Patent ID: 11893320
Assignee: DASSAULT SYSTEMES SOLIDWORKS CORPORATION
Field: Computer technology (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC G  B | IPC B  G

Claim 10:
11. A computer based method for an application in a computer aided drafting (CAD) environment for flattening a three dimensional (3D) backshell component to a two dimensional (2D) representation while maintaining a connected wiring component represented in 3D, comprising steps of:
identifying a 3D backshell component comprising a connector, a shell housing, and a connected first route segment comprising a curved route within the shell housing and at least a first sketch segment disposed within the backshell component and/or passing through a backshell component entry point;
storing all sketch segments for the connected first route segment;
identifying a first entry point at a first end point of the connected first route segment;
computing a first tangent at the first entry point;
computing a first junction point (J1) at a connected first route segment second end point using the first tangent and a required segment length;
calculating a flattened route for all route segments unconnected to the backshell component;
identifying a second junction point (J2) in flattened route;
computing a second tangent at the second junction point;
calculating a translation and rotation transformation aligning the first junction point to the second junction point, and aligning the first tangent and the second tangent,
calculating a transformation matrix based on the translation and rotation transformation;
displaying the flattened unconnected route segment aligned with the 3D backshell component;
obtaining a 3D direction of a connection point within the backshell component;
determining a 2D direction of a connection point within the backshell component in the flattened representation;
determining a cross vector comprising a cross product between a 2D connection point direction and associated tangent at 2D junction point;
computing a viewing direction transformation based upon the cross vector and Z-axis; and
calculating a combined rotation matrix based upon the viewing direction,
wherein the flattened unconnected route segment does not intersect the 3D backshell component.