Wishlist for CC4
Aramisdante
Newcomer
I would really really like to see a better interface in the next itineration of this software. The buttons are way to small and more importantly, when you highlight over them half the time, they don't tell you anything, you have to do it a few times to get the highlight to show.
A second nice feature would be to add buttons and libraries a lot more easier than it is now.
And lastly, a way not to mess up the original settings so easily. (This one is totally on me), but it would be nice. Also tutorials on the 70% of functions not used in youtube videos. I would love to see how those work without fumbling around to see how it is done.
Just to clarify, I am not complaining, I absolutely love this program and have used it since its first version, (and still not that great with it, LOL), but I would love to see these features implemented because lets face it, this program has a good learning curve to it because it offers so much.
Sincerely
Comments
In reference to the small buttons, you know you can change their size from Screen Tools
?
@Monsen - LOL! I'd never noticed that one, even though my eyes must have passed over it a thousand times every time I go for GRID.
Thanks - I can now see my buttons without squinting at them, which is very important since I will probably have to wait another 6 months before I can get to an optician.
LOL no I did not know but that goes to my last request about tutorials, LOL. Thank you for saving my eyes as well Monsen
um I thought I knew where that was but I don't how do you resize the buttons Monsen
Well, there can never be enough tutorials, but it is described in the Manual, which is a tutorial for the program. I know some people prefer videos instead of written word (that still boggles my mind, really), but videos do take time and effort to make (and are also way more difficult to keep up to date compared to written text). I do make video tutorials, but it is difficult to get to everything.
My only whishlist is for it to be 64-bit and cross platform... not holding my breath for that one though...
@Aramisdante It's right next to the GRID button. And don't worry - I had to really look for it too.
ok thanks Loopysue. Monsen I would like to see some of your youtube videos what name are you under in youtube. I have caught a few of Loopysue's ?
ok I found it but the tool wasn't where you said it would be. Drove me crazy looking for it. Its actually on the bottom. But you were right it is a hammer icon. I guess it depends on how you setup your program. And yes it is so cool to be able to change the size of those tiny icons. LOL thanks again. Sincerely Aramis
While we're talking wishlist: Dark Mode! ;-)
I would be happy with;
1) The software not crashing every 30 - 60 minutes.
2) Files not getting corrupted and losing hours of work.
3) Symbol catalogs not unlinking, changing, or corrupting every other launch.
4) Having to save after placing a few symbols or walls like every 30 seconds so I don't get screwed by #1.
Seriously, I want my money back. I've spent over $500 on this software and it's demoralizing. These forums are so full of problems, it takes hours to search and find solutions. Now I'm going to spend hours trying to recover my corrupted file, that even after saving, the zoom is all screwed up and neither the autosave or my save can fix it.
Who cares about CC4. We don't need another broken version, we just need ONE version that works.
@trechriron Please contact Technical Support through your account page with these issues. I have opened both the map examples from your other thread and while I can see the zoom problem the rest isn't happening on my PC.
I have problems opening some example maps, but its my older computer with a 1.6GHz cpu in it.
Why is 64bit so important. Forgive my ignorance, I am no computer tech.
Speed, and how much you can put on a map.
However, the situation isn't so bad the way it is. CC3 has a very efficient way of dealing with symbols and fills, so you can do a lot more with it as a 32 bit app than you can with other 32 bit apps.
One of the main advantages with 64-bit is getting rid of the memory constraint. As a 32-bit program, CC3+ can only address up to 4GB of memory, but with 64-bit it would be able to use all the memory in you machine, no matter how beefy, for a long time to come.
There are other advantages as well, but for CC3+ that is the biggest advantage.
oh ok I see now. Thanks for the replies. You all are on it. BTW Monsen I have been watching your videos. They are Awesome!! Thank you thank you. So are yours Loopysue!!!
Sincerely Aramis
Thank you, Aramisdante. Are you referring to the very minor role I play in the weekly Live Streams? Those are really Ralf Schemmann's and Remy Monsen's work. I just filter the questions out of the chat stream and feed them to whoever is actually doing the video ;)
I was referring to your articles and the vids you do too. Loopysue but now that you mention it, even your filtering is helpful. You Awesome!! LOL
Oh, I think there has been a misunderstanding. Sorry, Aramisdante. I've never made any videos.
One improvement I'd like to see in CC4 is better control of selection of overlapping elements. For example a wall around a floor. While I realize there are ways of using layers to make this easier, they all come down to extra clicks. I propose a new entry in the right-click menu, call it 'Choose from list' or similar. When 'Choose from list' is selected it pops up a floating window with a list of currently selected elements, each with a couple of descriptors (sheet, layer, color, ect) and a checkbox, and the 'do it' button at the bottom. By default all items are checked, and if unchecked are removed from the selection.
A 2nd improvement I'd like to see is a modification of the way changes to text entities are handled when multiple items are selected. Currently if I decide to change the font/size/color of multiple text entities, I have to make all the changes one by one, even if I've selected multiple entries at once. It would be nice to be able to make all the selected text entities have the same text properties applied using only one dialog box.
MstrCat, you can already change multiple text at once - i do it often.
To add to Quenten's reply, you would do that by using the regular Change Properties
command.
Thanks for the reply. Indeed, Change Properties works as one would expect for multiple selected Text entities.
Now I just have to remember to use that instead of Text Edit (TED), which is my normal inclination.
Here's a feature request that should help with map composition and planning: A guidelines sheet, ie a sheet where you put things like room centers, extension lines for walls, general shapes for planning, measurements, ect. The sheet should have the following properties:
Certainly all of these are able to be accomplished as is, but it generally requires lots of manual clicks and settings.
You can choose the colors of items like roads, lines, etc. now.
I'm not sure such a sheet would have much utility for all mappers. I've never had any need for such, but then I plan or sketch all my maps out on paper roughly before-hand, and simply use a bitmap scan of the hand-drawn version as the template in CC3+. If I need construction lines while mapping, as does happen sometimes, it's very easy to simply draw and then delete them once I'm finished with them. If I think I might need them again later, I save a separate copy of the FCW map file for that purpose before deleting them.
If you do find these are important, it's easy enough to create a Sheet on its own Layer (you can only freeze Layers, not Sheets, in CC3+) for use in the way you've described. If you're likely to be doing a lot of similar maps the same way, you can always save that as a personal set-up for the future having done it once. That way you can set the name and placement in the Sheets list as best-suits yourself.
You'd have to hide the Sheet before exporting, but you'd likely be doing that anyway to check the map without the construction lines getting in the way prior to that stage.
I doubt it would ever be possible to set up any single Sheet in CC that would somehow automatically "know" what colour you might expect different kinds of drawing entity to have. There are just so many variables involved - all of which you can adjust to whatever you require in CC3+ now, as Jim noted. If you might regularly require specific items of particular line thicknesses, styles and colours, it would be very easy to keep a sample of each on your "Construction Sheet" (or another Sheet set aside for such samples) that you could readily access using the "Draw like..." or "Extract properties" commands.
As for a set of particular symbols for say villages in a particular nation... I make a map of a typical village for that nation.
Then go into Symbol Manager and save all of them into a catalog. 'nationname_village.fsc as an example.
Next time I want to map a village in that nation, I load that symbol file.
To me, the most important would be the option to make bigger renders, like 20k x 20k or such.
I don't need them to be that big all the time, but there were maps where it would have helped, and going over 10 000 px doesn't work all the time.
Making cutting walls or entities a bit more accessible/easier would be cool too.
And I sometimes get a bug where all my sheet effects vanish. Usually I work in two files parallel, saving often, so most of the time this bug doesn't destroy much. But sometimes when I didn't save to files of the same project, having to do all the effects by hand again is a downer.