What's New in Inspire 2021.1

The Inspire 2021.1 release features the introduction of parametric modeling, as well as new and improved tools for sketching, geometry, and PolyNURBS.

Parametric Modeling

Parametric modeling captures the evolution of your model’s shape by showing the linear sequence in which the geometry was created. You can roll the model backward or forward, as well as group, delete, insert, suppress, or edit entities in the History Browser. When you make a change, it’s propagated through the sequence of operations and the model is updated automatically.

The entities in the History Browser are called “construction features” and they are interdependent. For example, PushPull 1 in the image below depends on Sketch 1, and Fillet 1 depends on PushPull 1. The blue line is the marker, which tells you where you are in the construction history timeline.

New and Improved 2D Sketching

Inspire 2021.1 features a new and improved sketching interface and a number of new sketching tools. You can now add dimensions, convert driving dimensions to reference dimensions, and add constraints. Highlights include:

• New sketch tools: New tools include Splines, Dimension, Extend, Fillet, Offset, Mirror, Project, and Intersect.
• Improved sketch tools: All existing tools have been rewritten and improved.
• Constraints: A complete set of sketching constraints are now provided including fixed, vertical, horizontal, midpoint, coincident, colinear, tangent, perpendicular, parallel, concentric, and equal.
• Dimensions, relations, and variables: All geometry can now be dimensioned, and variables or relations can be used in the dimension definition.
• Sketch inferencing: A new sketch inference and snapping engine allows an intuitive method to layout geometry with respect to existing sketch entities. 

New Geometry Modeling Tools

New tools have been added to the Geometry ribbon including Reference Geometry, Extract, and Shell.

PolyNURBS and Facet Improvements

Two new PolyNURBS tools have been added to Move Bodies and Mirror Bodies. PolyNURBS now retain all downstream geometry operations such as Booleans and fillets even after manipulating the cage.

Variable Manager

Geometry based variables can be defined and referenced through the application providing unique flexibility to configure and explore design variations.

Use the Variable Manager to create new variables, edit variables, and import or export variables to a .csv file. You can then add and define variables for use with the sketching and geometry tools. You can also specify dependencies between the variables, which will cascade changes and update the model accordingly. 

Once defined, you can then apply variables when using the sketching and geometry tools from the tool microdialogs. You can select any available variable previously defined in the Variable Manager whose type matches the selected field. Click the f(x) button to choose from the available variables.

Global References

Inspire now includes global references for the origin, global X, Y, and Z planes, and X, Y, and Z axes. These are hidden by default, but can be turned on by clicking the corresponding icon in the Model Browser.

Enhanced Tooltips

Enhanced tooltips have been added to microdialogs and guide bars for sketch, geometry, and PolyNURBS tools. This allows you to learn more about the tool parameters and options without needing to open the help.