Components

A component is a group of objects that shows only a chosen handful of controls. Everything inside it is still there in the design tree, but the Properties panel presents just the settings that matter – the height of one extrude, the diameter of one hole – so the component reads as a single part with a few parameters rather than as the stack of operations it is built from. The Image Converter is a component MatterCAD builds for you, and the Design Apps are components too.

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How to Use

Creating a Component

  1. Select one or more objects at the top level of the scene
  2. Choose Make Component from the object’s right-click Modify menu, or click it in the Constraints group of the toolbar
  3. The selection is replaced by a component named “New Component”, which starts in editing mode so you can choose what it surfaces

Make Component is only enabled for a selection sitting at the top of the scene, not for something already nested inside another object.

The Constraints group the toolbar button lives in is hidden by default. Click Tools at the right end of the toolbar and set Constraints to Expand or Collapse to bring it back. The right-click Modify menu offers Make Component either way.

Editing and Finalizing

A component has two modes, switched by the Finalized setting:

  • Editing (Finalized off) - Everything inside is on show, including any Variable Sheet it holds, so you can build and wire it up
  • Distribution (Finalized on) - Only the surfaced controls are shown, and the embedded sheet is hidden. This is how someone using your component sees it

Edit Component puts a finalized component back into editing mode. It is offered in the Modify menu for a finalized component sitting at the top level of the scene.

Using a Component

  1. Select the component
  2. The surfaced parameters appear in the Properties panel
  3. Change them to change the part

Behind the scenes those parameters usually write into a Variable Sheet inside the component, and the objects in the component read their dimensions back out of it – which is what makes one control move several things at once.

Tips

  • Components are useful for creating reusable building blocks in complex designs
  • Parameter changes are non-destructive and can be adjusted at any time
  • Surface as few controls as you can. A component with four meaningful settings is far easier to use than one with forty
  • Copy a component and the copy is independent. Editing one does not change the other – for parts that must stay identical, drive them from one Variable Sheet instead
  • Apply on a component flattens it down to plain meshes and cannot be undone by re-editing, so keep an unapplied copy if you may want to change it later
  • Grouping - Simple grouping without parameterization
  • Expressions - Use expressions to link component parameters
  • Variable Sheet - Store the shared values a component’s parameters read
  • Object References - Link a parameter to another object’s setting
  • Design Apps - Pre-built components you can customize