Walls, doors and windows

This chapter describes how walls are drawn, how they join and attach to roofs and floors, how their types and layers are set up, and how doors and windows are placed in them, flipped, moved and drawn at each detail level.

Drawing walls

Home ▸ Build ▸ Wall (or type WA) starts the wall tool, in a plan or in the 3D view. Pick the wall type in the type selector at the top of the Properties palette; Type Properties changes the type, and with it every wall of that type. The contextual tab Edit | Place Wall shows the Draw panel, and the options bar shows:

Option	What it does
Height or Depth	The wall rises from the level (Height) or goes down from it (Depth)
A level, or Unconnected with a value	The wall reaches that level, or is that high (or deep)
Level	In a 3D view only: the level the walls stand on; takes the level of the surface of the first click
Location Line	The plane of the wall that runs along the clicks: Wall Centerline (the default), the core centre line, or one of the finish and core faces, exterior or interior
Chain	On, each click ends a wall and starts the next one; off, each two clicks make a wall on its own
Offset	The location line runs this far from the clicks, towards the exterior
Radius	Not available: it needs curved walls, and is shown disabled

In the 3D view the wall being drawn follows the cursor as a solid, with its thickness and its height up to the top level (or the height typed), on the plane of the level, with its length and angle as a temporary dimension; Shift keeps it square and Esc takes it away.

While drawing:

the wall's exterior is on the left of the drawing direction: drawn from left to right, the exterior face is at the top. The preview shows the exterior face thicker;
the space bar puts the exterior of the next wall on the other side;
after the first point, type a length and press Enter: the wall ends that far, in the direction of the cursor;
Esc ends the chain; Esc again, or Modify, ends the tool.

The Draw panel picks the shape:

Shape	How
Line	Click the start and the end of each wall
Rectangle	Click two opposite corners: four joined walls, with the exterior outside
Inscribed Polygon	Set Sides in the options bar, click the centre and a corner: the corners are on the circle
Circumscribed Polygon	The same, but the sides touch the circle
Pick Lines	Click a line of the plan (a line or an edge of an element): a wall along it. Press TAB over a line to take the whole chain of lines joined to it, then click

The location line and flipping

Select a wall: blue dots mark the ends of its location line, and two arrows stand on its exterior side. Clicking the arrows turns the wall over about its location line: the first and the last layers swap, and the doors and windows keep their orientation. Changing Location Line of a placed wall does not move it; the next flip turns it about the new plane. Changing the type of a wall, or its layers, keeps its location line where it was.

Attaching walls to roofs and floors

A wall can follow a roof or a floor instead of a fixed height.

Select the walls.
Edit | Walls ▸ Modify Wall ▸ Attach Top/Base.
In the options bar, Attach Wall: Top or Base.
Click the roof or floor, in a plan, a section or the 3D view.

With Top, the walls rise or drop to the underside of the roof (following its slopes: the gable walls go up to the ridge) or of the floor above. With Base, they stand on the top face of the floor below. From then on they follow it: a steeper roof, a roof raised by its base offset, a moved floor carry the walls with them.

To detach them: select the walls, Edit | Walls ▸ Modify Wall ▸ Detach Top/Base, then click the element to detach them from, or press Detach All in the options bar. The walls keep the height they have at that moment, and can be attached again at any time. When a roof or floor with walls attached to it is deleted, the walls keep their height too.

The properties Top is Attached and Base is Attached show the state (read-only); while the top is attached, Unconnected Height is read-only.

Editing a wall's profile

A wall need not be a rectangle: its outline can be sketched in an elevation or a section parallel to it, with holes, as for a gable or a stepped wall.

Select the wall and click Mode ▸ Edit Profile in its contextual tab. From a plan or a view that is not parallel to the wall, Go To View lists the sections and elevations parallel to it: choose one and click Open View.
Sketch mode opens with the wall's outline in magenta. Change it with Line and Rectangle (see sketch mode): pick a line and press Del, draw new ones; a loop inside is a hole.
Click Finish Edit Mode (or Cancel Edit Mode to leave the wall as it was).

The wall takes that outline in 3D, in sections and in plan, where it is cut only where the outline reaches the cut plane; its doors and windows still cut it. A top attached to a roof or a floor still clips it. A curtain wall keeps the panels and mullions inside its new outline. Mode ▸ Reset Profile makes it a rectangle again; Ctrl+Z undoes either.

The profile can also be edited in the 3D view: the sketch lies on the wall's plane and the view stays 3D. Only from a plan does Go To View appear, and nothing changes until a view is opened with Open View. While sketching, the wall's original outline is drawn as dashed reference lines; the sketch snaps to their ends and onto them.

Wall joins

Walls whose ends meet join by themselves, and so do a wall ending on the side of another and two walls crossing each other. At Medium and Fine detail each layer is resolved against the layers of the other wall:

at a corner (an L), each layer meets the same layer of the other wall: the finishes wrap round the corner and the cores meet;
at a T, the core of the wall that ends runs through the finishes of the other wall up to its core; its own finishes stop at the face, which is open there;
where two walls cross (an X), a core runs through the finishes of the other wall;
pieces of the same material merge with no line between them; a thin line separates two different materials; the free outline is drawn thick.

At Coarse detail joined walls are one fill, with no line between them. Sections and the 3D view use the same pieces, so nothing overlaps.

The Wall Joins tool

Edit ▸ Geometry ▸ Wall Joins, then click the grey square that appears on a corner. The options bar offers:

Configuration: Butt (one wall runs through, the other stops against it), Miter (both end on the bisector) or Square off (the wall that stops ends square); Previous and Next change which wall runs through;
Display: Clean Join, Don't Clean Join (the walls butt, with a thick line between them) or Use View Setting.

Each change can be undone. Esc ends the tool.

The plan's property Wall Join Display (in Graphics) is the view setting: Clean all wall joins, or Clean same wall type to keep a thick line where walls of two types meet, unless their corner is set to Clean Join.

Disallowing a join

To keep an end of a wall from joining (an expansion gap, say), select the wall, right-click the blue dot of that end and choose Disallow Join: both walls then end square, apart. A small mark beside the end shows it; click it, or right-click the dot and choose Allow Join, to join it again.

Wall types and layers

Type Properties of a wall shows, under Construction, Structure with its Edit… button, Wrapping at Inserts, Wrapping at Ends, Width (the sum of the layers, read-only) and Function (Interior, Exterior, Foundation, Retaining, Soffit, Core-shaft); under Graphics, Coarse Scale Fill Pattern and Coarse Scale Fill Color, how cut walls of the type are filled at Coarse detail. Duplicate… makes a new type; its name does not follow its layers.

Structure ▸ Edit… opens Edit assembly: the layers from the exterior side to the interior side, each with its function, material and thickness, between the two Core Boundary rows. Insert, Delete, Up and Down change the list. A membrane layer has no thickness, and every other layer is at least 4 mm thick: other values are refused, and the dialog stays open.

The Wraps column ticks the layers that may wrap. Below the table:

Wrapping at Inserts (Do not wrap, Exterior, Interior, Both): the ticked layers outside the core on that side turn into the jambs of doors and windows; the layers behind them are pulled back;
Wrapping at Ends (Do not wrap, Exterior, Interior): the same at the free ends of the walls.

Wrapping is drawn in plan only. A door or window type overrides the wall's wrapping with its Wall Closure.

Wall properties

Under Constraints: Location Line, Base Constraint, Base Offset, Base is Attached, Top Constraint (a level, or Unconnected), Unconnected Height, Top Offset (with a level), Top is Attached and Room Bounding (untick it and the rooms around the wall ignore it). Under Dimensions: Length, Area, Volume. Under Identity Data: Mark and Comments.

Placing doors and windows

Home ▸ Build ▸ Door (DR) or Window (WN), in a plan, a section, an elevation or the 3D view. Pick the type, then move over a wall: the opening follows the cursor along it, and temporary dimensions measure from its centre line to the centre lines of the nearest walls across the host on each side. A door swings to the side of the wall the cursor is on; the space bar puts its hinge on the other jamb. Click to place it: the wall is cut in every view. A window takes its type's Default Sill Height.

Doors and windows get a Mark that counts up by category (1, 2, 3…), from the highest.

Flipping a door or window

Select a door or window in a plan: arrows across the wall, on the side it opens to, turn its swing over; arrows beside it, along the wall, put its hinge on the other jamb. The context menu does the same: Flip Hand (the hinge) and Flip Facing (the swing).

Moving a door or window to another wall

Select it, Edit | Doors ▸ Host ▸ Pick New Host (or Edit | Windows), then click another wall: the opening moves there, where you clicked, with its type and sill. It stays selected.

Door and window properties

Instance: Level, Sill Height, Width and Height (of the type), Head Height, Comments, Mark. Changing Sill Height or Head Height moves the opening up or down; its size stays.

Type: Wall Closure (By host, or a wrapping of its own), Function (Interior or Exterior), Door Material (Glass Material for windows) and Frame Material, Trim Width, Thickness (of a door's leaf, or the depth of a window's frame), Default Sill Height and Window Inset (windows: how far the frame sits from the exterior face), Trim Projection Ext and Trim Projection Int (doors), Leaves and Type Mark. A door cannot become a window by changing its type.

How walls, doors and windows are drawn

The Detail Level of the plan decides:

	Coarse	Medium	Fine
Walls	One fill (or the type's coarse pattern), joined walls merged	Each layer with its material's cut pattern	As Medium
Windows	The frame as one outline, the glass along it, the wall below seen as lines	The frame cut at each jamb and at the mullion of a two-leaf window, at its inset; one line of glass; the exterior sill and the interior sill board	As Medium, with double glass
Doors	The leaf as a line and its swing	The frame at each jamb, the leaf with its thickness, its swing	As Medium, with the trims out of the faces

In every case the layers end at the jambs of the opening, closed by the cut line, or wrap into them as the types ask. In sections and in 3D, doors and windows show their frame, leaves, glass and sills, in the type's materials.

Curtain walls

A curtain wall is a wall of a curtain wall type, drawn with the Wall tool: pick Curtain Wall (one glass panel the length of the wall), Exterior Glazing (grid lines by the type) or Storefront (grid lines and mullions) in the type selector, then draw as for any wall, in plan or in 3D, with Chain and the Draw shapes. A basic wall changes into a curtain wall by picking a curtain wall type in the type selector; the doors and windows it hosts are deleted, because a curtain wall does not host them, and a message says so (undo brings them back).

In plan each glass panel is drawn with its thickness and the mullions are cut. A type with Automatically Embed ticked (the Storefront) drawn along a wall cuts its own hole in it, in plan, sections, 3D and IFC.

The type's Vertical Layout and horizontal layout (Fixed distance, Fixed number, Maximum spacing) with their spacing, and the instance's Number of Vertical Grids and Vertical Justification, place the grid lines by themselves.
Home ▸ Build ▸ Curtain Grid: click near the top or bottom edge for a vertical line, near a side for a horizontal one, in an elevation, a section or a plan; it snaps to the middle and the thirds of the panel.
Home ▸ Build ▸ Mullion: Grid Line, Grid Line Segment or All Grid Lines, with the mullion type picked in the type selector.
Select the curtain wall, then Panel in its contextual tab: pick a panel type (a Curtain Wall Door, a glazed or solid panel, or none) and click the panel to change.

Panels and mullions have their own schedules, and the IFC export writes the curtain wall with its plates and members.

At the command line

The same operations, typed:

attach                      attach the selected walls to the roof over them
attach 412                  attach their top to element 412 (a roof or a floor)
attach base 398             attach their base to the floor 398
detach all                  detach them from everything
walljoin 0,0 {"kind":"Giunto d'angolo","cleanup":"Non calcolare unioni"}
walljoin 57 1 disallow      wall 57 does not join at its end
rehost 120 12,4             move door or window 120 into the wall at 12,4
door {"point":[3,0],"tag":{"vertical":true,"leader":true,"length":1}}

Not available yet

Curved walls (Arc, Circle, Radius), Pick Faces, structural walls, stacked walls, wall sweeps and reveals, vertically compound layers (regions), Join Geometry, phases, and skylights in roofs.