We have made several improvements and added new functionality to Design Review in November. In case you missed them here is a recap of the new functionality.
Understanding the location of issues in the model is very helpful in seeing problem areas or quickly finding the issues in your area of interest. We have now added issue markers which will appear in the view for any issue that has an element associated to it. the markers will appear when the issue panel is open and you can select a marker to view the details for that issue.
In complex models it can be frustrating trying to find an object you need to review when all you know is the name of the object but you do not know its location. We have added a new enhancement to our search functionality to make this task easier. You can now type an element name into our search panel and it display all the elements that match that name making it easy for you to find the elements you are looking for. Once you have a search result you can select individual elements to zoom to them and view properties or add the whole search result into a selection set.
Sometimes you need to do more than just view the properties of element. Now you can right click on a property and select "Copy Text" which will place the value of the property in your clipboard.
Most design applications create elements rich with attribution but sometimes all these properties make it hard to find the information that is most important to you. We have added the ability for you to favorite important properties you would like to have quick access to. These favorited properties will appear in their own group at the top of the properties panel making easy to find. When you favorite a property that property will be favorited for every element in the same class as the original element. For example if i favorite the fire rating property for an element on the door class then all other elements in the door class will have the favorited property of fire rating. To favorite a property simply right click on the property and choose "add to favorite" from the menu. You can also remove a favorite by right clicking on the favorited property and choosing the "remove from favorite" option.
We have received feedback that when emphasizing selected elements in a crowded scene it was difficult to see the emphasized element. Now when you emphasize an element we create a silhouette around the element which makes it stand out better even when there is a lot of geometry around it.
We have made a change for created views, are the views that are created when you select model or document codes from the iModel Index screen. Now when we generate these views the camera will be enabled by default, this will make it easier to navigate through the model in a first person perspective mode. You can always disable the camera and go to an orthographic view by deselecting the camera view attribute found in the status bar or selecting the Toggle Perspective tool in our view navigation area in the upper right corner of the application.
To provide better context when viewing your iModels we have added support for shadows. While this will have a minor impact to display performance when enabled, adding shadows will provide you a bit more realism to your view. You can easily turn shadows on by going to the view attributes popup in the status bar.
To provide better context when viewing your iModels we have now added the ability to change the background from black to a skybox background that defines sky, ground and horizon. The skybox background will be used by default when you go into an iModel but if you use a saved view which does not have the skybox enabled you can easily turn it on by going to the view attributes popup in the status bar.
We are excited to announce some big changes we have made to our issue system that will dramatically improve the way you capture and manage issues in iTwin Design Review. You can read all about the changes made to the Issue system in the Improvements to Issue Resolution blog post.
While we strive to have a perfect functioning application there are those rare times when something is not behaving properly. If you experience any difficulties with Design Review we now have a very easy way for you to report the problem and then track that issue until its resolution. If you go to the gear icon located on the right hand side of the header bar, you can select "Report a problem". This will take you to a form you can fill out to provide information about the issue you are experiencing and then receive tracking information to follow it as the problem is resolved.
For information on other improvements we are making to Design Review go to our What’s New page.