For the purpose of this section we will consider cabinet parts to be those parts that do not have their own Editor. These include top, deck, sides, back and toe kick plate. The outside frame of the face frame also behaves like a cabinet part but we cover that in detail in the face frame discussion so we will not deal with it here.
Cabinet parts, as defined above, are controlled by Construction Settings. Parameters that define these parts are stored in the Construction Settings area and you modify those parts by modifying the parameters.
Some of the things you can modify are the material they are made from, their size with respect to the cabinet, the joinery and overlap between parts, in some cases their position, such as insetting a back. You can also indicate whether the part exists at all on this cabinet.
Probably the best way to learn this is to load the Std Base Frameless from the Standard Cabinets directory and then go to Construction Settings, make changes and see what happens.
There are a couple of ways to get to Construction Settings and a neat shortcut that can save time once you learn it.
You can launch Construction Settings using the icon in the toolbar or you can right click and select Construction Settings. Once you get to Construction Settings you click on the tab for the part you want to work with. The neat shortcut is that if you right click on a cabinet part and then select Construction Settings it will automatically take you to the area for the part that you clicked on. You don’t have to click on the tab. OK it doesn’t save a lot of time but every little bit helps.