Saving designs from design library as well as projects

1

Hello all,

if these are stupid questions - please forgive.

  1. is there a way to ‘save’ a design found in the ‘design library’? as you likely know there are thousands (or more) designs in there. It takes a LOT of time sifting through trying to find something that I want/need to use. Is there a “my designs” or “favorites” option somewhere to save frequently used designs?

  2. this question is an off shoot from the first. Last year I spent hours designing a product. Through many iterations, I finally got it right and sent out a few of the prototypes. I just received an order for that product, and… IT’S GONE!!! VANASHED!!! it is NOT in my projects listing. So now I get to spend hours redesigning it. As such, I have learned from this misfortune. So, my question is this: is there a way to load all of my projects onto an external hard drive? If so, how?

2

Hopefully the Easel team can chime into why a project might have disappeared (I’ve never had that, myself).

You can’t exactly backup a project. Meaning, you can’t back it up and restore it exactly.

There is an option to download the project as a ZIP. If you do this, it will give you a file that contains an SVG with the basic design for each workpiece, and a text file with some (but not all) of the properties for running each workpiece.

You can re-import the SVG to at least get the design back, but the text file will not include enough information to recreate the project perfectly. Also, any non-vector features (i.e., notes and—I think—groups) will not be restored. It’s useful for backing up something that you have no other way to restore.

Honestly, for anything too complex, I generally prefer to design it in a different tool (Illustrator or Inkscape, for example), then import the SVG into Easel. Those programs have much better tools for complicated designs, and also make it much easier to iterate.

3

Thank you Phil,

I too hope that Inventables designers see this. It seems that with every problem that I encounter (and there are A LOT), the advice is to use a different software program. I’m a woodworker, NOT a computer guy, so this journey has been brutal, as soooo often when something doesn’t work I just want to grab a 100 year old tool and get the d@mned thing DONE!! but that’s not how I will learn, so I force myself to go through the design HELL day after day.
I’m getting to the point where I may have to shut down the shop, get a job, take some computer night classes to learn these other programs that different users keep telling me to use, and try again in a year or two.

so, IF any designers are reading this - HELP!!! If you would like input, I would be happy to do a phone call. If you want to make your software idiot-proof, employ an idiot. I volunteer, and will work with you for FREE if it means that the software can get to the point where everyone doesn’t tell me to go learn how to use a different software each time I try to build something.

all my best,

Joe