Don't Forget These Commands...Part 4

Here's another system variable that I forget because I only seem to need it when working on drawings from others:

XCLIPFRAME

Here's the definition from the AutoCAD Help Menu:

When this system variable is set to 0 and you xclip an xreference drawing, you can't see the boundary of the xclip and therefor you can't invert the selection. We set this variable to 2 in our templates so that we can see the frame (for adjusting and inverting as needed), but the frame won't plot.

Don't Forget These Commands...Part 2

Two AutoCAD Map commands that everyone should know:

MAPCLEAN - A powerful utility that enables you to delete duplicate objects, weed polylines, and do many other cleanup actions.

MAPIINSERT - Inserts a raster image at the location and scale specified in the image or in the associated world file if available.

Don't Forget These Commands...Part 3

So I know that I typically blog about Civil 3D, but after assisting with an issue in Microstation this morning, I realized that I should add this keyin command to my "Don't Forget" list.

The issue was that a linestyle looked fine in one drawing, but different when referenced into another drawing. I found some good information on the Bentley site with a quick Google search.  Here's a direct link to that page:

http://communities.bentley.com/products/microstation/w/microstation__wiki/setting-linestyle-scale-in-microstation-v8-cs.aspx

We used the keyin command window to set active linestylescale to 20 in both drawings and that fixed the display problem we were having.

So as not to disappoint the Civil 3D readers of this blog, I'll add these commands to the "Don't Forget" list as well. The descriptions are taken from the System Variables.:

LTSCALE - Sets the global linetype scale factor.

MSLTSCALE - Scales linetypes displayed on the model tab by the annotation scale.

PSLTSCALE - Controls the linetype scaling of objects displayed in paper space viewports.

I typically keep all three of these system variables set to 1.

Don't Forget These Commands...Part 1

There are so many commands in AutoCAD and Civil 3D that we use every day. Some of them are available via toolbars, menus, or the ribbon, that you only have to learn where to find them, not memorize them.

In my case, there are a few commands or system variables that just get lost in the deep void of space inside my brain. Here's a few of them:

LINEWORKSHRINKWRAP - Creates a boundary around a selection set of objects.

PELLIPSE - Setting this variable to 1 will draw an ellipse as a polyline.

FILEDIA - This variable gets set to 0 during some commands and/or lisp routines. If AutoCAD crashes, you may have to reset it to 1 to display dialog boxes instead of command line prompts.

'STAE - Transparent command for Civil 3D to select station from the parent alignment of a profile view.

'SSE - Transparent command for Civil 3D to select station from the parent alignment of a profile view and elevation from a surface.

'PSE - Transparent command for Civil 3D to select station and elevation from a profile view.

'ZTP - Transparent command for Civil 3D to zoom to a point or range of points.

There's plenty more to add to this list, but it's a start.