The Timeline#

Overview#

The timeline is the strip of icons along the bottom of the Design workspace. Each icon is one recorded operation: a sketch, an extrude, a fillet, a joint, a pattern, a move. Fusion plays them left to right to build the current model. The left-most entry happened first.

Understanding the timeline is the key to everything else in parametric work, because it answers three questions: what created this geometry, what depends on what, and what happens if I change something early.

The timeline stores:

• Features such as Sketch, Extrude, Revolve, Fillet, Hole, Pattern.
• Construction items such as planes, axes and points.
• Component operations and assembly relationships such as New Component, Joint and Move/Copy.
• Groups you create to organize entries.
• The Timeline Marker: the marker that moves along the timeline and shows the design at that point.

The timeline exists only when design history is captured (see Parametric vs. Direct Modeling). It belongs to the design as a whole; when you activate a component in the Browser, the timeline filters to show only the features that create or modify geometry in that component.

Where to find it#

• Along the bottom of the canvas in the Design workspace. Playback buttons sit to its left (Move to Beginning, Previous Step, Play, Next Step, Move to End) and an Options (settings) button sits on its right.
• The timeline exists only in Parametric Modeling Mode. In Direct Modeling Mode Fusion does not track features. Use Options > Change to Direct Modeling Mode to switch that way; see Parametric vs. Direct Modeling for the reverse.
• The Browser lists bodies, sketches and construction objects under their components, but order lives only in the timeline. Right-click a feature and choose Find in Browser to highlight its Browser entries with dashed lines.
• Right-click a feature to see commands such as Edit Feature, Rename, Suppress Features / Unsuppress Features, Create Group and Create Selection Set (Autodesk's Use the Timeline page). Hold Ctrl (Command on macOS) to select several features.

Step by step#

Read the timeline#

1. Open any design with several features.
2. Click Move to Beginning, then Play, or click Next Step repeatedly, to step through each feature and watch the model build.
3. Notice that sketches sit immediately before the feature that consumes them.
4. Click Move to End. The Timeline Marker returns to the right end; the next page covers rolling back in depth.

Rename entries#

1. Right-click the feature, choose Rename, type the new name and press Enter.
2. Use names that describe intent: "Base profile", "Mounting holes", "Lid lip". Names appear in error messages later.

Reorder entries#

1. Drag a feature left or right. If a feature depends on an earlier one, Autodesk's help says you cannot move it before the feature it depends on (for example a fillet cannot move before the box it fillets).
2. Reordering fixes errors. Autodesk's own example: a Fillet added after a Shell loses the solid edge; dragging the Fillet before the Shell fixes it.
3. Reordering is also useful for moving a fillet before a pattern so the pattern copies the fillet.

Tip: Dependency decides what can move. A fillet cannot go before the extrude that makes its edges. Sketches can usually move earlier if their plane or references still exist.

Group entries#

1. Hold Ctrl (Command on macOS) and select the features.
2. Right-click the selection and choose Create Group. A Plus button appears in the timeline; click it to expand the group and the Minus button to collapse it.
3. Right-click the group and choose Rename (for example "Housing shell").
4. To remove a group, right-click it and choose Edit Group, then choose Delete (deletes the group and its contents) or Expand (deletes only the group and leaves its features in the timeline).
5. Group icons show suppression status: Group Unsuppressed, Group Suppressed, or Group Mixed Suppression.

To select several different features or components at once, use Create Selection Set; it adds a Selection Sets folder to the Browser with Select and Update buttons.

Suppress and unsuppress#

1. Right-click a feature and choose Suppress Features.
2. The feature and all features that depend on it are suppressed: they are not displayed in the canvas and are dimmed in the timeline.
3. Right-click and choose Unsuppress Features to bring them back. Suppress is the non-destructive alternative to Delete, and Configurations can also control suppression (see the Configurations page).

Delete#

1. Select the feature, press Del (or right-click > Delete).
2. Features that depend on it may break. Undo with Ctrl+Z if the result is unexpected, and prefer Suppress when you only want to test.

Compute All#

Use Modify > Compute All or press Ctrl+B to compute all parameters, features and assembly relationships. Fusion normally computes automatically as you edit; Autodesk recommends Compute All after editing upstream features, especially after deleting or significantly changing geometry that later features reference, and before saving to validate the design. If something cannot compute, a yellow warning or red error highlights the feature in the timeline; right-click it and choose Review Warning.

Options reference#

Tips and pitfalls#

Tip: Name features as you create them. Debugging a timeline of 120 entries called "Extrude47" is miserable.

Tip: Group by design stage, for example "Base body", "Shell and ribs", "Fasteners", "Fillets". It makes the whole model read like a table of contents.

Tip: Put cosmetic fillets and chamfers late in the timeline. They are the most fragile features because they reference edges that change when upstream geometry changes.

Warning: The timeline is linear. If you create a component, then later insert a feature earlier in the timeline that references it, you can hit ordering errors. Plan top-level skeletons first.

Warning: Very long timelines (hundreds of features) slow rebuilds. Consolidate: one sketch with several profiles feeding one extrude is cheaper than ten sketch-extrude pairs.

Things the timeline does not do:

• It does not record every click. Only completed features appear. Cancelling a dialog leaves nothing.
• It is not version control. To return to a previous save, use the History dialog (see Autodesk's View design history page), not the timeline.
• It does not store sketch internals; those live inside each Sketch entry. Editing the sketch opens them.

Reading dependencies#

Autodesk's help does not describe a dependency graph viewer, but you can infer dependencies:

• Try to drag the feature left. If it blocks, something depends on its position.
• Suppress it temporarily and see which later entries show errors.

Working with long timelines#

Cost model. Fusion replays the timeline from the first affected feature to the end. A design with 120 features and a change to the first sketch recomputes all 120; a change to feature 110 recomputes 10. Put the features that change most often late, and features that rarely change early. If you change the base sketch daily and the fillets weekly, the fillets belong at the end so edits to them are cheap.

Moving through a long timeline. Jumping the marker to the end of a large file recomputes the features it passes. Expect a delay on large files and save first.

Groups in practice#

A group is a collapsible bundle of features. Typical groups for a 40-feature enclosure: "Datums" (4 planes), "Base body" (sketch, extrude, shell), "Lid lip" (3), "Bosses" (sketch, extrude, pattern, holes), "Fillets" (6). The group shows a single suppression status icon (unsuppressed, suppressed or mixed) and can be expanded or deleted from Edit Group. Grouping makes a long timeline easier to read.

Rules that save trouble:

1. Do not insert entries into the middle of a group while rolled back unless you intend to add to it.
2. Name groups after intent, not content ("Mounting" not "Group3").

Reordering with dependencies#

Features can move left only as far as their inputs allow. A fillet cannot go before the extrude that makes its edge; a sketch on a plane can move before the feature that made the plane only if the plane is also moved. When a drag is refused, read why: the feature depends on something to its left. To reorder anyway, roll back, recreate the feature at the earlier point and delete the original.

Example: Pattern1 repeats Hole1, and Fillet1 on the hole edges is to the right of the pattern. To have the pattern copy the fillet you would need the fillet before the pattern. Dragging Pattern1 right of Fillet1 fails because the pattern's source is Hole1 only. The reliable method is to roll back to Hole1, create the fillet there, and then recreate the pattern with both features as sources.

Suppress as a diagnostic#

Suppress a feature and watch which later entries break; this shows the dependent chain without deleting anything. A common finding: one early hole is referenced by eight later features. Document this in the group name or the version note.

Cleaning up#

Before sharing, do a pass from left to right: rename generic entries, remove dead sketches (hidden, unused), collapse groups, move the marker to the end, and check for yellow or red icons.

Failure modes and fixes#

Practice exercise#

Build a timeline you would be happy to hand to a colleague, and learn its dependencies.

1. Build an enclosure with 20 or more entries: three datum planes, base sketch, extrude, shell (2 mm), lid lip, four screw bosses (sketch, extrude, circular pattern of 4), four holes, and a fillet pass.
2. Rename every entry. Hold Ctrl to multi-select and group them into "Datums", "Base", "Lid lip", "Bosses" and "Fillets".
3. Suppress the Bosses group. Which later entries fail? Unsuppress. Write down the dependency.
4. Suppress the Datums group and note the cascade. Unsuppress.
5. Try to drag the Fillets group before the Bosses group and record what the tool says.
6. Edit the first sketch to change the width by 10 mm and note how long the rebuild takes; then edit the last fillet and compare.
7. Move the cosmetic fillets to the end if they are not already, and consolidate any sketches that feed a single extrude.
8. Run Compute All and verify there are no warnings. Save a version note describing the groups.

Expected result: a tidy, collapsible timeline with named groups, a written dependency note and a measured sense of rebuild cost.

Related#

• Rollback and editing features
• Timeline errors
• Design-for-change patterns