- [Instructor] Let's get started
by opening up the SolidWorks Composer software
for the very first time.
Of course, I'll just double click my icon
to open up the software
but an important thing to note here
is that with the SolidWorks Composer
I have two slightly different looking icons.
First, I have just my standard SolidWorks icon
with some gold boxes over top
and this is the full SolidWorks Composer software.
I also have a SolidWorks Composer icon
with some silver boxes over top
and this is just the SolidWorks Composer Player
as we can see,
so this is just a free viewing software
and won't be used to edit or design any files.
So, throughout this course, of course,
we'll be using the full SolidWorks Composer software,
so we'll just double click to launch
for my first time here.
Once opened, we will see the general user interface.
Now it may look familiar
as it is a Windows-based software,
so at the top for example
I have a number of ribbon tabs
and this is similar to say my Microsoft Word
or Microsoft Excel.
I also have a 3D workspace here,
so let's go ahead and open up our first file.
So, I'm just going to go to File, Open
and I'm going to navigate to a completed project
and hit Open.
So, here we can see in my 3D workspace
I have the project that I'm working on
and here I can zoom in and move around,
rotate, pan and so forth
but what's most important about the user interface
is that it's pretty much completely customizable.
So, the most important tab here would be my Window tab
and this is where I can show or hide
whichever panels I would like,
so say for example, I'm not yet creating animations,
maybe I don't need my timeline
down at the bottom turned on here,
so I can just check off the timeline
and that of course will expand my workspace here.
So, there's the number of different panels
that I can turn on or off as needed
and in general I'd say the most important
that I will almost always have turned on
is my assembly tree
and here I can find my assembly tree
which is pretty much just a list
of all of the components within my project.
I also have a collaboration tree
and here I can find my collaboration tree.
This is a list of anything within my project
that does not have geometry behind it
such as labels, text, call outs and so forth.
I also have my views turned on
and these we're going to take a look at later on
but these are all the views
that we'll be generating throughout our project.
And finally, I have Properties.
Properties again, very important here.
These will be all of the properties
I'll be changing to my components here
such as color and opacity and so forth.
And the other important thing to note here
is that I can also customize where my panels
are located by just a simple click and drag.
So, say for example,
I wanted my Views panel to be somewhere else
in my user interface,
I can just click and drag on the views on here
and really place it wherever I'd like.
I can have it floating or just place it in the middle here
for example, or I can click and drag
and dock or pin it to say the top
or the bottom or let's see, the right here
and you can do this with really any panel,
so you can customize your user interface
to fit your own preferences.