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Workdesk Environment

The EPLAN Harness proD Studio workdesk environment is primarily focused on wire harness design. It enables you to design wire harnesses by imitating a 2D manufacturing drawing, without being bothered with 3D mechanical models. It is basically a 3D environment with a locked Z axis; however, the Z axis is not fully locked. If needed, workdesk design can be easily converted to workspace environment, a full 3D environment.

Workdesk design serves as a source for outputs such as nailboards, cable drawings, and reports.

The workdesk environment consists of the navigation panel, the working window, the properties panel, the command bar, the Tasks list, and the corresponding menus and toolbars.

Navigation panel

It is displayed in the left-hand side bar (default) and contains the following tabs:

Working window

This is the place where wire harnesses are designed. It is situated in the center of the EPLAN Harness proD Studio screen (default) just below the tab of the currently opened library item.

To pan, zoom and rotate objects and view them within the 3D working window it is possible to use a 3D mouse such as SpaceTraveler, SpacePilot, SpacePilot PRO, or SpaceExplorer.

Properties panel

It is displayed in the right-hand side bar (default) and shows the properties of the currently selected objects. These can be edited to better suit your needs.

Command bar

While placing objects into the workdesk or using commands (e.g. the Move and Rotate commands etc.), the corresponding options are available in the command bar.

Tasks list

The Tasks list is available in the workdesk environment to manage errors.

Global grid

The global grid is displayed in the workdesk working window. Objects placed into the workdesk are snapped to the grid. The Global grid object is available in the Environment node in the tree view.

Global grid name, distance, color, line type, line thickness, and line color can be specified in the properties panel. Changes made there are immediately applied to the workdesk working window. The global grid property defaults can be determined in the workdesk settings (under Tools > Settings > Workdesk > Global grid).

Local radial grid

The Local radial grid object is available in the Environment node in the tree view. Once selected, you can define the following properties in the properties panel:

The radial grid becomes available if you switch to a polar coordinate system in the command bar while placing objects such as bundles, wires, cables, surface protections, etc. and also when you use the Move wire harness segment command. The local radial grid property defaults can be determined in the workdesk settings (under Tools > Settings > Workdesk > Local radial grid).

Active dimensions

Active dimensions are placed within objects such as (rapid prototyping) wires, (rapid prototyping) cables, (rapid prototyping) ribbon cables, bundles, and surface protections. They can be modified in the workdesk settings (under Tools > Settings > Workdesk > Active dimensions) or the properties panel.

The following properties can be modified in the properties panel if you select the Active dimensions entry in the Environment node:

In addition, each individual active dimension can be modified in the workdesk working window.

Coordinate system

While placing objects such as (rapid prototyping) wires, (rapid prototyping) cables, (rapid prototyping) ribbon cables, bundles, and surface protections, you can switch between the Cartesian and polar coordinate systems in the command bar.

Measurement

While placing objects such as (rapid prototyping) wires, (rapid prototyping) cables, (rapid prototyping) ribbon cables, bundles, and surface protections, you can switch between absolute and relative measurements in the command bar.

Z axis

Since the workdesk environment imitates a 2D manufacturing drawing, a typical workflow is to work in the 2D space with the X and Y axes being available for placing objects and the Rotate, Move and Move wire harness segment commands.

The Z axis is, however, available in the Position section of the properties panel where you can define the [x,y,z] values for position and rotation. In addition, you can rotate the scene (as in the 3D space) in the workdesk working window.