0.5.410: snapping to the floor below, and your own keys

Drop plans to start a job, see and snap to the level below, guides that square your shapes, buttons for the framing picks, a set of joists doubled at once, forms on the default tools, and keyboard shortcuts you can change.

The goal of this version

This version gathers a round of your feedback into one update. Most of it is about fewer steps: drop plans instead of browsing for them, line a floor up with the one below without measuring, square a shape without typing lengths, and double a run of joists in one go instead of one at a time. The goal is a takeoff that lands where you meant it to, the first time.

What's new to try

• Drop plans to start a job. Drag PDFs or images from File Explorer onto Home, or onto the New Job window. The job is named after the first file.
• The left panel opens on Project, the list of levels and pages, instead of the Takeoff summary.
• The floor below, under this one. Snap to its lines and corners while you draw; it's never selected or printed. The pages line up through Overlay & Align.
• Guides that square a shape. While you draw, a dashed guide shows when you're level or plumb with a corner you've already placed, and two guides snap to where they cross. G turns them on and off.
• Buttons for the framing picks. Select a Joist or Rafter item and its picks sit at the top of the plan: Pick direction edge or Pick the eave, Draw first joist, Edges…, Hanger edges… or Overhang edges….
• Double a set of joists at once. Drag a box across the joists you want (or Ctrl+click them), then Double joists. One Undo, and the rim board is left alone.
• Doubling a joist a beam cuts now stops at the beam.
• Delete a section or the whole item from the right-click menu of an area with more than one section.
• Forms on every DimSum Defaults tool, with the inputs you change most.
• Your own keyboard shortcuts in System Settings → Keyboard Shortcuts: change any key, clear it, or reset.

What we're fine-tuning, and what to look for

• The level below. Is it faint enough to stay out of the way, and clear enough to snap to? Should more than one level show by default?
• Guides. Do they help you square things up, or get in the way when you don't want them?
• The framing bar. Is the top of the plan the right place for these buttons? Would you use them, or stick with right-click?
• Picking joists with a box. Is it easy to get exactly the joists you want?
• The forms. What's missing that you change on every job?
• Your own keys. Which keys did you change, and why?

Known issues

• Right-click menus outside the toolbar still show DimSum's own keys after you change them.
• On a Linear item, the right-click menu keeps Delete this segment; Delete this section is on area items.
• The known issues listed for 0.5.380 are still open.

How to send feedback

Click the red Report a bug button or Feedback on the top bar, or use Help → Report a bug… (Ctrl+Shift+B). Your DimSum version goes with every report, so you don't have to look it up. See Beta program for all the ways to reach us.