Editor (Beta)

Overview

The Editor turns imported geometry into an asset that moves. A STEP or JT file arrives as a silent tree of CAD parts; the editor gives that tree axes, drives, materials and signals, and saves the result as a GLB that any realvirtual WEB document — and the Layout Planner — can reuse.

Unlike the other workspaces, the editor works on one asset document at a time rather than on a whole plant or layout. Every change is recorded as an undoable step, so authoring is a matter of trying something and looking at it, not of getting it right the first time.

A Festo station open in the editor: the imported CAD tree with its original part names on the left, the tool strip and the transform gizmo in the 3D view, and Quick Edit with kinematics, transform, create, components, drive behaviours and signals on the right

Importing

The import dialog on its STEP tab: a strip of source tabs across the top, the note that conversion runs in the browser and no CAD data leaves the machine, the tessellation quality and up axis settings, a Convert via CONNECT option, and a drop area for .step and .stp files

Every source sits behind one dialog, as a strip of tabs: GLB, STEP, JT, USD, FBX, the Asset Manager and Onshape. Each tab carries the settings that source needs — for STEP that is tessellation quality and the up axis. Local files are read in the browser — nothing is uploaded. Assemblies too large for a browser tab are converted by realvirtual CONNECT on the same machine instead.

Without a commercial license — in the public demo and on the free CONNECT tier — CAD import is limited to 25 MB per STEP file and 12 MB per JT file; a commercial license lifts both limits. The limit applies per file, so importing an assembly delivered as several smaller files is fine. Details: licensing and activation.

The document header shows what you are editing, whether it has unsaved changes, and the undo, redo and Save controls:

The asset header: name, unsaved marker, undo and redo, save

The Quick Edit panel

Quick Edit: kinematics, transform, create, components, drive behaviours, signals and logic steps

Everything you do to a selection happens here, and the panel is deliberately honest about it: every tool stays listed and greys out until it applies to what you have selected, so the set of available operations is always visible rather than appearing and disappearing.

Group	What it does
Kinematics	The axes of this asset, each with the number of parts assigned. Add Kinematic creates one from the current selection; Auto Assign proposes an assignment for the whole tree
Transform	Zero position, to ground, pivot to bottom, pivot to object, pivot to circle, align Y up, and rotation around X, Y or Z
Create	Empty child, empty at root, group into empty — the structure a raw CAD tree usually lacks
Components	Drive, Kinematic, Transport Surface, Sensor, Source, Sink, Grip
Drive Behaviors	Simple, Cylinder, Destination Motor, Gear, Follow Position, Speed, Position Switch, Erratic Position
Signals	Bool, Int and Float in both directions, plus conversions between them
Logic Steps	Sequences that drive the asset without a controller

In the example above, the imported Festo station already carries five axes — AxisLeft_Y, AxisLeft_Z, AxisRight_Y, AxisRight_Z and Feeder_X.

Pivot to Circle

A rotary axis turns around the centre of a bore, a bearing seat or a shaft — a point that is almost never the origin the CAD system left behind. Pivot to Circle puts the pivot on that centre by letting you point at the round feature instead of typing coordinates.

Select the part whose pivot you want to move and click Pivot to Circle.
Click the mesh that carries the round feature. The rest of the model dims and the camera frames what you picked, so the only thing competing for your attention is the geometry you are aiming at.
Move the cursor over the feature. The corner nearest the cursor lights up, and where that corner lies on a circle the circle is drawn together with the axis the commit would take.
Click the circle to move the pivot there.

Escape steps back one stage rather than leaving the tool, because “wrong part” is the correction you will need most; Escape again, or a right-click, cancels. Every way out restores the normal view — the dim and the framing are part of the tool, not a state you can get stranded in.

Notes on a node

Any node can carry a written note — what the assembly does, how it is commissioned, what a maintainer needs to know. Notes are stored inside the document and travel with it, so they arrive with the machine rather than in a separate file. The property inspector renders a note as formatted text with a short header (when, by whom, how confident), in a box that grows with the window; long notes scroll inside it instead of stretching the panel.

Saving

The document header carries the name, the unsaved marker and Save. Two rules are worth knowing before you rely on it:

“Untitled” is a name like any other. A document you never renamed saves exactly like a named one. Only a document with no name at all is refused.
Save is refused while a test run holds the document. Stop the run first — saving a model whose drives are mid-cycle would write the pose it happens to be standing in.

A save that fails leaves no half-created document behind, and the card preview of a saved asset refreshes so the dashboard shows what you actually saved.

What you can do

Import — STEP, JT, USD, FBX and GLB, or geometry from Onshape.
Structure — browse and rename the node tree, select identical parts in one step, isolate and hide what is in the way.
Kinematics — group parts into an axis, add its drive, and place the rotation point. Rotary axes are defined in degrees, linear axes in millimetres.
Verification — drive an axis through its range and watch it move before saving. A wrong axis direction shows up as parts sliding instead of turning; a wrong pivot as an orbit instead of a spin.
Materials — assign from an industrial preset library (steel, RAL paints, rubber, glass) or set physical properties directly.
Signals and logic — add PLC input and output signals to nodes and connect simple sequences, so the asset reacts to live data or to a standalone simulation.
Forces — the toolbar’s Forces button opens the force and torque analysis for a rigid-body mechanism: actuator loads, bearing loads and the peak and RMS figures a drive has to be sized against. It is described in full under rigid-body mechanisms.

Quick Start

Switch the workspace to Editor.
Import a CAD file, or open an existing asset from the library.
Work out what the machine does — focus the camera on a part, select its identical copies, name what you see.
Group the parts of one movement into a kinematic axis and give it a drive.
Verify the axis by driving it through its range.
Assign materials.
Save. The asset lands in the library and can be placed, driven and connected like any other.

Where the result goes

A saved asset is an ordinary GLB with realvirtual metadata — the same format the Unity exporter produces and the same one the viewer reads. That means an asset authored in the browser is not a second-class citizen: it can be placed in a layout, connected to live signals through CONNECT, published as a document, or handed on as a file.

It lands in the project you are working in, and the project is itself the library the Layout Planner offers first. Nothing has to be published, registered or copied into a separate catalogue for a saved asset to be placeable — see documents for how libraries are attached.