With each yearly release, I like to review the published “What’s New in Inventor” list within Inventor Help. But many of my colleagues prefer to get right into the Inventor software to discover for themselves what has changed. In general, they focus on the features and tools that they use on a regular basis, to investigate if they have changed or not. Personally, I like to read the release notes to find any New tools that I can use, which I may not easily find by navigating the software interface alone.
A great example of this was in 2022 when Instance Properties were added. They weren’t something that would have jumped out at you by simply using the software. If you still don’t know what these are, you can read my blog (A Closer Look at Autodesk Inventor Instance Properties). With the release of 2024, small changes have been added which are easy to miss if you don’t read the “What’s New in Inventor 2024” list. This blog covers five new changes that I found very useful.
1. It is now possible to assign a Hardness unit to a user parameter using the Unit Type dialog box, as shown below. These units previously were not available in the list. To open the dialog box, simply double-click on the unit you would like to modify. Locate and select the unit and click OK.
Hint… These units were added in support of the Finish feature that assign heat treatments to faces. You shouldn’t miss this one as it is a new command on the Modify panel (
). Even if you don’t use the Finish feature and have your own Hardness user parameter, you can assign these units.
2. A new Sheet Name parameter has been added to the Sheet Properties type, as shown below. This now allows you to incorporate the name of your sheet when you add text in a drawing. Previously, a sheet’s name was not controlled by a parameter, and you would have had to use static text if you wanted to incorporate the sheet name in drawing text.
3. It is now much easier to identify whether you have assigned a filter to a parts list simply by looking at its icon in the Model browser or the icon in the heading of the Parts List dialog box (when editing a parts list). Parts lists that contain no filtering display the 
icon, whereas Parts Lists with filters, display the 
icon.
4. If you are like me and you like shortcuts, Inventor 2024 now has the letter “J” assigned to the Joint command. Previously “C” was assigned for Constraint, but the Joint command wasn’t assigned a default shortcut.
5. Lastly, and definitely my favorite, is that you can now edit a Section View, if it was saved in a Design View. The workflow for Section Views has also been updated (check out my blog on this), but just by looking at the new interface you might not be able to figure out that you can modify a section. To do this, you have to right-click on the Design View in which it is stored, as shown below. Once you select Edit, the mini-toolbar that you used to create it becomes available for you to make your changes. Another nice option is that you can suppress the Section view as well.
I hope these are helpful for you!
About the Author
Follow on Linkedin More Content by Jennifer MacMillan
