Monthly Archives: August 2011

Disable Viewport Activation

Posted on August 29, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

While working in paper-space, you may be wanting to simply move things around. The trouble sometimes is  accidentally activating an unlocked viewport and messing up the correct position or scale of the that viewport. In a perfect world, the viewport should be locked … Continue reading →

Posted in Customization, Layers, Modifying, Paper Space, Text, TIPS, Viewports | 2 Comments

Select Individual Polyline Segment

Posted on August 29, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

Here’s a useful quickie: You can select individual segments of a PolyLine and then edit the segments by simply holding the CTRL button and then individually picking the segments. In the example below, I selected the individual segments and then … Continue reading →

Posted in Modifying, Polylines | 5 Comments

AutoLISP: Swap Text & Attributes

Posted on August 24, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

Here is a good quickie that lets you swap text objects – even Attributes that are within the same block and even attributes within different blocks. (Note: the “swapping” of attributes is actually only swapping the “value” of the and … Continue reading →

Posted in Attributes, AutoLISP, Modifying, Text | Leave a comment

AutoLISP: Background Text Mask (Mtext Only)

Posted on August 19, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

Here is a quick way to turn on the text background to MTEXT. (Note: this routine works with MTEXT only.) Click here to see how to add Background Text Mask to Dimensions and MLeaders as this routine does not allow … Continue reading →

Posted in AutoLISP, Modifying, Text | 3 Comments

How to Exit Text

Posted on August 18, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

You may know that after you finish editing or entering MTEXT, all you need to do to exit the MTEXT is to click outside of it. But if you do that when working with DTEXT (Single Line text) you will … Continue reading →

Posted in BASICS, Text | 9 Comments

Tab Through OSNAPS

Posted on August 17, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

Depending on what OSNAPS you currently have turned on, you can simply cycle through them without having to move your cursor over the exact snap that you need. (This is really helpful in your drawing is cluttered and you want … Continue reading →

Posted in BASICS, TIPS | Leave a comment

Use TRIM to Extend

Posted on August 16, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

Let’s face it – we use the TRIM command a lot and we rarely use the EXTEND command. In fact, we use it so rarely that we tend to forget how it works. Luckily, you can use the TRIM command … Continue reading →

Posted in BASICS, Modifying, TIPS | 1 Comment

Snap Overrides (Illustrated)

Posted on August 15, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

I recently was asked to better explain a tip that I posted a while ago. And since I love making those handy-dandy animated pictures – here ya go. If you have a lot of snaps turned on or if you … Continue reading →

Posted in BASICS | Leave a comment

Delete objects with the Delete Button. Big Woop…

Posted on August 15, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

Big surprise!!!! Huh? I know that you all know that if you select objects and hit the DELETE button the selected objects are erased. But did you know that if you hold the DELETE button and then pick individual objects, … Continue reading →

Posted in BASICS, Modifying, TIPS | Leave a comment

Hatch Gap Tolerance

Posted on August 15, 2011 by AutoCAD Tips

If you need to insert a hatch in an area that isn’t completely “closed” this may be your new favorite friend. Instead of temporarily making a line to close off the area and then inserting the hatch and then going … Continue reading →

Posted in BASICS, Customization, Hatch, Modifying, Settling In, TIPS | 4 Comments