Cadalyst - November/December 2008 - (Page 58)

hottipharry By Bill Kramer Hot Tips for Cold Days This month’s top tip automatically dimensions polylines. A s Harry rushed in carrying his tattered briefcase, the cold air sucked the door shut behind him. Tossing a disk in my direction, he said quickly, “Got some more loose ends cleared up here, plus a real treat for your automatic dimensioning library.” Extra! Extra! Hot Tip Harry finishes off 2008 with an big bang. Visit www. cadalyst.com/cadtips after December 1 to check out a supersized batch of tips from our readers. Get the Code! Tip 3021: Repeat Dist Command Azfar Mahmood sent in Repeat Dist Command, a new twist on the familiar Distance command in AutoCAD. The LISP command function Sum_Dist repeats the Dist command using the object snap Nea (near) for the first point and Per (perpendicular) for the second point. Given the two input points, the program displays an alert box containing the current distance, a running total, and number of the distances selected. After the alert box is closed, the loop repeats until an invalid distance entry is made or until you use the Esc key to exit. Each time the routine is restarted, the cumulative distance value is reset to zero. Download Harry’s code at Cadalyst’s new CAD Tips site, www. cadalyst.com/cadtips. Search for the tip of your choice by tip number or keyword. Downloads are free, provided as is without warranty or support. Tips included in “Hot Tip Harry” are tested with AutoCAD 2008, unless otherwise noted. Review tip submission guidelines at www.cadalyst.com/tips, then submit your AutoCAD tip to harry@cadalyst.com. Authors of all published tips will receive a Cadalyst T-shirt. The author of Harry’s Top Tip each month will win a $100 cash prize. Tip 3025: Change File System Properties Ronald Maneja submitted Change File System Properties, a system-management tool for changing the file system properties of a current file. When used, a currently open file will be set to a read-only and hidden state. Load the LSP code and type Raise at the AutoCAD Command line. The file will be located in the file system, and the attributes will be adjusted. The routine will then ask you for a new file name, meant to be used for future revisions of the drawing. This routine uses MS Windows’ file system object to access the Attributes property and change it to a value of hidden and read only (and integer code). Tip 3022: Purge and Save or Purge and Exit Purge and Save or Purge and Exit from Clement Yiu are two command functions to purge drawings of unused applications and table elements. PF and PX perform the same function with different outcomes. The first command is a zoom out to the far extent of a drawing. Next, the Purge command is run twice — the first time to remove unused applications and the second to remove all unreferenced, named objects (layers, linetypes, and so forth). The last common operation is a quick save of the drawing after purging. At this point PF ends, but PX will continue by closing the drawing. Tip 3026: Automatically Dimension Polylines Terry Miller earns November’s top tip prize for Automatically Dimension Polylines. To use this marvelous tool, draw a polyline and load the LISP code. Type DPL at the Command prompt to activate the function and pick the polyline. This routine automatically dimensions the y distances. The current dimension variables are used as defaults. Y distance dimensions are created from one vertex to the next along with an overall y distance. The program is nicely structured so you can modify it to automatically dimension other items or properties if you are inclined to play with the LISP code, like I am! Thanks to all the tipsters for this month’s submissions! Note that your code is now downloadable from the new and improved CAD Tips site at www.cadalyst.com/cadtips. Until next time, keep on programmin’. Cadalyst contributing editor Bill Kramer has been programming AutoCAD solutions, writing magazine articles and books, and teaching CAD/CAM/CAE customization for more than 20 years. Bill wrote the first article about AutoLISP in Cadalyst back in 1986. www.cadalyst.com cadalyst November/December 2008 Tip 3023: Quick Text Replacement To use Quick Text Replacement from Matt Sibum, load the LSP file into AutoCAD, then type MPT to start the text edit tool. Select a first text object to be used as a template. That text will be copied to other text (or MText) objects selected until you exit the function by not selecting a valid object. Tip 3024: Replace Text with Incremental Value Replace Text with Incremental Value from Eric Lee Brown replaces text strings with an incrementing value, very useful for labeling columns and rows in a grid. After loading the LSP file, type Counter to activate the text edit tool. Enter an increment value (default value is 1). Next, select a starting base text. If the first character is a number (0 . . . 9), the counter will convert the string to a number. Otherwise, the next character will be used. (For example, if you pick text containing the value A with the default increment of 1, the next text item you pick will be changed to B and then to C and so forth.) 58 http://www.cadalyst.com/cadtips http://www.cadalyst.com/cadtips http://www.cadalyst.com/cadtips http://www.cadalyst.com/cadtips http://www.cadalyst.com/tips http://www.cadalyst.com/cadtips http://www.cadalyst.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Cadalyst - November 2008

Cadalyst - November 2008 Contents Editor's Window CAD Central Tech Trends: Designed after Our Own Image Budget-Conscious Workstations — 64-Bit CAD Power for Less than $2,500 Cadalyst All-Star Awards 2008 SolidWorks 2009 — 3D MCAD Software IES Virtual Environment 5.9 — Building Performance Analysis Software View Point: A Design with Teeth CAD Manager: CAD Manager’s Survey 2008 MCAD Modeling: Ask for What You Want AEC Insight: AEC Software by the Clock CAD Cartoon Issue Indexes Hot Tip Harry: Hot Tips for Cold Days

Cadalyst - November 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.