Wipeouts and Annotative Text

I recently tried to add a wipeout to a bit of annotative DTEXT, and discovered that these two things don’t play well together in AutoCAD 2008. Basically, the text just disappears. So what do you do if you want to display some masked task at one particular scale? It’s easy.

LTSCALE and PSLTSCALE

One of my biggest gripes with PSLTSCALE is that it can make working in model space a pain. I like to see what my linetypes are going to look like when they plot, and with PSLTSCALE set to 1, you need to have LTSCALE set to 1 (generally) rather than the scale of your viewports. Of course, if you have multiple viewports at different scales, you generally need to have both PSLTSCALE and LTSCALE set to 1.

Annotative scales to the rescue.

Automatically Purge Scale List

Tired of seeing all of those xref’d scales showing up in your scale list?  Never use ‘em?  Here’s a little AutoLisp routine you can use to automatically purge the list upon opening a drawing.

Non-Xref Layer Filter

Ever since AutoCAD 2000, we’ve had the ability to filter our layer manager and layer toolbar views. One thing that I always found myself doing is adding a filter which shows only non-xref layers. It’s easy enough to create one (just use ~*|* as a name filter), but I wanted something faster, so I wrote a VBA script to add the filter.

It’s a simple thing, but it saves me a lot of time. Here’s how you can use this script.

Blog roundup

Looks like I got a little busy (napping) over the holidays, so I’ve let the blog roundup slide.  Well, here are a few highlights:

• Ellen Finkelstein elucidates methods for copying objects between drawings.
• LuAnn Sims leaves a few tips on the little things.
• and Heidi Hewett has some valuable information regarding mouse zooming.

Sheet Sets, Titleblocks, and Fields

I recently discovered the power of using Sheet Sets with Fields in AutoCAD 2008. We have a project that requires us to use sequentially numbered sheets. The client also requires us to use those sheet numbers when referencing between drawings. Since we are still developing the set and may have to insert drawings into the sequence, we may have to renumber many of the sheets, so the dynamic nature of Fields will come in handy.

Overlays vs. Attachements Best Practices

I added a section on Xref Overlays versus Attachments to the Best Practices guide.

Classic Xref

Since AutoCAD 2007, the Xref Manager has changed from this:

to this:

Personally, I prefer the old-school version, for two reasons. One, it loads faster, and two, it is easier to change an xref from Attachment to Overlay.

AutoCAD Blog Roundup

CAD Digest offers a number of new pointers to various tips around the web:

• Erhan Toker gives us a tip on how to use Polar Tracking.
• Ellen Finkelstein espouses on the benefits of using Layer States.
• Burak ÖzdemIr shows us the great TCASE command.
• Ward Romberger tells us how to delete duplicates with OVERKILL.
• Eren Pala explains how to rein in an annoying UCS Icon.

And R.K. McSwain has an excellent bit on the different kinds of Polylines.

Best Practices: Object Snaps

I put up a section on Object Snaps in the Best Practices guide.