A Stroll Down Memory Lane - Level of Detail

The memory of things gone is important to a jazz musician.
Louis Armstrong

It's been a long time since I visited this (the tool originally came out in Inventor R11), and I've never done it in a video format, and that's the use of Level of Detail (aka Load on Demand) inside of Inventor.

Level of Detail inside Inventor
(click to enlarge)

We'd all dream of a monster machine with enough RAM to make a minor deity jealous, but we can't always get it. For example, if you're still running a 32 bit system, you're stuck with 4GB of RAM. You can't go any higher.

So when faced with this, Level of Detail can make a huge difference when your system starts hitting the wall.

So what exactly is Level of Detail, or LOD?

LOD allows you to unload unneeded components in an assembly from memory, freeing up RAM to work on the components you do need. It can be used to unload components after you open your assembly, and it can also be saved, and recalled when you open your assembly, allowing fora faster load time.

So without further adieu, here's the video!



So that's Level of Detail in a nutshell.

A few updates from my Plane's of Fame volunteer gig. This weekend the TBM Avenger flew. Unfortunatley, I forgot my good camera, so no aerial shots of the Avenger flying. But I did get a slick picture (at least I think so) of the WWII reenactors posing in front of it.

Open it up in Techsmith's Snagit, change the picture to monochrome and add an edge effect, and it almost looks like it could be from the 1940s! Granted, if you look carefully, you can bust it as being modern. But hey, I'm only an amateur!

The TBM Avenger
(click to enlarge)

Happy Inventing!