See SolidWorks What’s New 2016 Part 1


Hello all, today title is about “SolidWorks What’s New 2016 Part 1”. SolidWorks What’s New 2016 basically will be separate in 4 pillars. Which is Design, Validate, Collaborate and Build. And this blog will be focus on a part of the ‘Design’ Pillar.


This blog highlights the core message on the DESIGN PILLAR. In this video we will show you about the new enhancement on User interface, Sketching and Part modeling.

User Interface Redesign

The SOLIDWORKS 2016 user interface is redesigned to provide better support for high-resolution, high-pixel density displays.

All icons, buttons, toolbar, and text respond well to your Windows display scaling settings.

Visual clutter is removed from the user interface, and a new triad design provides improved visual clarity and ease of use.

New Icon Style

SOLIDWORKS 2016 provides a new icon style that is consistent with the Dassault Systemès portfolio of 3D EXPERIENCE products. It also allows vector-based scaling for superior support of high resolution, high pixel density displays. The new icon syle standardizes the perspective of icons, removes non-essential details, and emphasizes primary elements. Consistent visual styling applies to all icons.


The visual styling uses blue to emphasize the primary action or feature, dark grey outlining to define the overall icon shape, and shadows for visual grounding.Most icons are similar to previous icons, but with crisper lines that improve readability and recognition. The location of icons on the Command Manager and toolbar has not changed. Finally, the icon color scheme and use of highlights are easier to identify for color blind users.

Redesigned Triad

The triad is redesigned to make it easier to control model orientation in 3D, using selection handles and angle rotation.

On screen manipulators like the triad manipulator, section view triad, and Instant 3D arrows have been redesigned for better visibility and enlarged to be easier to manipulate.


Moving the Confirmation Corner Options to the Pointer

You can confirm changes you make in sketches and tools more easily by using the keyboard shortcut to move the OK and Cancel buttons to the pointer location in the graphics area.

When you open a Property Manager, the OK and Cancel options are located in the upper left corner of the Property Manager and in the Confirmation Corner, while your pointer may be in the middle of the graphics area where you are manipulating the model.


To move the Confirmation Corner options to the pointer:

  1. Open a tool.
  2. Use a manipulator to modify a feature.
  3. Click in the graphics area and then press D.

The buttons from the Confirmation Corner move to the pointer position, making it easier to complete the action.


To move the buttons back to the Confirmation Corner, press D again.

If a Property Manager or sketch is not open, you can also press D to display selection breadcrumbs at the pointer location. See Selection Breadcrumbs on page 29.D is assigned as the keyboard shortcut to move the Confirmation Corner buttons or selection breadcrumbs to the pointer unless you have assignedD as a shortcut for another SOLIDWORKS action.

Selection Breadcrumbs

Selection breadcrumbs are a context-based view of the current selection. They show related elements up and down the hierarchical tree, from the selected entity through the top level assembly or part.

Breadcrumbs let you select something in the graphics area and refine that selection through the context-based representation of the item. For example, in an assembly, when you select a face, you can see all of the mates of the component that face belongs to.

Prior to SOLIDWORKS 2016, to view the mates you either had to right-click the component or find the component in the Feature Manager design tree and open the mates folder.

Breadcrumbs provide access to the entire hierarchical chain of entities from the item you selected up through the top level document. In addition, breadcrumbs provide access to common selections that are adjacent to the entities in the breadcrumb, such as the underlying sketch of a feature, or the mates of a component.


Selecting Midpoints with Dynamic Highlighting

You can dynamically highlight and select midpoints on sketch entities and model edges to add relations. You can also dynamically highlight and select midpoints of sketch entities while dimensioning in sketches.

Previously, you could only select midpoints of model edges while dimensioning using

Select Midpoint from the shortcut menu. However, on selection of a second midpoint on another entity, the first entity was cleared.


Show or Hide Sketch Dimensions

You can show or hide 2D and 3D sketch dimensions with the View Sketch Dimensions


Previously, only 3D sketch dimensions were hidden when you turned off View Sketch


Unmerging Sketch Endpoints with Detach Segment on Drag

You can unmerge sketch entity endpoints with Detach Segment on Drag.

Previously, with Detach Segment on Drag, you could drag any sketch entity and detach it from other entities, but you could not detach an entity at just one endpoint.

Segment Tool

You can use the Segment tool to create equal length segments in lines,arcs and circles.

Equidistant Relations

When you use the Segment tool in lines, arcs, or circles, an equidistant relation is applied to the sketch points.

The equidistant relation creates space between the sketch points on the line, arc, or circle.

If you drag or resize the line, arc, or circle, the sketch points automatically adjust to remain equidistant along the segment.

Deleting any of the equidistant relations in a sketch point group deletes the entire relations group. After deleting an equidistant relation, the sketch points remain in their previous locations with a coincident relation to the entity onto which they were placed.




You can create helical threads on cylindrical faces using profile sketches. You can store custom thread profiles as library features.

Using Thread, you can define the start thread location, specify an offset, set end conditions, specify the type, size, diameter, pitch and rotation angle, and choose options such as right-hand or left-hand thread.


Presented to you by:

Joe Lam

Application Engineer, CADVision Systems Sdn Bhd