Now that I've got a couple larger items out the door, so to speak I'm able to clear my head and think about some other items that have been percolating for a few days.

One of those items (technically it is not on my todo list) it how to preserve and maintain custom edits or geometry to a wall panel while still allowing for the full parametric ability of the plugin.  In all  honesty I probably have not given this enough thought but the subject has come up multiple times in the last few weeks with a number of designers so I think it is important enough to fully consider.

As far as respecting manual edits to the geometry that the plugin creates I still do not see a rational way of doing this however if a user were to insert some additional geometry into the wall panel main group I think there may be an easy way to place this geometry into a sub-group(s) within the main group and then name that sub-group in such as fashion so that the plugin knows to maintain that sub-group and hence it will persist even with multiple edits or other operations to a wall panel group.

Would such a feature be useful to you the designer?

With the column annotation option enabled:



I've added another option into the global settings which will allow the user to toggle off the column annotations independently of the window and door annotations.

All of the parameters in the Draw Column tool also have default values that are being pulled from the global configs, I will eventually add these into the global settings so they can be customized I just haven't figure out where I should put them.  The global settings is starting to get rather populated with tabs and parameters, I actually need to create a second row of tabs along the top, I will give this some more thought.

Even in fully conventionally framed houses this type of "in wall column" situation is not uncommon.  Sometimes the beam will run inside the floor and no beam pocket is required in the wall below, other times the beam will run below the floor or roof joists and in such cases a beam pocket is fairly standard practice.

The column tool will allow for a number of configurations including PSL columns (standard sizes).  The designer can also specify independently the number of king studs (0,1, or 2) next to a column and their thickness.

The column can project above or below the wall, with the plates being cut out as needed.  If the column height is specified as "FULL" then no cut out of the top plates is done and the column runs up to the bottom of the top plates just like the other studs.

If certain sizes of lumber are specified (ie. 4x2, 6x2, 6x4) then the plugin recognizes that these are "on the flat" and will multi-lam them as so when more than one ply is specified.  So one can create multi-lam columns (ie. (3) 2x6) oriented parallel or perpendicular to the wall.

Similar to windows and doors the Column Edit Menu will allow you to edit any parameter of the column so that it is completely parametric.

Just a reminder that tomorrow is the last day of the June promotion:  Purchase the Wall Plugin and receive free licenses or license upgrades for both Truss and Foundation Plugin.

Version 0.7.8 - 06.14.2018
- Added the ability to create, load and delete wall presets within the Edit Wall (HTML) Menu.
- Fixed a bug within the auto-corner configuration module which caused issues for walls less than 36" in height.

Note that wall presets can only be currently loaded and applied after the fact (within the Wall Edit Menu).  My intent is to also make this feature available within the reworked Draw Tool within the next few days but I first want to introduce this feature within the Edit Menu and work out any potential pitfalls before rolling it out further.