AboutCAD: 10/04/11

Grip Options on the AutoCAD 2012 Platform

In this Click Saver article, I want to talk about some really nice enhancements in 2012 using grips. In the past, when using grips, a lot of the options were done through the right-click; but, starting in the 2012 release, hovering over the grip gives us new abilities.

The first one to look at is using grips on a line. Select the line and move the pointer over the grip at the end of the line, but don’t pick it. If you click it, you will activate stretch command. By hovering over the grip, you will see a pop up menu with the option of lengthen. So, how is lengthen different than stretch? Lengthen locks the angle that the line was originally drawn at. You can also choose lengthen by picking the grip and then pressing the [CTRL] key on your keyboard to cycle between the commands.

Another click-saving feature that was slipped in is using grips on dimensions. By hovering over the dimension arrow you can quickly continue the dimension, create baseline dimension, or even flip the arrowhead.

Now, you can consider how this might help you with other objects in AutoCAD such as arcs, polylines, multi-leader, multiple-sided viewports and more.

How to: Publish AutoCAD layouts to multiple pdf file with single sheet

Do you use publish command to plot several AutoCAD layouts to PDF/DWF format? The default setting will allow you to get single file, with multiple pages.

What if you want to get multiple files, with one sheet in each PDF/DWF file?

You can change it in publish dialog. Click publish option.

In publish option dialog, change type in general DWF/PDF options to single-sheet file.

In this example, I have 4 sheets to plot. I will get 4 PDFs instead of one PDF with 4 pages.

RELATED POSTS

Squeeze or stretch single-line text to fit in a space with TEXTFIT

The TEXTFIT command lets you easily squeeze or stretch existing single-line text (TEXT or DTEXT) so you can fit it into a defined space, such as a title block. TEXTFIT doesn’t work with multi-line text (MTEXT). When you start the command, you select the single-line text and TEXTFIT puts a drag-line under the text. Just pick the desired endpoint and you’re done. If you want to change the start point of the text, use the Start Point option, pick a start point and then an end point.

TEXTFIT works with existing text, but you can fit single-line text into a space when you create it, using the Align or Fit Justify options. Here are the steps:

Start the TEXT command. At the Specify start point of text or [Justify/Style]: prompt, type j and press Enter. At the Enter an option. [Align/Fit/Center/Middle/Right/TL/TC/TR/ML/MC/MR/BL/BC/BR]: prompt, type a for the Align option or f for the Fit option and press Enter. At the Specify first endpoint of text baseline: prompt, specify a start point for the text. At the Specify second endpoint of text baseline: prompt, specify an endpoint. You may want to turn on Ortho before specifying the endpoint. If you chose the Fit option, it asks you to specify a height. This option maintains that height, distorting the letters if necessary. The Align option changes the height of the text to maintain the proportion of the letters. Type your text and press Enter twice to end the command.

Thanks to Tommy Holden for the part of this tip relating to TEXTFIT.

RELATED POSTS

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Grip Options on the AutoCAD 2012 Platform

How to: Publish AutoCAD layouts to multiple pdf file with single sheet

Squeeze or stretch single-line text to fit in a space with TEXTFIT