LT Unlimited

Bring Text and Dimensions to Front

I like to think I usually have a pretty good idea of when a certain feature or command was added to AutoCAD LT. But I was surprised to realize that today's tip has been around since as far back as AutoCAD LT 2005. Now I've learned my something new for the day!

Anyway, this under-the-radar command is TEXTTOFRONT, and while it's under the Draw Order item on the Tools menu, it's not on any default toolbars or ribbon panels.

Its purpose is simple: to grab all text objects and/or dimension objects in your drawing and bring them in front of all other geometry. If you plot with "lines overwrite" turned on, this provides a quick and easy way to make sure none of your annotations get obscured by other lines.

(And if you're curious how I managed to track down the introduction date of this command, check out the excellent AutoCAD Command Reference at HyperPics.)

Set Linetype for Dimension Extension Lines

Even though dimensions are created as a single object, you can control the properties of individual elements separately from the whole. For example, you can set the text to be a different color from the lines and arrows:

You can even set the extension lines to be a different color from the dimension line:

But a relatively new feature (since AutoCAD LT 2008) is the ability to set a different linetype for the extension lines as well. They don't even have to be the same linetype:

These properties can either be set for the entire dimension style in the Dimension Style manager, or for individual dimensions in the Properties palette.

Got some spare time? Watch a webcast!

If you're a long-time blog reader, you've probably seen my announcements for various AutoCAD LT-related webcasts. Watching them live is great, but what if you missed one, or thought one was so good you want to tell all your friends about it? (You do tell your friends about them, right? Right?)

Fortunately, all past AutoCAD LT webcasts were recorded and archived for easy repeat viewing. You can find them on the Training tab of the AutoCAD LT home page. There have been seven so far -- that's almost a whole day's worth of tips, tricks, and info available on-demand, to watch at your convenience.

AUGI CAD Camps are coming!

The AUGI CAD Camps are back, and with 25 cities on the tour schedule so far, the odds are good that there will be one near you! Here's the list as it stands now:

February San Francisco, CA Los Angeles, CA San Diego, CA March Austin, TX Dallas, TX Seattle, WA April Spokane, WA Atlanta, GA Lansing, MI

May Wilmington, DE Las Vegas, NV Phoenix, AZ June Jacksonville, FL Orlando, FL Honolulu, HI September Jefferson City, MO Nashville, TN

October Cincinnati, OH Waukegan, IL Boston, MA Omaha, NE Denver, CO Salt Lake City, UT November Minneapolis, MN Canton, OH Arlington, VA Greensboro, NC Rochester, NY New York, NY

Registration is open now for San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego -- go to http://www.augievents.com/ for details & to sign up. More details will be available for the other dates & locations as they get closer.

Plot Stamp from Fields

A plot stamp function has been around as part of the AutoCAD LT plotting process for a long time, but its usefulness is limited by the fact that it doesn't change its size or location for different sized plots and titleblocks or borders.

Instead, I recommend creating your own plot stamp from a simple mtext object populated with fields. That way, the size and location is always consistent, whether you're plotting full size, half size, or even scale to fit.

Let's say that I want my plot stamp to include the drawing name and path, the last plot time, the user who plotted it, and the plot scale.

The first step is to start the mtext command, pick the corners, and right-click to access the edit field command.

My first field is the drawing name, which I can find under the "Document" category. I can choose the case of the field (upper/lower/sentence), and whether to show just the path, just the file name, or both, with or without the DWG extension.

Next up is plot date, which is under the "Date & Time" category. There are tons of formatting options here -- far too many to explain in a blog post, but I'm sure you get the idea.

It shows up as dashes right now, since I haven't plotted the drawing since I created the field.

For user name and plot scale I'll go to the "Plot" category.

Add some explanatory labels to the fields, and I'm done.

I plotted the drawing (you'll have to take my word for it) so that you can see what the date/time field looks like.

(Click on any of the actual plot stamp images to see them full size -- it'll be easier to read the text that way.)

Display Plot Styles in Layouts

For today's tip I'm borrowing one from yesterday's Plotting & Publishing webcast that I almost forgot to mention. (Maybe if I post it here I'll remember it better for next time.)

Ever open a drawing and discover that the layout is black & white, even though the layers are not?

What's going on is that the current page setup is set to Display Plot Styles -- sort of a pre-plot-preview. To turn this off, go to the Page Setup Manager...

...Modify the current page setup...

...and uncheck the "Display Plot Styles" box.

When you go back into the drawing, you'll see your regular layer colors again.

Missed the webcast? It'll be up soon on the Training tab of the AutoCAD LT home page, along with all the other previous webcasts.

AutoCAD LT and 3ds Max Webcast today!

Not sure if I've got any design visualization readers here at LT Unlimited, but if you're out there, you may be interested in a webcast I'm helping out with later today (sorry for the short notice):

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Design Vis Series: AutoCAD LT to 3D with Autodesk 3ds Max Design

Autodesk® 3ds Max® Design is the perfect companion to your AutoCAD® LT workflow, particularly for small firms, giving you the ability to link your design from LT directly into 3ds Max Design to enhance and create stunning visualizations.

Join Autodesk Design Visualization Expert, Eddie Perlberg, to learn more about how to optimize and visualize your LT designs!

January 13, 2010, 10:00 Pacific (1:00 Eastern)

Register here.

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It's not an LT webcast (that's Thursday), but it'll be about using LT to make 3D images. If you're into design visualization, it should be pretty interesting!

Drawing Units for Input and Display

Ever tried to enter a feet-and-inches distance in a drawing and received the message "Point or option keyword required?" You probably thought, "Hey, I did enter a point!"

Don't worry, AutoCAD LT's not broken -- it's just not using the same units you are.

To check what you're using, head to the Drawing Units dialog. You can find it on the Application menu under Drawing Utilities, or by typing UNITS at the command line. I've talked about this dialog before, but I wanted to come back to how display settings affect input options.

The "Type" setting controls what AutoCAD LT will display and accept as valid units.

Depending on which display format is current, only some input formats are accepted. Architectural and Engineering accept numbers input in any format, but Decimal, Fractional, and Scientific only accept numbers in one of those three formats (i.e. nothing with a foot or inch mark will be recognized).

The other unique thing about Architectural and Engineering units is that their base unit is the inch. If you draw a line by typing 1'-6" for the length and then use the Distance command on it, it will display 18". For all other formats, the base unit can be whatever you want, from nanometers to light years.

Looking for focus groups participants

Interested in helping to shape the future of Autodesk products? See the announcement below from our research team:

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Are you an Autodesk software user in Boston, Toronto or Portland (Oregon)? If so Autodesk wants your input on improving its products at a focus group or visit to your location. If you’re selected to attend you’ll receive an iPod Nano 8GB.

Research will be conducted in late January/early February. Focus groups will be conducted in a downtown hotel in each city at approximately 6:30pm – 8pm on a weekday evening. Customer visits will be conducted in the day time and will last approximately 1 hour.

If you’re interested in participating and helping us improve Autodesk software let us know by completing this form.

New year, new webcast

The AutoCAD LT 2010 Webcast Series continues next week with an entire hour dedicated to plotting & publishing. There's so much to talk about, I have a feeling it'll be hard to keep it to just an hour! Don't have LT 2010 yet? That's okay -- just about everything applies several versions back.

<edit> Might help if I included actual date and time info...

Thursday, January 14th, 10:00 am Pacific

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Topics covered will include:

• Plotting single drawings
• Publishing multi-drawing sets
• Output format options
• Controlling colors and lineweights
• Page setups and layouts

What better way to start the new year than with a little new knowledge? (Of course, if you're reading this, you're already ready to learn.)

Register today, and I'll see you next week!