First Impressions

[Plankton]

I've been using Simplify3D for a few weeks now, the main selling point for me was the ability to apply settings to parts of a model, or to individual models on a build plate, this works brilliantly, however listed below are a few things I think work less well.

PROFILES
There are 3 classes of profile settings you need to save independently of each other:
1. Printer specific settings - eg, number and type of extruders, dimension of build area, starting/ending scripts, etc
2. Filament specific settings - filament diameter, temperatures, extrusion multiplier - many people use a separate profile for each reel of filament
3. 3D object specific settings - layer height, speeds, infill, etc
Whilst I agree that version 3.0 introduced improvements, it still hasn't caught up with Slic3r in terms of profiles.

Firstly they could be named more clearly, to reflect the 3 categories above.
Then the filament profile currently only modifies temps and cooling, why doesn't it modify filament diameter and extrusion multiplier?
Add a comments section in each profile (so we can document why specific settings were chosen)
Stop saving the profile settings to REGISTRY! - many users have more than one computer, and need to synch their profile settings so that (for example) when they travel with the printer their laptop has the same profile settings as their home PC. With Slic3r I can do this by keeping the program (or at least the directory where it saves its settings) on OneDrive, no interaction required, the synch happens seamlessly. With S3D the only way to do this seems to be to manually export profile settings and import on your other machine - not a seamless experience!

DOCUMENTATION
Can we have a wiki, or other document that lists precisely what each setting modifies?
So for instance, this morning I was looking at "solid infill underspeed", and trying to work out if that applies to just the top and bottom layer (as the tool-tip says), or to all solid layers (as the name implies), and does "first layer speed" over ride this, or do the 2 settings get added? There are many other settings where the meaning is similarly ambiguous, and good documentation should be another of the areas where a paid for program can differentiate itself from the open source community.

BRIDGING
Finally for now (and probably another example of the documentation shortcomings), but why on earth do we have a bridge setting "unsupported area threshold"?
A bridge is an unsupported linear stretch of filament, how does "bridge area" affect how well a filament stretches between 2 points? Surely the relevant parameter should be "unsupported length threshold"?

[ovidiu]

+1 for Documentation (lack of)

[KC_703]

Many of the parameters you list are configurable as presets with the "auto-configure" Quality or Material sub-profiles. Export an existing FFF that you've setup and take a look at the autoconfigureXXXXX parameters.

For instance:
autoconfigureMaterial modifies/presets: nozzle diameter, extrusion multiplier, retraction, temp & cooling
autoconfigureQuality modifies/presets: Layer Height, top/bottom solid layers, skirt/brim (possibly raft), Print Speeds

Sample attached from a custom FFF I've been experimenting with...

Sample AutoConfigure Quality and Material.txt

Sample expanded XML tags for autoconfigure Qaulity & Material

(2.64 KiB) Downloaded 229 times

Ovidiu had an insight into enhancing the UI through highlighting the parameter overrides, which would be nice... but I think the issue is that all the parameters can be overridden, and adding code to the software to highlight could be cumbersome.

+1 on the documentation... but then again if all the tags can be added... maybe a distinction between <globalXXXX> tags.