Jeff's Tool Shed

More often than not, I don’t dog SolidWorks. It’s my bread and butter. Honestly, were it not for SolidWorks, I wouldn’t be where I am today. But, ugh, the help files. This is a sore subject for many SolidWorks users, and for good reason. Truth be told, the help files are lacking in many areas. It looks pretty complete, doesn’t it? Lots of areas are, apparently, covered.

Take a closer look, though:

Maybe it’s just me, but the FAQ section looks pretty sparse. Only mates and sketch relations? Seriously? What about settings information? This is a question I see on the forums all the time. I’m sure that something could be worked out with Ben and the FAQ section on solidmentor.com.

Skipping down, let’s look at the help section on templates.

Here’s the problem: It only skims the surface. It tells you the very basics of creating a template, but doesn’t mention anything about setting your system options so that the templates you create are the ones that SolidWorks uses. The blurb about drawing templates doesn’t even mention saving your sheet format. It is, as Mr. Lombard would say, half-baked. There are sections that are pretty complete, but then others that seem to have been dropped between the washer and dryer and forgotten about. I’d have to say, too, that if it’s an add-in it should get a mention in the help section (i.e. DriveWorksXpress).

I think my biggest problem with the help files is all the hyperlinks. Let’s say you want to find out about sub-assemblies, so you use the index and bring up the sub-assembly section. As you’re reading, you see a link to ‘insert a new, empty sub-assembly’. Then, while reading that you see a link to ‘virtual components’. Then you see…well, you get the idea.

Here’s the thing, how do you solve it? What can SolidWorks do to make the help files more helpful? This, my dear reader, is the $25,000 question. I don’t know that you can get away from the rat-hole that is hyperlinks. It needs to be easily updateable. Do you make it an online/wikipedia thing? Something that is ever changing? How would you go about protecting it?

This is one of those conversations that I could go on and on having. Most everyone agrees that the help files need help, including some at SolidWorks. Does this mean we’ll see a change in the help files? One can only hope.