Jim,

The Cadkey 97 manual should have a pretty good bit of information on using Cadkey and similar information on solids and surfaces.  If you are looking for some other information on Cadkey, I would try the Dr. Walt website.  He has published books on Cadkey for serveral years and if I remember, he had some books on Cadkey 97 and 98.  By the way, I'm still using Cadkey 99 8 years later.  Also, I post questsions about Cadkey on Cadchat.com as well.  Brian Vierstra contributes to that site and he has extensive experience with Cadkey - he just helped me remember how to solve some font questions I had after reloading Cadkey 99.  

Kyle

do you have the basic cadkey 98 or the design suite pro? I have the manuals for the design suite and could provide you with copies...if you have the basic version you wouldn't need all if them.

Thanks kjoiner and BeachBum for helping me out. It is encouraging to find out that there are still people out there that are still using the old Cadkey programs (97,98,99) I don't think that they have an equal for machine designers. I have tried to get started in Autocad several times and get impatient and switch back to Cadkey.
I have purchased the Cadkey 97 book, The Companion For Cadkey 97 by John Cherng, and it looks as though it will be useful for Cadkey 98 also.

I have come upon another problem in my new use of Cadkey 98. I have used the DOS program Cadkey 7 for many years and in the program when you worked on a drawing file you were working on a copy and the only way to change the file was to change the copy and overwrite the file by saving the copy.
What is happening to me in Cadkey 98 is that I seem to be working in the file and everything that I do appears immediately in the file. This is a huge pain in the neck and can't be right. There must be some command that I am using improperly of some configuratiion that I have not done. Can either of you help me with this? I hope so, it's driving me nuts, so much so that I am saving my work files to a floppy and loading them into DOS Cadkey 7 to work on them.
Thanks for your help,
Jim Cobb

Jim,

When you say that your work is appearing in your file do you mean that it is autosaving your work?  If so, there is a tab under the Tools, Options called Misc and it has some check boxes for file locking and auto saving.  I think auto save is enabled by default.  I always turn it off so that I have control over when I save my work in case I need to punt, close the file and re-load it.

Kyle

Kyle,
I will get back to you about this autosave problem, if it is a problem. I am trying to use Cadkey98 using the classic Cadkey DOS Options Menu and trying to use it in the same way that I did/do in Dos Cadkey7. I am finding out that loading and saving drawings using the classic options menu does not work exactly the same in Cadkey98 as it did/does in the old DOS Cadkey7. In Cadkey98 it seems that using the dropdown options from "File" in the toolbar to "open" and "close" a drawing file gives me what I want rather than using the "Load" and "Save" options in the Classic menu options window. As I say I will get back to you. It is 1 AM and I am about to nod off while typing this note.

Thanks again, Jim Cobb

Kyle,
If I am working in DOS Cadkey7 on a drawing (XXX.prt) when I want to save the part I go to the classic options window and press File, then Part, then Save and Cadkey7 will ask
"XXX.prt exists do you want to change it? (no)". I have to press yes to save my work by over writing the old file. If I press return or press no my work is not saved and if I press load Cadkey7 loads the old file (xxx.Prt) with no changes. When working in Cadkey7 my autosave function saves my work in a separate file named "backup" and if I want to see what has been autosaved I must load "backup". I have Cadkey7 set to save to "backup" every 5 minutes.

If I am working in Cadkey98 on a drawing (XXX.Prt) when I want to save it and I use the classic options menu I press File, then Prt, then Save and Cadkey98 saves it without any question as to whether I want to overwrite old file or not.
Further, if I wish, I can load a different file (YYY.Prt) and Cadkey98 will replace (XXX.Prt) with no questions as to whether I want to save (XXX.Prt) or not. Then when I load
(XXX.Prt) again if appears as I was working on it, with all of the changes, and not as the original (old) file. I have the autosave function set for 2 minutes. However in Cadkey98 the file list lists autosaved files as (XXX.asv)and you have to load that particular file to see what was autosaved. It seems that I am changing the old file (XXX.Prt) as I am working on it, although this may not be so. If I "load" and "save" through the dropdown menu under File on the toolbar using "open" and "close" saving new work seems to work more like the old Cadkey7.

I hope that all of this is clear.

 Cordially, Jim Cobb

Jim,

I'm trying to remember how the DOS version operated since it's been about 10 years since I used it but my guess would be in the difference between how the DOS version and the Windows versions handle prompting during file saves.  In the windows version, an asterisk appears next to the file that is open which indicates that a change has occurred but as you mention, Cadkey 98 does not prompt you for whether or not you want to overwrite the file.  Look in the Tools/Options settings and make sure you have the "keep backup copy on save" checked.  I looked at the help file in CK99 and it says that Cadkey will save the backup copy before the save.  It goes on to say that autosave will save the copy at the selected interval but maintains the last version you manually saved.  You probably need to use a combination of saving manually to lock in a baseline of your part and then let autosave keep a running save of the part.  If there's a problem, you would load the *.bak file to go back where you were.  I would recommend running some test cases to make sure this functions properly.

As far as loading XXX.prt and the YYY.prt, they should open in separate windows but will by default be cascaded on top of each other.  Sometimes I will have several files open and I use ctrl+tab to sequence through the files on screen.  This is useful for multiple sheet drawings.

The Windows versions of Cadkey use a *.bak file as the backup file.


Kyle

Kyle,
I have been reading about Cadkey (Cadkey97)
and experimenting with Cadkey98 and the only
commands that seem to work the way that I am
used to are from the drop down options under
File, those are "open" and "close". I'm not
sure what the difference is between "close"
and "save" but "close" works for me whereas
"save" and "Save as" don't. I can imagine
that I am damaging or screwing anythingng
up by using those two commands to "load" and
"save" so I am proceeding that way.

Kyle, thanks for your help in starting me up
in Cadkey For Windows. This conversation
has been invaluable. I may show up in another
posting thread but for now I'm signing out.

Thanks again and best regards, Jim Cobb