To make a Key Characteristic stand out on the drawing, use any of these tips:

1. Change the Key Characteristic balloon shape under File and Balloon Properties.
2. Enlarge the size in the Balloon Properties box.
3. Fill in the balloon shape.
4. Add a Key Designator, such as *.
5. When you export, the Key will be dramatically apparent.

Navigate the zoom with the space key.

1. Use the zoom tool to initially zoom into an area.
2. Press the Space bar and keep it depressed.
3. Click the left mouse to move the zoom throughout your drawing.
4. When you find a location to view, let go of the Space bar.
5. Repeat 2-4 as needed

If you add a drawing and need to remove it, do so easily. No balloons can be associated to the drawing, however.

1. Click File and Bill of Documents.
2. Select the item you want to remove and click the X icon.
3. The document is removed from the TDP.

There have been a few questions from our DISCUS users about the ability to use OpenOffice instead of MS Office and Adobe PDF.  While not officially supported (yet), preliminary tests indicate that DISCUS can export to the Excel equivalent in OpenOffice as well as to their built-in PDF converter.  For example, with OpenOffice installed, we were able to export a ballooned drawing to PDF and export to the built-in AS9102 template.  The template was originally created in Excel ‘03.

Of course, one of the main advantages of using OpenOffice is that it is free and is supported by Oracle!  At least for DISCUS, it is a worthy alternative to using MS Office.  Also, another reason to potentially use OpenOffice is that there is a known issue in MS Office where images become lost when editing an ‘03 excel template with Office ‘07.  The only workaround at the moment is to find someone who has Office 2003 or to download and install OpenOffice.

Check out OpenOffice at the following link – http://www.openoffice.org/.

Remember – we don’t officially support OpenOffice with DISCUS but you can go ahead and try it out.  Let us know your experience with it.

For those of you who already have DISCUS installed and then subsequently upgrade to the new 4.1, you will need to do one step to enable your GD&T column and functionality.  In the bottom left portion of DISCUS, in the Bill of Characteristics panel, you will see a row of vertical icons.  Click on the Configure Columns icon.  It looks like this .  In the dialog box that pops up, you should notice a column named GD&T on the Available Columns side (left side).  Click on the GD&T column and then move it to the Selected Columns side (right side) and then click OK.  At that point, you should see the column appear in your Bill of Characteristics panel.  To use GD&T, simply click on the GD&T cell under the column after you have added at least one characteristic.  You will have to option to use GD&T in Guided Mode (Feature Control Frame) or in Free Form Mode.

Let us know how you like it.  Good Luck & Enjoy!!

We have released DISCUS 4.1 with GD&T support.  You can now download it and try it out as a customer or prospective customer.  Check out the following link for more info – http://www.discussoftware.com/news/3/17/.