Hidden SolidWorks Commands - compiled by Scott Baugh
SolidWorks Help file is notoriously unhelpful at times. It has evolved over the years to improve its usefulness. However, there are still many under-documented functions within the Help file or commands that are completely undocumented. One day in January 2011, Scott Baugh asked a sincere and innocent question in the SolidWorks area on Eng-Tips.
Does anyone no (sic) where I can find a document with hidden SW commands. There are some key strokes and commands in SW that are not always listed in the help, or if they are they are overlooked very easy (sic).
From there, a long thread of comments grew. Someone mentioned that users can print out a list of keystroke assignments. This isn't what Baugh was looking for.
Then, the list of "hidden SolidWorks commands" began as people submitted commands they felt were obscure or impossible to find in the SolidWorks Help file. It wasn't long before Baugh offered to compile the list into a document. At first, the idea was to build the list in a discrete document. However, Deepak Gupta suggested GoogleDocs.
From there, Baugh built the list of "hidden SolidWorks commands". There were three types of items added to the list: commands that are truly undocumented, commands that are under-documented (full functionality isn't described), and commands that were too hard to find within the documentation.
Baugh then brought the topic over to the SolidWorks Forums, where the discussion further exploded. SolidWorks staff chimed in to address several points, but also to learn. Jim Wilkinson provided several detailed responses to help bring clarity to the conversation. Through his efforts, he also discovered several areas where improvement to the SolidWorks Help file is needed.
The Hidden SolidWorks Commands list is now a treasure of numerous golden nuggets. It's not long, yet it can take awhile to fully explore. Check it out. If you have any further suggestions, feel free to leave a comment here, or in either the SolidWorks Forum thread or the Eng-Tips thread.
Hidden SolidWorks Commands
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