements

The working color dialog now uses a smaller subset of colors when working with a white or gradient background in order to improve contrast and make entities easier to see in the graphical view.

Shift Points In a Direction

The Construct > Point(s) > Shift Points > In a Direction and Construct > Point(s) > Shift Points > In Cylindric Coordinates commands now provide the option to include the source point group's names as a prefix for the shifted point names.

Geometry Fit Decimal Precision

Geometry fit results will now be displayed in the SA job file's selected decimal precision:

Sort by Measurement Database Order

In a point group's right-click context menu, you now have the option of sorting a point group according to its order in the underlying measurement database.

Instrument > Locate > Measure Nominals: Point At

While inside the Instrument > Locate > Measure Nominals command, you can now select any point and click the "Point At" button in order to point the instrument at the nominal point's position.

More Powerful Selection Methods

Improved selection capability has been added to speed up your software workflow.  During a selection mode (any time the yellow prompt is displayed), single-click any applicable entity in the graphical view to toggle it between selected and unselected states.  Marquee-select to add entities to the current selection, or hold down ALT and marquee-select to remove entities from the current selection.  This applies for all entity types, including instruments and point clouds.

New Command: Construct > Vector Groups > From Lines

You can now convert lines from a CAD model (or created in SA) directly into vectors using the new Construct > Vector Groups > From Lines command

Performance Enhancements

The speed of USMN calculations has been improved by about 5-10%.  Also, small USMN networks will no longer trigger multithreading, as the overhead of multithreading itself exceeds the benefits gained from computing in parallel with small USMN networks.  This also results in a slight performance gain.

Other improvements include a drastic speedup in the calculation of projected points, both with and without edge projections.  The speed at which auto vector group computations is performed has also been improved, as well as the speed at which rendered CAD can be moved (via either drag graphically or entering a transform).

Cleaner Tracker Interface

Redundant buttons on the laser tracker interface have been removed in favor of a smaller, cleaner interface.  Notice that instead of simply listing the instrument index, the new interface shows the instrument collection, index, and name at the bottom of the interface.  (This applies to the arm interface as well).  The following image is a reminder of which icons correspond to the previous button locations.

Metadata & Instrument Updates

Instrument updates sent to SA now include measurement metadata.  This enables operations such as Synchronized Measurement > Polling to send over measurement metadata (weather, measurement mode, etc).

Leica AT401: Watch Window Updates

Watch windows can now be updated continuously with the AT401, even if the target is moving.  Use Settings > Tracker > SA Interaction > Update SA Graphics when Not Measuring for this purpose.  While the watch window is being updated, the remote can be used to acquire points.

Theodolite Manager Reflector Database

The Theodolite Manager now has a reflector database, similar to the reflector database for laser trackers:

This database is accessible via the instrument's options or reflector type buttons.  It can also be accessed directly from the Theodolite Manager's Options button.  The manufacturer definitions are populated by the definitions within any connected instrument, and user-defined reflector definitions are possible, which handle reflector type, prism constants, and planar/radial offsets.

SA SDK

SA SDK sample files are now available from within the SA install folder under the subdirectory "SA SDK".  While not yet 100% complete, documentation for the SA SDK has been added to the documentation (SA Roadmap).  Look for it under the SA Ultimate > SA Software Development Kit section.

Measurement Plans: Round Double

A new MP command has been added that rounds a double value to a specified decimal precision.  Find it under Scalar Math Operations > Round Double.

Measurement Plans: Make a Double from String

A new MP command has been added that converts a numeric string into a double value.  Find it under Construction Operations > Other MP Types > Make a Double from String.

Measurement Plans: Get i-th Instrument from Collection Instrument Ref List

A new MP command has been added that gets a specified instrument from a collection instrument reference list.  It is found in Analysis Operations > Get i-th Instrument from Collection Instrument Ref List.

Measurement Plans: Directory Commands

Two new directory manipulation commands have been added to MPs.  Utility Operations > Make Directory and Utility Operations > Delete Directory.

Enhanced Point Cloud to Objects Relationships

Point cloud to objects relationships now have the same reporting options/table as points to objects relationships.

New Instrument Driver Installer

The SA install process has been made even simpler.  The SA Master Installer has been replaced by the new SA Instrument Drivers installer.  This installer will guide you through the proper installation of the drivers for your selected device.  What's more, it's a single download that contains drivers for many instruments and many different system types (32-bit, 64-bit).

This instrument driver installer can be downloaded from the NRK website's Download page.  Note that you can continue to download individual instrument drivers from ftp://ftp.kinematics.com/pub/SA/Install/Driver%20Downloads/.

For information on additional fixes, features, and changes, refer to the SA Readme file.