We just uploaded a big new update to Carbide Create that includes new layer functionality and a couple of bug fixes. Check out the details at:
Download it on the beta page
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(blog talks about Motion not Create 
)
Iâll eventually be able to write a blog post and get the product name right.
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Nice feature!
Do you have other release notes? Was anything else updated?
anyway very happy to see layers⌠will play with that for this weekends cuts.
@robgrz I played a bit with the layer function. Very cool. Here is my immediate feedback / ideas / issues:
1. It would be good to have the Layer dialog remember its position when its closed. You donât want to have to move it out of the way of the diagram each time you open it.
2. For consistency with other dialogs, allow right click to bring up the layer menu (the same as the ââŚâ) within the layer dialog
3. Also for consistency, support drag and drop for the up down functions
4. I think that clicking and highlighting on a layer ought to activate that layer. Itâs actually confusing that the layer highlights when you click on it - but isnât actually activating the layer. The bold name isnât really prominent enough to be the only indicator. The highlight is so much more prominent, that itâs confusing!
5. If you create a new layer, that layer should be the active layer automaticallyâŚbecause youâre going to want to add objects to that new layer, likely
6. Have some indicator as to which layer is active on the design page (maybe on the status bar at the bottom, by the cursor position?) - since the layer dialog isnât up all the time, it would be helpful to know which of the layers youâre working on.
7. Donât allow us to pick a layer color thatâs the same as the âselected objectâ colorâŚor even close. Thatâs just flat out confusing! It also turns out that blue is an issue - because toolpaths are blue. That limits your options. At a minimum, please change the order of the default colors/layer to push blues and reds to the end.
8. DONE> There ought to be an indicator for when a layer is locked
9. DONE> What are the ?'s next to the layer color for?
10. Add Deselect All on Layer
11. Add tooltips for the icons on the dialog|
12. It would be great to be able to dock the dialog, rather than having it being modal|
13. When clicking on âSelect all in this layerâ things that were selected before remain selected, even if theyâre not on the layer. This is not âstandardâ behavior for selections in CC (or any other product, really). You would expect this if you were pressing CTRL or SHIFTâŚbut in general, when you select something without the modifier, it is the only thing selected. I would consider this a bug. If CTRL or SHIFT click is not available, then I would suggest an âAdd all to selectionâ option, in addition to âselect allâ
14. New to 524: The new feature added to NOT offset a copied object is too subtle. You press CTRL-C and there is no visual acknowledgement that the object is copied successfully. This may lead you to press multiple times - creating multiple copies on the new layer. Perhaps a Status Bar message that says, âObject Copied Successfullyâ could appear at the bottom and then disappear on next click or keypress?
- Gary
EDIT: This list remains valid as of build 524
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We just posted a new version to the beta page that fixes items 8/9 in your list plus a couple of bugs.
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Another suggestion - in the tool path creation process, allow âall items on this layerâ as a selection which might alleviate some peopleâs reported âtoo many clicksâ whilst tool path-ing an array of repeated objects (such as waste board designs)
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@robgrz While youâre actively working on CC again and have debuted a new drag engraver could you fix the issues with the texture feature introduced in V5.xx? Using the texture tool for hatch and cross hatch fills is very efficient way to get nice shading effects. The patterns formed when using a pocket tool path donât look right in many designs.
Iâm now going to make myself (more) unpopularâŚ
Please, Iâve seen a lot of Feature Requests for CC, but not many for layers. Theyâre probably useful for some people, but my guess would be anyone who needs the layers function already has software that can do it, or will buy professional, fully featured software that does.
Could the developers of CC and CM please look at the prolific list in Feature Requests and, at least, tell us if theyâre being considered and, if not, why not?
Thank you.
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This is such a useful feature!
Nearly all my designs, albeit simple, involve different workpieces or different orientations of the same workpiece. So far, Iâve tried just stacking all shapes on top of each other, which gets confusing quickly. Iâve also tried moving the groups for the different jobs around, but this is very dangerous as you are tempted to group them and youâll mess up your toolpaths when accidentally editing a toolpath. I also tried keeping several c2d files, but keeping them in sync if one measurement changes is very error-prone (for me at least). Now I can get much more done in Carbide Create itself, without switching between CC and Inkscape all the time.
In my opinion this is an addition that has potential to make Carbide Create the Lightburn of CNC (if you keep it cloud-free and subscription free).
Edit with some feedback:
- Inconsistency in that some icors are clickable (colour), while some are just indicators (lock, visibility). If the lock and eye icons were also clickable toggles, that would speed up interaction I think.
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Personally, I never asked for layersâŚnever considered the need for them - but now that theyâre there, I can see MANY uses for them. So, Iâm grateful for the new features.
That said, I have to agree with folks above - that it would be REALLY helpful to know what the roadmap for this product looks like - and, in particular, what the disposition for the requests is (will be considered for inclusion, working on including it, will never be included). I have asked for features, some of which I consider to be defects, that I consider to be more important than layers (even though I really like layers), but I recognize Iâm just one client. The issue is that all of them go unrecognized until they show up in the product. Not that my ideas are so great, but acknowledgement and disposition would be helpful and make the experience of trying to help improve the product more fulfilling.
@smokesout Iâm afraid thatâs not going to happen without a major paradigm shiftâŚLightburn is a software company looking to profit from writing software; Carbide is a hardware company writing software to support their hardware. The motivation to provide top-quality, ever-evolving, powerful software is very different for the two companies. Think about IBM getting into softwareâŚworked a bit, but failed in the long run.
The licensing model for Lightburn works well for them because they dedicate themselves to upgrading many times a year with richly packed, client-driven features. You can buy lightburn for $40 and never pay another penny - but you wonât get upgrades after the first year. It costs $30/year (after the first year) to get the upgrades (all year long). The thing that discourages people from not paying the $30/yr and just re-buying the $40 license every two or three years (which would give you the features at a substantially lower cost), is that the features are useful and frequent. They are putting their money where their mouths are with regard to listening to their clients and focusing on the quality of their software. You put up the $30 because itâs worth it to you to get the features as soon as theyâre available.
As Carbide crosses the chasm into charging for their software (the Pro version), they will have to consider what it means to have folks paying for software - and really up the game in terms of usability/consistency, software control, feature management, roadmap, etc. As an x-shrinkwrap software developer, I can tell you itâs a completely different ball game!
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Playing with this (hope to write a tutorial tomorrow or so for the forum)
- Iâd love to have a âduplicate layerâ function where a layer and all objects in it get copied to a new layer
- If you try to copy (ctrl-C) a text object from not-the-active-layer, it gets put in the top layer, not in the active layer. That is neither what I wanted, nor is it consistent with the concept of the active layer
- If you do a pocket operation with an outside box from an inactive layer, something really weird happens. Will attach file below
- Would be nice to have a radio button or something for the active layer, rather than having to click into the submenu
- There is a lot of vertical space on the left side below the icons⌠would like to just see the layers there rather than as a separate dialog
Problem file:
yourtexthere.c2d (1.4 MB)
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hmm I cannot reproduce the weird pocket behavior by doing the work from scratch so probably discard that was some weird fluke
+1
Also, within 1 minute of playing with layer colours, I picked âorangeâ as the layer color, and oh boy thatâs a good way to confuse oneself 
YupâŚthat was my #7 above
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another nit⌠Ctrl-A keybinding⌠Iâd really would like to consider that to be changed to âselect all on the current active layerâ⌠itâs more intuitive in the workflows that Iâve done so far. Iâve always wanted to select-all-in-the-current-layer and never âselect really all except from locked layersâ
one more request; on Ctrl-C from an object selected from not-the-active-layer⌠(after the bug gets fixed that puts it in the wrong layer)⌠maybe do NOT apply the offset that was done for objects in the same layer. The use case for me to do those copies is always to have them in the same spot. WIthout layers, I get that no-offset was confusing⌠but now with layers, thatâs not the case anymore.
(Simplified use case: Layer 1 has a piece of text, Layer 2 will also have its own text but I need to do a boolean operation on that layer 2 text with the text from layer 1 to make multi layered text plaques. Iâd like to just copy the Layer 1 text with layer 2 active, and join the original text. Now I first need to carefully align it back to overlap with the original⌠error prone)
one more: Default color of the layer. RIght now itâs always black, I would suggest to change that to be the next color out of a sequence each time you add a layer⌠itâs a better user experience. And you can pick colors that are not-orange-or-pink to not confuse Julien or Gary.
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