2012

Glossary
Glossary of technical terms relating to Autodesk Navisworks Freedom 2012.
Display Terminology
average frame rate This shows the current measured frame rate, averaged over the last second.
average frame time This shows the time taken to render the last frame.
average triangle rate This shows the rate at which triangles are being rendered and is a
measure of how well your graphics card is working.
culling Culling is a process for determining items not to draw during the render of a scene.
Autodesk Navisworks does a level of prioritized culling with the drop-out (page 305) method
of rendering interactive scenes, but you have a certain level of control over other aspects of
culling such as backface, near and far planes.
drop-out In order to maintain interactivity and guarantee a user-defined
frame rate (page
305), Autodesk Navisworks only renders what it can in the fraction of a second it has. The
remainder is “dropped out”, or not rendered.
Autodesk Navisworks prioritizes what is rendered and what is dropped out based on size of
the item's bounding box, distance from viewer and size on screen, so only the less significant
items in the scene are dropped out.
Once navigation has ceased, the scene continues rendering until all items are visible.
frame rate The frame rate is the number of frames per second (FPS) that are rendered in the
main navigation window. Autodesk Navisworks guarantees a user-defined frame rate in order
to maintain interactivity.
File Terminology
published data files (NWD) Published NWD files are useful when wanting to take a snapshot
of the model at a certain time. All the geometry and review information is saved into the
NWD file and cannot then be changed. Published NWD files can also contain information
about the file, as well as being able to be password protected and time-bombed for security.
These files are also very small, compressing the CAD data by up to 80% of the original size.
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