As an aside, to some extent you can already set your scale in a round-about way: All the size inputs accept math. So, if you have a 100cm x100cm design, you can just put in 100/10 for your object dims and you'll get the scale conversion. Do this on all your base elements (the size of your piece, mostly) and then just put in a HUGE warning that the item is 1/10 scale (I usually do this with huge text converted to paths and then turned into guides. Haven't had a print malfunction yet due to scale.

Speaking of "CAD design software", for a while I worked at a large architectural office. They used AutoCad which—although you could pick a scale for document print-out—designed everything, including skyscrapers, at FULL SIZE.

Wow.. get a coffee... I am not talking about infinite numbers of artboards at all.. I don't care about them.. this topic is to remove the canvas size limit... I think you are posting in the wrong board!!!
Also.. Infinite number of artboards is pretty stupid in my opinion.. way too much to go wrong!.

Bill,
I work in interior / office decoration and design and I work 100% all the time, especially in elevations.
I understand scales and why you think everyone should know about it. What I fail to understand is why you have to be a jerk about it. I too work for one of the "top" companies in my field and I really would love to be able to work at 100% in Illustrator.
Instead of having to work in scale export to 100% only to see paths dont connect and other irregularities that happen when scaling up. (which happen all the time even from the best architects, who are notoriously bad at forgetting minor details)
And I have seen 10s-100's million dollar projects go **** up because of this exact issue, so please stop with the ego stroking and realize that infinite artboards would make a lot of peoples jobs easier.

Thanks

Also Bill.. any moron knows that for the industry you are talking about you use read CAD design software not Illustrator.. Wake up and stop TROLLING!!!

Bill.. deal with it.. we want 1:1.
if you don't like it.. turn away.. you have no need.. we do..
also.. you should not be publishing NON PUBLIC Adobe documentation.
You should be removed from the Adobe prerelease group!!!
READ THIS!!! or do you just not care!!! you must be better than the rest of us because you can use a scale in you documents..

The information discussed within the program is confidential. Your participation and your knowledge of this information cannot be shared outside of the people in this group per your acceptance of the Prerelease Agreement.

Architects and engineers work in scale all the time for 10s-100s million dollar projects. However, its much is harder to get that degree then graphic design. Scaling is used by most industries from signs to skyscrapers. Most graphic design degrees don't cover the industrial design aspects needed for reproducing real-life products. Industrial design aspects should be mandatory for any design degree. However, schools give you the stamp of approval learning not much more than designs for the web or small print. I've seen it time and time again, over-confident people getting into a design position for a sign company only to get humbled when they really don't know how all the pieces fit together from start to finish. Canvas size limitations are harder to grasp because they never had to scale to produce something that needs to be handed down to people to build.

Say I'm working on a half million dollar pylon, I work in scale. That scale-able design then goes to many different outlets to a final product. From the engineers, to cad drawers, to the hands of the metal workers, city permits, all the to install...

There seems to be a bunch of people bewildered by the canvas limitations, probably just a standard graphic designer without knowledge of real-life applications. Why would anyone work at 1:1 for industrial design? Yes, little billboards and banners are a form of industrial design.

Designing for the web? The canvas is plenty big enough.
Designing for real-life applications? Scaling is used by all industries. don't fight the way it is because you don't grasp that concept or you didn't learn industry standards.

For those messing up prints because you forgot to scale should place checks and protocols to avoid simple mistakes. Not only to check scale but to check for other common errors that will mess up a print. You can set presets in any RIP to automate scales.

FYI, infinite canvas' is currently on Adobes roadmap. But there is rarely a need for it for any industrial design project (shirts, signs, billboards, etc.) Maybe the people that put all the eggs in one artboard will be happy? Sorry for when that file ever goes corrupt.

Here is the current projects Adobe is working on for Illustrator: https://us.v-cdn.net/6027299/uploads/editor/l7/7ddcjnx7zgsx.png

Sorry Bill…agreed

Sorry Bill but you do not represent the majority of people asking for this..
When you realize you just sent a file to print and forgot to set scale or something went wrong because of virtual scaling and you now have tens of thousands of dollars in rework.. Don't tell my I should have done my job correct..
Illustrator is a proprietary format... its not PDF.. We should NOT have to work in scale.. there should be no scale limit.. If Adobe wants to embed some sort of internal scaling system that they use behind the scenes that will never give us a bad scaled output then thats fine.. Until then, we need 1:1 scaling.. I need a 20 foot banner and I expect I can have this.. PDF standard does NOT have this limit.. in other applications.. I can send a 20 foot pdf file to have print.. Illustrator cannot.. It needs to conform to todays standards not hold on to 1990 legacy working code..

Illustrator is a professional tool and their marketing team does a good job masking that to gain more monthly subscriptions. To please the majority and casual users, Adobe really needs an offspring and call it Illustrator Elements, just like its sister programs Photoshop (Elements,) and Premiere (Elements.)

Artboards is where rookies and experts are separated, in most cases the successful to the non-successful. Complaining about scaling you are simply refusing to learn something simple. Complaining about it not working with a vector/raster mix, you obviously need to learn how to handle raster files in a vector environment. Understanding how vector environments are you should understand everything is already a virtual scale, even your beloved Affinity and Corel. Bouncing between programs to deal with your lack of knowledge is a terrible workflow, but continue on while others are knocking out more jobs. More jobs = more money.

Illustrator should implement a virtual scale, and this will likely be what they will do to please the complainers. To increase workflow professionals use the Hotdoor CAD tools plugin, its easy to use but you need at least some basic knowledge of architecture/engineering. The plugin is great and all but it would be nice to have it built into the program. It would be great to see it implemented in future releases.

Before you complain about your billboard won't fit. It does fit, plugin or not, and the file is still lossless. I do work for the largest billboard/sign company in the Western USA, we don't complain as we understand a vector environment.

Those who put 100 designs in one file and complaining you can't get 101 designs in that same file... I'm sorry for the chicken's eggs you put into one basket.

See screenshot. Check Size.
5-6 - 13-14 alone what about the rest of the sizes.
This is a big problem for Illustrator

'Scale your designs to 10%' - I very nearly hit the 'flag as inappropriate' button. Have you not read any of the comments!? This used to be a feature in Illustrator years ago, when Illustrator was great.

I'll bet it's one of their do-nothing engineers coming up with these b.s. "just scale" comments.

"Just Scale your designs to 10%" .
WOW.. Ill put this simply....

NO! - Fix the program!

"Just Scale your designs to 10%" .
It's not so simple, if your 9,5 m billboard contains both, bitmaps and vectors and you need to keep desired resolution in the resulting pdf.

Scale? no way. I'm in the clothing industry and you can imagine laying all sizes of jersey's / tees plus shorts on 1 document. From x-small to 5 x large. 1:1. why scale? illustrator doesn't stand a chance unless they fix this issue.
Don't get me wrong i'm a huge Illustrator fan. Still work with it at home. A 20 000mm X 20 000mm is our standard working area at work. Can't believe they haven't fix the issue yet!

Chill guys!! Just Scale your designs to 10% and Enjoy!

Chill guys, Just Scale your designs to 10% and enjoy.

Affinity Designer. The circle has diameter 11 km. Artboard — 20x20 km.

I’m not sure how you figure this is only an issue for 1% of the user base when there’s no real data to show that and is based mostly on conjecture. That aside I believe that the reason big things like the canvas size and performance issues, such as only running on one cpu core, will require a complete rewrite of the software. I do agree that they need to do the rewrite because Affinity is actually gaining a lot of ground and with Corel on both Mac and PC now they’re going to see more and more leaving the platform. If they fail to make changes to the core structure, instead of adding features that only slow down the software, then they are only going to end up like Quarck did.