MasteringAutoCAD 2011 and AutoCAD LT 2011 phần 4 pps

sUBsTiTUTing fonTs | 337 In the Dictionaries dialog box, you can also add or delete words from a custom dictionary. Custom dictionary files are ASCII files with names that end with the .cus extension. Because they’re ASCII files, you can edit them outside of AutoCAD. Click the Current Custom Dictionary drop-down list to view a list of existing custom dictionaries. If you prefer, you can select a main or custom dictionary by using the Dctmain system vari- able. Click the Help button and search for Dctmain for more on the Dctmain system variable. You can also select a dictionary from the Files tab of the Options dialog box (Figure 10.23; choose Options from the Application menu). You can find the dictionary list under Text Editor, Dictionary, And Font File Names. Click the plus sign next to this item, and then click the plus sign next to the Main Dictionary item to display the dictionary options. From here, you can double-click the dictionary you prefer. Substituting Fonts At times, you’ll want to change all the fonts in a drawing quickly. For instance, you might want to convert TrueType fonts into a simple Txt.shx font to help shorten redraw times while you’re edit- ing. Or you might need to convert the font of a drawing received from another office to a font that conforms to your own office standards. The Fontmap system variable works in conjunction with a font-mapping table, enabling you to substitute fonts in a drawing easily. The font-mapping table is an ASCII file called Acad.fmp which is located in the C:\Documents and Settings\User Name\Application Data\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2011\R18.1\enu\Support folder. You can also use a file you create yourself. You can give this file any name you choose, as long as it has the .fmp extension. This font-mapping table contains one line for each font substitution you want AutoCAD to make. A typical line in this file reads as follows: romant; C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2011\Fonts\txt.shx Figure 10.23 Choosing a diction- ary via the Options dialog box 621974c10.indd 337 4/26/10 12:35:14 PM 338 | CHAPTER 10 Adding TexT To drAwings In this example, AutoCAD is directed to use the txt.shx font in place of the romant.shx font. To execute this substitution, you type Fontmap↵ Fontmap_filename. Fontmap_filename is the font-mapping table you created. This tells AutoCAD where to look for the font-mapping information. Then you issue the Regen command to view the font changes. To disable the font-mapping table, type this: Fontmap↵ .↵ You can also specify a font-mapping file in the Files tab of the Options dialog box. Look for the Text Editor, Dictionary, And Font File Names listing. Click the plus sign next to this listing, and then click the plus sign next to the Font Mapping File listing to display the name and loca- tion of the current default font-mapping file. If you hold the cursor over the name, AutoCAD displays the full location of the file (Figure 10.24). You can double-click this filename to open the Select A File dialog box. From there, you can select a different font-mapping file. Finding and Replacing Text One of the most time-consuming tasks in drafting is replacing text that appears repeatedly throughout a drawing. Fortunately, you have a Find And Replace tool to help simplify this task. AutoCAD’s Find And Replace works like any other find-and-replace tool in a word-processing program. A few options work specifically with AutoCAD. Here’s how it works: 1. Enter the text you want to locate in the Find Text input box located in the middle of the Annotate tab’s Text panel (Figure 10.25), and then click the magnifying glass to the right. The Find And Replace dialog box opens and the drawing area displays the part where the text has been found. 2. Enter the replacement text in the Replace With input box. Figure 10.24 AutoCAD shows the full path to the font-mapping file. 621974c10.indd 338 4/26/10 12:35:14 PM finding And rePlAcing TexT | 339 3. When you’ve made certain that this is the text you want to change, click Replace. If you want to replace all occurrences of the text in the drawing, click Replace All. 4. If you want to skip over the found text, click Find Next to locate the next instance of the text in your drawing. If text is not found, AutoCAD returns to your original view. Making Substitutions for Missing Fonts When text styles are created, the associated fonts don’t become part of the drawing file. Instead, AutoCAD loads the needed font file at the same time the drawing is loaded. If a text style in a draw- ing requires a particular font, AutoCAD looks for the font in the AutoCAD search path; if the font is there, it’s loaded. Usually this isn’t a problem if the drawing file uses the standard fonts that come with AutoCAD or Windows. But occasionally, you’ll encounter a file that uses a custom font. In earlier versions of AutoCAD, you saw an error message when you attempted to open such a file. This missing-font message often sent new AutoCAD users into a panic. Fortunately, AutoCAD automatically substitutes an existing font for the missing font in a drawing. By default, AutoCAD substitutes the simplex.shx font, but you can specify another font by using the Fontalt system variable. Type Fontalt↵ at the Command prompt, and then enter the name of the font you want to use as the substitute. You can also select an alternate font through the Files tab of the Options dialog box. Locate the Text Editor, Dictionary, And Font File Names listing, and then click the plus sign at the left. Locate the Alternate Font File item, and click the plus sign at the left. The current alternate is listed. You can double-click the font name to select a different font through the Alternate Font dialog box. Be aware that the text in your drawing will change in appearance, sometimes radically, when you use a substitute font. If the text in the drawing must retain its appearance, substitute a font that is as similar in appearance to the original font as possible. You can also enter Find↵ at the Command prompt to open the Find And Replace dialog box and then enter the text you want in the Find What text box. Figure 10.25 Using Find And Replace 621974c10.indd 339 4/26/10 12:35:15 PM 340 | CHAPTER 10 Adding TexT To drAwings You can also limit your find-and-replace operation to a specific set of objects in your drawing by choosing Selected Objects from the Find Where drop-down list. Once you’ve selected this option, click the Select Objects tool in the upper-right corner of the Find And Replace dialog box (Figure 10.26). When you click the Select Objects tool, the Find And Replace dialog box closes temporarily to enable you to select a set of objects or a region of your drawing. Find And Replace then limits its search to those objects or the region you select. You can further control the types of objects that Find And Replace looks for by clicking the More Options tool in the lower-left corner of the Find And Replace dialog box. The dialog box expands to show more options (Figure 10.27). With this dialog box, you can refine your search by limiting it to blocks, dimension text, standard text, or hyperlink text. You can also specify whether to match the case and find whole words only. Speeding Up AutoCAD with Qtext If you need to edit a large drawing that contains a lot of text but you don’t need to edit the text, you can use the Qtext command to help accelerate redraws and regenerations when you’re working on the drawing. Qtext turns lines of text into rectangular boxes, saving AutoCAD from having to form every letter. This enables you to see the note locations so you don’t accidentally draw over them. To use it, enter qtext↵ at the Command prompt and enter On or select the On option from the dynamic input display. Figure 10.26 The Select Objects tool Select Objects tool Figure 10.27 More extensive options for Find And Replace 621974c10.indd 340 4/26/10 12:35:16 PM finding And rePlAcing TexT | 341 Create Paragraph Columns You can format Mtext into multiple columns. This can be useful for long lists or to create a newspaper column appearance for your text. Text formatted into columns will automatically flow between columns as you add or remove text. To format text into columns, do the following: 1 . Create the text using the Mtext tool as usual. 2 . Click and drag the double-headed arrow at the bottom of the text upward. As you do this, a second column appears. Click and drag the diamond icon to adjust the column width. Click and drag the double-headed arrow in the ruler to adjust column spacing. Click and drag the double-headed arrow at the bottom of the column upward to create new columns. 3 . If you want to create another column, click and drag the double-headed arrow below the second column upward. 4 . To adjust the column width, click and drag the diamond icon that appears just to the right of the first column in the ruler. All the columns will adjust to the width of the first column. Once you’ve set up your columns, click the Close Text Editor tool. You can adjust the column width and spacing by using grips that appear when you click on the text. Click and drag this grip to adjust the column width. Click and drag this grip to adjust the column spacing. Click and drag the grips at the bottom of the columns to adjust the column height. Click and drag the grip of the last column upward to add more columns. To adjust the column width of existing Mtext, click and drag the arrow grip at the top-right of the first col- umn. To adjust the width between columns, click and drag the arrow grip in the upper-right of the group of columns. The grips at the bottom of each column allow you to adjust the height of the columns. 621974c10.indd 341 4/26/10 12:35:17 PM 342 | CHAPTER 10 Adding TexT To drAwings You can manually set column features through the Column Settings dialog box. To open it, double- click on the Mtext and then choose Column Settings from the Columns flyout in the Text Editor tab’s Insert panel. The Dynamic Columns option is the default for the column type group and it allows you to adjust the column size using grips. The Bottom Line Prepare a drawing for text. AutoCAD offers an extensive set of features for adding text to a drawing, but you need to do a little prep work before you dive in. Master It Name two things you need to do to prepare a drawing for text. Set the annotation scale and add text. Before you start to add text, you should set the annotation scale for your drawing. Once this is done, you can begin to add text. Master It In a sentence or two, briefly describe the purpose of the annotation scale feature. Name the tool you use to add text to a drawing. Explore text formatting in AutoCAD. Because text styles contain font and text-size set- tings, you can usually set up a text style and then begin to add text to your drawing. For those special cases where you need to vary text height and font or other text features, you can use the Formatting panel of the Text Editor tab. Master It What text formatting tool can you use to change text to boldface type? Add simple single-line text objects. In many situations, you need only a single word or a short string of text. AutoCAD offers the Single Line text object for these instances. Master It Describe the methods for starting the single-line text command. Use the Check Spelling feature. It isn’t uncommon for a drawing to contain the equivalent of several pages of text, and the likelihood of having misspelled words can be high. AutoCAD offers the Check Spelling feature to help you keep your spelling under control. Master It What option do you select in the Check Spelling dialog box when it finds a misspelled word and you want to accept the suggestion it offers? Find and replace text. A common activity when editing technical drawings is finding and replacing a word throughout a drawing. Master It True or false: The Find And Replace feature in AutoCAD works very differently than the find-and-replace feature in other programs. 621974c10.indd 342 4/26/10 12:35:17 PM Chapter 11 Using Fields and Tables Adding text to a set of drawings can become a large part of your work. You’ll find that you’re editing notes and labels almost as frequently as you’re editing the graphics in your drawings. To make some of those editing tasks easier, AutoCAD provides a few special text objects. In this chapter, you’ll look at fields and tables, two features that can help automate some of the more common tasks in AutoCAD. Fields are a special type of text that can automatically update to reflect changes in the drawing. The Table feature is a tool that helps to automate the process of creating and editing tables and schedules. Tables are a common part of technical drawings and are similar to spreadsheets. In fact, AutoCAD tables behave much like spreadsheets, giving you the ability to add formulas to cells. You’ll start this chapter with an introduction to fields and then go on to learn about tables. Toward the end, you’ll revisit fields to see how they can be used to add formulas to tables. In this chapter, you’ll learn to do the following: Use fields to associate text with drawing properties •u Add tables to your drawing•u Edit the table line work•u Add formulas to cells•u Import and export tables•u Create table styles•u Using Fields to Associate Text with Drawing Properties The text labels you worked with in Chapter 10 are static and don’t change unless you edit them by using the tools described there. Another type of text object, called a field, behaves in a more dynamic way than the multiline text. A field can be linked to the properties of other objects and updates itself automatically as the associated properties change. For example, you can create a field that is associated with a block name. If the block name changes, the field text automatically changes as well. Try the following exercise to see how this works: 1. Open the 11c-unit.dwg file. This file is similar to the drawing you worked on in Chapter 10. 2. Double-click the Kitchen text to highlight it and make it available for editing. 3. Right-click the highlighted Kitchen text, and then choose Insert Field to open the Field dialog box (Figure 11.1). A list to the left shows the types of fields available. 621974c11.indd 343 4/26/10 12:35:20 PM 344 | CHAPTER 11 Using Fields and Tables 4. In the Field Category drop-down list, select Objects. This limits the display of field types to object fields. 5. In the Field Names list, select NamedObject. 6. Make sure that Block is selected in the Named Object Type drop-down list in the top of the dialog box, and then select Kitchen. This associates the field with the Kitchen block name. 7. In the Format list to the far right, select First Capital. This causes the field text to be lower- case with a capital first letter, regardless of how the block name is actually spelled. 8. Click OK to exit the Field dialog box, and then press ↵ twice to return to the Command prompt. When you return to the drawing, the text appears in a gray background. This tells you that the text is a field rather than an Mtext or Dtext object. The gray background is just a device to help you keep track of field text; it doesn’t plot. You’ve converted existing text into a field that is linked to a block name. Now let’s see how the field works: 1. Enter Rename↵ at the Command prompt to open the Rename dialog box. 2. Make sure Blocks is selected in the Named Objects list, and then select Kitchen from the Items list. The word KITCHEN appears in the Old Name input box near the bottom of the dialog box. 3. Enter Kitchenette in the input box just below the Old Name box, and then click the Rename To button. 4. Click OK to close the Rename dialog box. 5. Type Re↵. The field you created changes to reflect the new block name. Figure 11.1 Choose the field to insert. 621974c11.indd 344 4/26/10 12:35:21 PM Using Fields To associaTe TexT wiTh drawing ProPerTies | 345 Fields can be associated with a wide variety of properties. You’ve just seen how a block name can be associated with a field. In this exercise, you’ll use a field to display the area of an object: 1. Click Zoom Extents from the Zoom flyout on the navigation bar or type Z↵ E↵ to view the entire plan. 2. Place a rectangle in the living room area so that it fills the area, as in Figure 11.2. 3. Double-click the Living Room text to open the Text Editor tab and the text editor. 4. Highlight the text that reads 230 square feet. Right-click the selected text, and choose Insert Field from the shortcut menu. 5. In the Field dialog box, select Object from the Field Names list. 6. Click the Select Object button next to the Object Type input box at the top of the Field dialog box (Figure 11.3). The Field dialog box momentarily closes to enable you to select an object. 7. Select the rectangle you just added. The Field dialog box returns. 8. In the Property list just below the Object Type input box, select Area. 9. Select Architectural from the Format list to the far right (see Figure 11.4). Figure 11.2 Place a rectangle that fills the living room. Rectangle Figure 11.3 Click the Select Object button. 621974c11.indd 345 4/26/10 12:35:21 PM 346 | CHAPTER 11 Using Fields and Tables 10. Click OK. The field you just added appears in the drawing as the area of the rectangle. 11. Click Close Text Editor in the Text Editor tab’s Close panel. Next you’ll alter the rectangle to see how it affects the field: 1. Click the rectangle to expose its grips (Figure 11.5). Then select the top middle grip of the rectangle, and move it upward so the top edge aligns with the bathroom wall. 2. Type Re↵. The field you just added updates to reflect the new area of the rectangle. 3. After reviewing the results, close 11c-unit.dwg. In previous exercises, you changed existing text into fields. You can create new fields in either the Dtext or Mtext command by selecting Insert Field from the shortcut menu whenever you’re typing the text content. In this exercise, you used a rectangle, but you can use any closed polyline to create an area field. You’ve touched on just two of the many possible uses for fields. You can associate other types of properties, including the current layer, the drawing name, linetypes, and more. You can include Diesel macros as part of fields. (You’ll learn about Diesel macros in Chapter 28.) Fields can also be used in AutoCAD’s Table feature, described in the next section, which enables you to create tables and schedules quickly. Fields are used to coordinate sheet labels with reference symbols in the AutoCAD Sheet Set feature described in Chapter 30. Figure 11.4 The Architectural option in the Format list Figure 11.5 Expose the grips. Move this grip upward. 621974c11.indd 346 4/26/10 12:35:22 PM [...]... group, enter 9 for Columns and 12 for Data Rows 4 Click OK The dialog box closes and the outline of a table follows your cursor 5 Position the table in the center of your drawing area, and click to place it The table appears with a cursor in the top cell You also see the Text Editor tab in the Ribbon 621974c11.indd 347 4/ 26/10 12:35:22 PM | Chapter 11  348   Using Fields and Tables Figure 11.7 The... gray, and the Text Editor tab appears in the Ribbon You also see labels across the top and left side showing the row and column addresses 3 Enter Number for the room number column at the far left, and then press the Tab key to advance to the next cell to the right Figure 11.8 Double-click the first cell shown here 621974c11.indd 348 4/ 26/10 12:35:22 PM | Adding Tables to Your Drawing   349 4 Enter... Importing and Exporting Tables Frequently, tables are created outside AutoCAD in a spreadsheet program such as Excel You can import an Excel worksheet as an AutoCAD table by using the AutoCAD Entities option in the Paste Special feature The ability to import tables lets non -AutoCAD users create the table data while you concentrate on the drawing 621974c11.indd 356 4/ 26/10 12:35:26 PM | Importing and Exporting... to cells?  ​ Import and export tables. ​ The Table feature allows you to import Microsoft Excel  ​ spreadsheets into AutoCAD Master It ​ Describe how to import a spreadsheet from Excel into AutoCAD  ​ 621974c11.indd 361 4/ 26/10 12:35:28 PM 621974c11.indd 362 4/ 26/10 12:35:28 PM Chapter 12 Using Dimensions Before you determine the dimensions of a project, your design is in flux and many questions may... selected 3 Right-click, and choose Borders 4 Select 0.30 mm from the Lineweight drop-down list Then click the Outside Borders button as you did in step 5 of the previous exercise 5 Click OK The outlines of the selected cells are given the new line weight setting (Figure 11.15) 621974c11.indd 353 6 Save this file for future reference 4/ 26/10 12:35: 24 PM 3 54 | Chapter 11  Using Fields and Tables Figure 11.15... cell 3 Enter =A2+D4 in the cell to add the values in cell A2 and cell D4 4 Press ↵ after you enter the formula The value of A2 plus D4 appears in the cell (Figure 11.18) Figure 11.18 The cell with the sum of two other cells In step 3, the equal sign tells AutoCAD to convert the text into a formula field You may have noticed that when you start to edit a cell in a table, the row and column labels appear... Figure 11.10 Double-click this cell and the Text Editor tab appears 2 Enter Floor, and press the Tab key 3 Enter Base, Wall, and Ceiling in each of the following columns as you’ve been doing Remember that the Tab key advances you to the next cell to the right Your table should look like Figure 11.11 621974c11.indd 349 4 Click Close Text Editor in the Text Editor tab’s Close panel 4/ 26/10 12:35:23 PM | Chapter... firsthand how this dialog box works: 1 Turn on the display of line weights by typing LW↵ 2 In the Lineweight Settings dialog box, turn on the Display Lineweight setting, and then click OK 3 Click in the title cell at the top of the table to select the cell, and then right-click and choose Borders to open the Cell Border Properties dialog box 621974c11.indd 352 4 Click the Lineweight drop-down list, and. .. above or in line with the dimension line Dimension styles also make your work easier by enabling you to store and duplicate your most common dimension settings 621974c12.indd 3 64 4/26/10 12:35:33 PM | Creating a Dimension Style   365 AutoCAD gives you one of two default dimension styles, ISO-25 or Standard, depending on whether you use the metric or Imperial (also called English) measurement system You’ll... Flyout 4 With the Paste radio button selected, click AutoCAD Entities in the list, and then click OK 5 At the Specify insertion point or [paste as Text]: prompt, click a point in the lower-right area of the drawing The worksheet data appears in the drawing as a table In this exercise, you imported the worksheet by using the default standard table style This gives you a simple-looking table using the AutoCAD . Command prompt to open the Find And Replace dialog box and then enter the text you want in the Find What text box. Figure 10.25 Using Find And Replace 621974c10.indd 339 4/ 26/10 12:35:15 PM 340 . false: The Find And Replace feature in AutoCAD works very differently than the find -and- replace feature in other programs. 621974c10.indd 342 4/ 26/10 12:35:17 PM Chapter 11 Using Fields and Tables Adding. list to the left shows the types of fields available. 621974c11.indd 343 4/ 26/10 12:35:20 PM 344 | CHAPTER 11 Using Fields and Tables 4. In the Field Category drop-down list, select Objects.