Tolerance for the verification of a model
After each use of a drawing function (drawing a line, creating a slab starting from its contour, deleting elements, rotation or translation operations, etc.), Diamonds conducts a significant number of verifications and automatic operations to ensure that the model remains coherent and logical.
In particular, Diamonds:
- divides each line joined by a new segment;
- intersects crossing lines provided that they belong to the same slab or wall;
- generates new slabs each time an existing slab is cross cut by a new line or when a closed contour is located in an existing slab;
- divides each slab intersected with another one.
Moreover, a model is considered as ‘usable’ only when a certain tolerance is accepted at the level of coordinates of nodes. Without it the user will systematically be confronted with inaccuracies and defects that prevent the smooth running of the calculation and verifications.
Diamonds takes into account such tolerance so that …
- nodes too close to each other are consolidated;
- nodes too close to lines are associated to them and the lines are then divided taking into consideration the presence of these nodes;
- slabs or walls are generated even when the lines that constitute their contours are not located perfectly in the same plane.
Diamonds allows you to define this tolerance via the menu ‘Options – Preferences – tab page Model’.
This verification is conducted automatically …
- every time when you import a DXF file, a Diamonds , a PowerPlate or a PowerFrame file
- every time when you add, delete or modify elements of a model
Since these geometric verifications require a lot of calculation time, they are conducted only in the zone directly adjacent to the place where an element has been modified, added or deleted.
If at some point, you want to conduct a verification with bigger tolerance, click 
in the ‘Geometry’ pallet after having selected the whole model or its part (see Model verification). When Diamonds is not able to redefine slabs or walls according to the tolerance set by the user, it simply deletes these elements from the model.
Setting tolerance for the group definition
A certain number of Diamonds features concern bars that are in the prolongation of each other. For example, to group physical elements, it is essential for them to be perfectly aligned (see Defining groups). The alignment also affects buckling lengths.
An angular tolerance allows you to make sure that the elements originating from a CAD software or drawn with the use of various functions of are perfectly aligned.
Move elementes as physical entity
The transformation described in Groups for geometry operations, were established by applying a function ( 
or 
). When performing these function you can indicate if the transformation should be applied on the elements as a physical entity or not.
But you can also deform a structure by adjusting the coordinates of the points.
If you don’t want Diamonds to perform the deformation on the physical entity, you must uncheck the option ‘Move elements by default as physical entity’ in the tab ‘Model’ (and vice versa).
