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Inside AutoCAD 14

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- 16 -

Text Annotation

by Francis Soen

Text is a very important part of any drawing. On any given drawing, you may need to draw a single word, a single sentence, or even paragraphs of text. Being able to efficiently draw and edit text directly affects your productivity. In this chapter you learn how to do the following:

Drawing Single-Line Text

A single line of text can consist of a single character, a word, or a complete sentence. The easiest way to draw such text is to use the DTEXT command. To insert a single line of text, from the Draw menu, choose Text, Single Line Text. The initial prompt displayed in the command window presents several options:

Justify/Style/<Start point>:

The default option is to specify the lower-left endpoint, which is otherwise known as the start point, of the new line of text. After picking the start point, you are prompted to supply the height and rotation angle of the text and the new text to be drawn. As you type the text to be drawn, it is displayed on your drawing. If you make a typographical error, you can use the Backspace key to delete the error and retype the text. You signify the end of the line of text by pressing the Enter key, at which point you may begin a new line of text immediately below the line of text just drawn. To stop drawing any additional lines of text, press the Enter key without typing any new text. You may also relocate the text marker (the []) by picking a point with the cursor.

When you enter text, you can take advantage of the command line buffer to repeat previously entered text by using the up and down arrow keys to scroll through the buffer.

TIP: The spacing between successive lines of text is fixed at approximately 1.67 of the text height. This spacing is normally fixed; however, each line of text is a separate object. As such, you can use the MOVE command to re-arrange the lines. You also can pick a new justification point at the Text: prompt prior to typing the new line of text, thus enabling you to override the default line spacing.

Typing the text you want to draw is the easy part. It is also important to know how to format the text according to your needs. The following sections discuss how to choose the correct text height, justification, and text style. You also learn how to continue text below the previous line, use special formatting codes and symbols, and edit text.

In the following exercise, you use DTEXT to add several lines of text to a site drawing.

DRAWING SINGLE-LINE TEXT USING DTEXT

1. Open the IAW drawing ACME.DWG from the accompanying CD. This is a site drawing set up in paper space with a model space scale of 1 drawing unit equal to 100 feet (1:100 scale).

2. Make sure you are in paper space. Choose Named Views from the View menu to restore the view TITLE_BLOCK. Make a new layer named TEXT and make it current.

3. From the Draw menu, choose Text, Single Line Text. Using the Style option, set the current style to STANDARD. Using the Justify option, set the justification option to Center and pick the point 29,2.5 as the center point. Specify a height of 0.3 and a rotation angle of 0.

Type the text ACME Engineering and press the Enter key twice.

4. Repeat the DTEXT command. Pick the point 26.75,2 as the start point. Remember, the default justification is left-justified text. Use a height of 0.2 and a rotation angle of 0.

Type the text Bakersville Project and press the Enter key once. Type the text Legend & General Notes and press the Enter key twice.

5. Repeat the DTEXT command. Type M at the start point prompt, thereby specifying Middle justification.

You can bypass the Justify option and set the justification directly at the initial prompt. Pick the point 29.5,1 as the middle point. Use a height of 0.2 and a rotation angle of 0.

Type the text L10 and press the Enter key twice.

6. Repeat the DTEXT command. Type R at the start point prompt to specify Right justification.

Pick the point 27.8,0.6 as the right point. Use a height of 0.1 and a rotation angle of 0.

Type the text 1"=100' and press the Enter key twice.

7. Restore the view ALL. Make the model space viewport active (double-click the Paper button).

8. Issue the DTEXT command. Pick the point 855,1290 as the start point.

Use a text height of 50, which at a 1:100 plot scale will produce 1/2" text. Use a rotation angle of 10 degrees.

Type Route 101 and press the Enter key twice.

9. The exercise is complete and you may now save the drawing. Figure 16.1 shows the outcome.

Figure 16.1 ACME.DWG with some single line text added.

Now that you know how to create new text in your drawing, the following section details how to change text styles in accordance with your needs.

Choosing the Correct Text Height

The hardest part of drawing text is deciding on the correct text height for the scale for which the drawing is set up. Unfortunately, because AutoCAD does not have a built-in mechanism for storing and using the drawing scale to set the correct text height for full-size drawings, it is necessary to take into account the drawing scale in specifying the text height. Use tables 16.1 and 16.2 to help specify the correct text height. To use these tables, go to the row associated with your drawing scale. Then move along the row to the column associated with the height you want your text to have on your plot.

Table 16.1 Text Heights for Architectural Scales

Plotted Text Heights
Drawing Scale 3/32" 1/8" 3/16" 1/4" 3/8"
1/16"=1' 18" 24" 36" 48" 72"
3/32"=1' 12" 16" 24" 32" 48"
1/8"=1' 9" 12" 18" 24" 36"
3/16"=1' 6" 8" 12" 16" 24"
1/4"=1' 4.5" 6" 9" 12" 18"
1/2"=1' 2.25" 3" 4.5" 6" 9"

Table 16.2 Text Heights for Decimal Scales

Drawing Scale Plotted Text Heights
3/32" 1/8" 3/16" 1/4" 3/8"
1:10 0.9375 d.u.* 1.25 d.u. 1.875 d.u. 2.5 d.u. 3.75 d.u.
1:20 1.8750 d.u. 2.50 d.u. 3.750 d.u. 5.0 d.u. 7.5 d.u.
1:50 4.6875 d.u. 6.25 d.u. 9.375 d.u. 12.5 d.u. 18.75 d.u.
1:100 9.3750 d.u. 12.50 d.u. 18.750 d.u. 25.0 d.u. 37.5 d.u.

*d.u. stands for drafting units

Choosing a Justification

The default option of DTEXT is to specify the left endpoint, or the start point, of the line of text. Specifying the Style option at the initial DTEXT prompt displays the following prompt:

Align/Fit/Center/Middle/Right/TL/TC/TR/ML/MC/MR/BL/BC/BR:

Figure 16.2 shows the various justification options and their corresponding locations.

Figure 16.2 The possible justification points for a line of text.

Unlike the justification options illustrated in figure 16.2, the Align and Fit options require that you define two points.

Use the Align option when you want to specify the left and right endpoints of the text and do not care about the resulting height. The text height is automatically set to make the text fit between the specified points. Also, the angle from the first point to the second point is used as the rotation angle of the text.

Use the Fit option when you want to specify the left and right endpoints and the height of the text. To make the text fit between the specified points, the height-to- width ratio of the text characters is varied. Therefore, you may end up with skinny-looking characters on one line and very fat-looking characters on the next.

TIP: You can specify a justification option at the primary DTEXT prompt, which eliminates the need for first selecting the Justify option. The most commonly used ones are the default Start point, Right, Middle, and Center justifications.

When the text is initially drawn with one of the alternate justification options specified, it is drawn left justified, as if the default justification were being used. Upon ending the DTEXT command, however, the text is redrawn with the correct justification.

NOTE: You can pick the justification point of a line of text with the INSERT object snap mode.

This concludes the discussion of text justification options. The next section deals with the topic of text styles.

Choosing a Text Style

The appearance of the text drawn by DTEXT is controlled via a named group of settings referred to as a text style. The default text style supplied in the prototype drawings ACAD.DWG and ACADISO.DWG is STANDARD. In the template drawings, several text styles are predefined for you. Use the Style option to set the style you want to use to generate the new text. The process of actually defining new and modifying existing styles is discussed in the section "Defining Text Styles," later in this chapter.

Continuing Below the Previous Line

If, after you end the DTEXT command, you want to draw an additional line of text below the last drawn line of text, you can easily do so by issuing the DTEXT command and pressing the Enter key rather than picking a new start point. DTEXT will then draw the new line of text using the style, height, and rotation angle of the previously drawn text.

TIP: To help you spot the last line of text drawn, that line is highlighted when you begin DTEXT. The highlighting, however, may not be apparent if the text is too small on the screen.

Using Special Formatting Codes and Symbols

You can do a limited amount of formatting with the DTEXT command. For instance, a line can be drawn under or above the text simply by adding the codes %%u (underlining) and %%o (overlining) to the text as you enter it. The codes act as toggle switches; the first time you include the code in a line of text, it turns that effect on. The second time the code is encountered in the same line of text, the effect is turned off. If the code is not encountered a second time in the line of text, then the effect is continued to the end of the text line but is not continued to the next line. For example, to draw the text shown in figure 16.3, the text you type is %%uUnderlining%%u and %%oOverlining%%o can be used separately or %%o%%utogether.

Figure 16.3 Using underline and overline formatting codes.

In addition to underlining and overlining, you also can draw symbols that are in the font file, but are not on the keyboard. Table 16.3 shows several formatting codes and the resulting symbols.

Table 16.3

Additional Formatting Codes

Formatting Code Symbol Meaning
%%c Ø diameter
%%d [ring] degree
%%p ± plus/minus

The codes are not case-sensitive. In addition to the codes in table 16.3, the code %%nnn can be used to draw any character in a font file.

A much easier way of drawing a symbol is simply to use Window's Character Map program.

To use the Character Map program in place of the %%nnn code, simply start the Character Map program (usually found in the Accessories group of programs) and select the font file you have specified in the current text style. Then select the character you want to draw and copy it to the clipboard. You can now paste the character into the text you are typing.

WARNING: Not all font files contain the same characters, which is why it is important that the font file you choose to copy from in the Character Map program is the same font file specified in the text style you are drawing with in AutoCAD. What the Character Map program actually copies when you choose to copy a character to the clipboard is the character's position number in the font chart. When you paste that character in AutoCAD, the character corresponding to the position number recorded in the clipboard is drawn--if you are using a different font file in AutoCAD, you may end up with a different character altogether.

After drawing and formatting the initial text, you may want to change the wording or appearance of the text. The following section covers the commands you will need to do this.

Editing Single-Line Text

Two commands are of particular use for editing existing text: DDEDIT and DDMODIFY. DDEDIT is quicker to use than DDMODIFY when all you want to do is change the text in one or more text objects. DDMODIFY is slower, but more powerful, than DDEDIT, in that DDMODIFY enables you to change the appearance of the selected text.

Using DDEDIT

From the Modify menu, choose Object, Text to issue the DDEDIT command. After selecting the text object to be changed, the Edit Text dialog box appears displaying the selected text (see fig. 16.4).

Figure 16.4 The Edit Text dialog box of DDEDIT.

Initially, the entire line of text is highlighted and will be replaced by whatever you type. If you want to edit a specific portion of the text, it is necessary to position the cursor at the desired point in the text and pick it. You can then use the Insert, Delete, and Backspace keys to add and delete characters.

If you want to replace a portion of the text displayed in the Edit Text dialog box, highlight the portion to be replaced. The highlighted portion is replaced with any new text you type.

Using DDMODIFY

Choose Properties from the Standard toolbar or Modify menu and select a single text object to issue the DDMODIFY command. The resulting Modify Text dialog box, shown in figure 16.5, enables you to change the text, the style, the justification point, and the various settings that control the appearance of the text object.

Figure 16.5 The Modify Text dialog box of DDMODIFY.

See "Defining Text Styles" later in this chapter for a clearer explanation of the text settings that you can change.

In the following exercise, you use DDEDIT and DDMODIFY to change some text in a drawing.

EDITING SINGLE-LINE TEXT WITH DDEDIT AND DDMODIFY

1. Continue to use the drawing ACME.DWG to which you added some text in the previous exercise.

2. Choose Named Views from the View menu. Restore the view TITLE_BLOCK.

3. From the Modify menu, choose Object, Text. Select the text "Bakersville Project." Highlight "ville" and type field. The text should look like figure 16.6. Click on OK to make the change. Press Enter to exit the DDEDIT command.

4. Choose Properties from the Object Properties toolbar. Select the text "L100." Press the Enter key to end the selection process. Change the height from 0.20 to 0.30 and click the OK button to effect the height change. The text should look like figure 16.6.

5. You are done making changes to this drawing, so you may now save the drawing.

Figure 16.6 Changing text with DDEDIT and DDMODIFY.

Defining Text Styles

A text style is a named group of settings that controls the appearance of text in a drawing.

The default text style, and only defined style, in the templates ACAD.DWT and ACADISO.DWT is named STANDARD. You can, however, have as many text styles defined as you want in a drawing (the other template files each have several styles predefined). Text styles are defined and modified with the STYLE command, which is issued by choosing Text Style from the Format menu. Figure 16.7 shows the Text Style dialog box. The various settings within the Text Style dialog box are explained in more detail in the following sections.

Figure 16.7 The Text Style dialog box of STYLE.

To create a new style, you actually begin by making a copy of the current style. If the current style is not the style you want to begin with, then select the desired style from the list of existing styles (thereby making it the current style).

Click on the New button. Specify a name for the new style, and a duplicate style is created from the selected style. To rename an existing style, select the style from the list of existing styles, click on the Rename button, and enter a new name. To delete an existing style, highlight the name from the list of existing styles, and click on the Delete button. The Standard text style cannot be renamed or deleted.

NOTE: When a text object is created, the style it is created with is recorded with the object. A text style can only be deleted if no existing text objects reference the style.

Text styles are stored in the drawing in which they are defined. If you want to have multiple styles immediately available in a new drawing, define the styles in your template drawings. If you want to import a style from another drawing, insert the other drawing or attach the drawing as an external reference and bind the desired style. (See Chapter 13, "External References," for a complete explanation of binding.)

In defining a new style or modifying an existing style, you must choose a font file, what special effects to enable, a text height, a width factor, and an oblique angle. Choosing these settings and previewing the results of these settings are covered in the following sections.

Previewing the Text Style Settings

The character Preview area enables you to view a sample of the selected style and the results of changing the various settings. To view your own sample text, type your sample text in the text edit box and click on the Preview button.

Choosing a Font and Style

The font file is the file that contains the information that determines the shape of each character. Table 16.4 lists the various types of font files supplied with AutoCAD.

Table 16.4 Various Types of Font Files

File Name Extension Font Type
SHX AutoCAD's native font file, known as a shape file
TTF TrueType font file

The most efficient font files are the shape files supplied with AutoCAD. In addition to the TrueType font files supplied with AutoCAD, the TrueType fonts supplied with Windows and other Windows applications can also be used.

PostScript files used to be directly usable in earlier versions of AutoCAD. In R14, however, you must first use the COMPILE command to compile the PostScript font file into a shape file. In fact, in earlier versions several PostScript font files were supplied, but none are supplied in R14.

AutoCAD supports TrueType font families, which means that for some TrueType fonts, you can choose a font style such as regular, italic, bold, or bold italic. Note that not all TrueType fonts have more than the regular style defined.

There are two system variables that affect the plotting of text drawn with TrueType fonts, TEXTFILL and TEXTQLTY. When TEXTFILL is disabled, the characters are plotted in outline form only. If TEXTFILL is enabled, the characters are filled in.

The value of TEXTQLTY affects the smoothness of the characters at plot time. The value of TEXTQLTY can be set from 0 to 100, with the default value set to 50. The higher the value, the better the resolution of the characters, but it will take longer to process the drawing for plotting.

Both system variables can be typed at the Command: prompt, but are easier to access through the Print/Plot Configuration dialog box (see fig. 16.8). TEXTQLTY is set via the Text Resolution text edit box, while TEXTFILL is set via the Text Fill check box.

Figure 16.8 Setting TEXTFILL and TEXTQLTY through the Print/Plot Configuration dialog box.

TIP: Using the simplest shaped characters will minimize the drawing size and speed up opening and working with the drawing file. The characters in the Simplex and Romans font files are quite simple in appearance and are similar to the simplex characters used in board drafting. Some shape files contain the alphabet of foreign languages, such as GREEKS.SHX, or even symbols, such as SYMUSIC.SHX.

After you change the font file associated with an existing style, upon applying the change, all text drawn with the modified style is updated to reflect the change. If you want to draw text with more than one font file, you must create one style per font file and switch between the styles as you draw the text.

Setting a Height

Also found in the Font area is the text Height setting. The default height of 0 dictates that the user sets the text height at the time the text is drawn. A height other than 0 sets the text height for that particular style to that height. The style is then referred to as a fixed height style and the text height prompt for the DTEXT command is suppressed.

Changing the text height setting of an existing style does not affect the appearance of existing text objects.

Specifying Special Effects

In the Effects section of the Text Style dialog box are the Upside down, Backwards, Vertical, Width Factor, and Oblique Angle settings. These settings are covered in detail in the following sections.

Upside Down, Backwards, and Vertical Text

In the Effects area, you can enable the Upside down, Backwards, and Vertical settings. See figure 16.9 for an example of how these settings affect the appearance of text.

Figure 16.9 The effects of Upside down, Backwards, and Vertical settings on text.

Although the Upside down and Backwards options work with all font files, the Vertical setting only works with SHX files.

TIP: If you want to draw text upside down, you don't have to enable the Upside down option. Instead, specify a text rotation angle of 180 degrees. The Backwards option is useful if you want to plot text on the backside of the plot sheet so that the text is readable when viewed from the front. The Vertical option is useful when you need to draw text down the side of a vertical surface, such as a building.

Unlike the font file setting, changing the Upside down and Backwards settings of an existing style does not result in the existing text being automatically updated to reflect the changes. Changing the Vertical setting, however, does affect existing text objects, so you may want to create a new style before changing the Vertical setting.

Setting a Width Factor

The Width Factor determines the width-to-height ratio of the drawn characters. A factor of 1 results in the characters being drawn with the width-to-height ratio defined in the font file used. A factor greater than 1 results in fatter characters, while a factor less than 1 results in skinnier characters. Figure 16.10 illustrates the effects of using different width factors. All three lines were drawn with the same text height.

Figure 16.10 The effects of the Width Factor setting on a line of text.

TIP: Drawing text with a width factor that is less than 1 may make it easier to fit text into an already crowded drawing.

Setting an Oblique Angle

The Oblique Angle setting affects the slant of the characters. It is often used to draw italic text when the characters in the font file being used are not naturally italic. Unlike the text rotation angle, the oblique angle of 0 refers to a vertical direction (see fig. 16.11). A positive text value makes the letters lean to the right, and a negative value makes the letters lean to the left.

Figure 16.11 The effects of the Oblique Angle setting on a line of text.

In the following exercise, you use the STYLE command to modify an existing style and to create a new style.

MODIFYING AND CREATING TEXT STYLES

1. Continue to use the drawing ACME.DWG. Restore the view TITLE_BLOCK.

2. Issue the STYLE command by choosing Text Style from the Format menu. In the Text Style dialog box, make sure STANDARD is the current style.

3. Select the ROMANS.SHX font file. Click on the Apply button and close the dialog box. Notice how the text you drew in the previous exercise, with the Standard text style, is revised to reflect the font file change (see fig. 16.12).

Figure 16.12 Modifying the appearance of text by changing the font file in the text style definition.

4. Repeat the STYLE command. Click on the New button. Name the new style NOTES. Initially, NOTES is a duplicate of STANDARD, the style that was current at the time the New button was selected.

5. Choose the TrueType font Courier New, which is a font file that offers several font styles. If you do not have Courier New on your list of available fonts, then choose an alternate font. Choose Bold as the Font Style. Click on the Apply button and close the dialog box. The text style NOTES is now the current text style.

6. After completing the exercise, save the drawing.

Drawing Paragraphs of Text with MTEXT

While the DTEXT command can be used to draw multiple lines of text, each line is drawn as a separate object. Sometimes you will want to draw multiple lines of text as a single unit, such as a paragraph of text. At such times, use the MTEXT command (see fig. 16.13), which is issued by choosing Text from the Draw toolbar or Multiline Text from the Text submenu of the Draw menu.

Figure 16.13 The Multiline Text Editor of MTEXT.

After you issue the MTEXT command, you are prompted to select the first corner point of a window. This window is used to determine the direction in which the mtext object is drawn. When the window is dragged to the right, the mtext object is drawn to the right; when the window is dragged to the left, the mtext object is drawn to the left. Similarly, when the window is dragged upward, the mtext object is drawn upward; when the window is dragged downward, the mtext object is drawn downward. Within the window, the mtext object is drawn with a top left justification. If you want, you can change the justification type to one of eight others: TC (Top Center), TR (Top Right), ML (Middle Left), MC (Middle Center), MR (Middle Right), BL (Bottom Left), BC (Bottom Center), or BR (Bottom Right). These justification types are similar to those available with the DTEXT command (refer to fig. 16.2), except that they apply to the whole mtext object and not just a single line of text.

If you want, you can also choose to use the first window point as the justification point by specifying the Justify option and choosing a justification option. Then choose the Width option and enter the width rather than using the width of the window as the width.

A width of zero will disable the word wrap feature of the Multiline Text Editor, and you will have to press the Enter key every time you want to begin a new line of text.

Several other options appear at the command line that can be set from the command line, but which are easier to set through the Multiline Text Editor dialog box. The Multiline Text Editor is divided into two parts. The bottom part is the screen editor and the top part is divided into three tabs: the Character tab, Properties tab, and Find/Replace tab, all of which are described in detail in the following sections.

TIP: If you position your pointer in the screen pointing area and right-click on your mouse, a menu appears that facilitates access to the Undo, Cut, Copy, Paste, and Select ALL operations.

If you have text in an existing ASCII or RTF file, use the Import Text button to import the file into the editor and then edit the text as you want.

Using the Character Tab

The Character tab controls the properties of the text you are drawing. The property settings can be used in one of two ways. First, the property settings control the appearance of the text you type. You also can change the properties of selected text through these settings, thereby creating various special effects. To select text, position the cursor at the beginning of the text, left-click, and then drag the cursor to the end of the text. You can select a word by double-clicking at the start of the word or select the entire body of text by triple-clicking.

Using Special Effects

This section discusses the various effects you can achieve by using the Character tab of the Multiline Text Editor dialog box.

Changing Font File and Text Height

After selecting the text to be affected, you can change the font file to be used and even the height of the text. The text height drop-down list is actually a combination drop-down list and text edit box. You can enter a new text height in the text edit box, or you can also select a height that was previously entered from the drop-down list.

Bold and Italic Text

The Bold and Italic buttons enable you to bold or italicize the text, but only if the chosen font file is a TrueType font. You can use the Underline button to underline any selected text regardless of the font file used. To remove any bold or italic effects, simply select the text again and choose the appropriate button.

Stacking/Unstacking Text

The Stack/Unstack button is used to stack or unstack the selected text. Selected text can be stacked when a backslash character (/) appears somewhere in the text. Everything to the left of the slash is treated as the numerator and everything to the right is treated as the denominator.

Color Settings

Normally, the color setting is ByLayer, but if you want, you can set a specific color for the selected text with the color drop-down list. Just remember that Text Color controls the pen used with the PLOT command.

Using Special Symbols

Use the Symbol drop-down list to insert the degree, plus/minus, or diameter symbol (see fig. 16.14). To insert any other symbol, choose Other from the list to invoke the Character Map program. Inserting a nonbreaking space prevents the Multiline Text Editor from making a break at that point when deciding where to break the line of text (word wrap feature) to continue to the next line.

Figure 16.14 The Symbol drop-down list in the Multiline Text Editor.

Using the Properties Tab

Choosing the Properties tab enables you to set the text style, justification option, width, and rotation angle of the overall mtext object. Remember that if you use a window to define the location of the mtext object, the justification used is TL, or Top Left, and that the width of the window is the width used for the mtext object.

Using the Find/Replace Tab

Use the Find/Replace tab to search for a specific combination of characters and even to replace the found text with a replacement text string. If the Match Case setting is enabled, only text that matches the case of the find string exactly is found. If the Whole Word setting is enabled, only words that exactly match the find string are found; otherwise, even words that simply contain the find string are found.

After specifying the settings, use the Find button to start the search.

Editing Mtext Objects

Edit mtext objects with the DDEDIT and DDMODIFY commands as you would edit text objects. If you want to change a property, such as height, of the mtext object, you must select the entire body of text and then change the property. Don't forget, a triple-click selects all text.

Additionally, you can use grips to move or change the width of the mtext object. When you select the grip point that corresponds to the justification point, the mtext object can be moved. Selecting any other grip point enables you to stretch the width of the mtext object.

The next exercise uses mtext to add the notes shown in figure 16.15.

USING MTEXT TO DRAW PARAGRAPHS OF TEXT

1. Continue to use the drawing ACME.DWG. Restore the view ALL. Make sure the paper space viewport is active and the layer TEXT is current.

2. Issue the MTEXT command by choosing the Text tool from the Draw toolbar.

Specify the point 26,18 as the first corner point. Enter @4,-1 for the opposite corner point. The Multiline Text Editor dialog box is displayed. Set the height to 0.25. Enter the text Notes and press the Enter key twice.

3. Enter the text. The information on this drawing reflects information gathered as of 2/2/97. Press the Enter key twice.

4. Enter the text. This drawing is a preliminary drawing and should not be used for engineering purposes.

5. Select the text Notes and click on the Underline button. Close the dialog box.

Figure 16.15 shows the drawing with the MTEXT object added.

Figure 16.15 ACME with an mtext object added.

6. For now, you are done modifying this drawing, so go ahead and save your work.

Performing a Spelling Check

To check the spelling of your text and mtext objects, issue the SPELL command by choosing the Spelling tool from the Standard toolbar. Figure 16.16 illustrates the Check Spelling dialog box of SPELL.

Figure 16.16 The Check Spelling dialog box of SPELL.

When SPELL encounters an unknown word, the Check Spelling dialog box is displayed, and you must choose to either replace the word, ignore the discrepancy, or add the word to your supplemental dictionary. If no errors are found, a message box appears informing you that the spell check is complete, but the Check Spelling dialog box itself does not appear.

The following exercise takes you through the steps of using the SPELL command to check the text you entered in ACME.DWG.

CHECKING THE SPELLING IN YOUR DRAWING

1. Continue to use the drawing ACME.DWG. Make sure the paper space viewport is current.

2. Issue the SPELL command by choosing SPELLER from the Standard toolbar.

Use the All option to select all objects. SPELL stops at any word it does not recognize. If you use abbreviations a lot, be sure to add them to your supplemental dictionary.

3. If you want to check the spelling of text in model space, you must repeat the SPELL command with the model space viewport current.

4. This is the last exercise for this chapter, so you may end the drawing if you want.

Specifying the Dictionaries

The SPELL command looks up words in as many as two dictionaries at any given time: a main and a supplemental dictionary. Several main dictionaries are supplied with AutoCAD, with the default being the American English Dictionary. The default supplemental dictionary is SAMPLE.CUS (SAMPLE.CUS contains a number of AutoCAD command words and terms). To change the dictionaries used by SPELL, issue the PREFERENCES command. In the preferences dialog box, change the Main Dictionary and Custom Dictionary File settings under Text Editor, Dictionary, and Font File Names in the Files tab.

Unlike the supplemental dictionary, the main dictionary file cannot be modified or added to. You can, however, add words to and change the supplemental dictionary.

Creating a Supplemental Dictionary

A supplemental dictionary file is a simple text file that contains the additional words that you want SPELL to use. The file format is simple--one word per line. You can create as many supplemental dictionaries as you want, but you can only use one at any given time. When you create a supplemental dictionary, be sure to use a CUS file name extension and place it in one of the folders listed in the Support Files Search Path setting in the Preferences dialog box.

Now that you know how to draw single and multiple lines of text, and how to edit the text style and check spelling, you should familiarize yourself with several additional text handling features that are covered in the next section.

Looking at Additional Text Options

The following sections cover several optional text handling features that may prove useful to you. These features will enable you to speed up the display of text, handle missing font files, and insert text files into the current drawing.

Enabling the Quick Text Display

Displaying text, especially text drawn with complex font files, can be time- consuming. When you want to speed up the display of the drawing and do not need to read the existing text, enable the Quick Text mode. You can enable the Quick Text mode through the Drawing Aids dialog box. With Quick Text enabled, text and mtext objects are displayed as simple rectangles. To immediately see the effects of enabling Quick Text on existing text, issue the REGEN command.

NOTE: Even with Quick Text enabled, new text objects are displayed completely, rather than as rectangles, making adding text easier.

Specifying an Alternate Font File

Font files are not stored with the drawing file. If a font file that is referenced in the drawing is not available when the drawing is opened, an error message is displayed. You are then prompted to choose a replacement font file. If you want to bypass all such error messages, you can specify a font file that is automatically used whenever a needed font file cannot be found. This alternate font file is specified by setting the Alternate Font File setting under Text Editor, Dictionary, and Font File Names in the Files tab of the Preferences dialog box. The default alternate font is simplex.shx.

WARNING: A couple of possible problems with using an alternate font occur, however. If the missing font file contains special characters that the alternate font file does not have, the text on the drawing may end up incomplete. Furthermore, because the space that a line of text occupies is dependent on the font file used to generate the text, you may find that the text on the drawing looks out of place or does not fit properly anymore. The best solution is to obtain the correct font files and use them, unless you are sure you have a suitable replacement file.

Mapping Fonts

If you need to specify more than one alternate font file, specify a font mapping file. A font mapping file is a text file where each line in the file specifies the font file to be replaced and its substitute font file (separated by a semicolon). The default font map file is ACAD.FMP. You can change the font map used by changing the Font Mapping File setting under Text Editor, Dictionary, and Font File Names in the Files tab of the Preferences dialog box.

The default file ACAD.FMP (the contents of which are listed in the following list) maps the PostScript fonts that were supplied with R13 to their equivalent TrueType fonts.

Cibt__.pfb = CITYB__.TTF

cobt__.pfb = COUNB__.TTF

eur__.pfb = EURR__.TTF

euro__.pfb = EURRO__.TTF

par__.pfb = PANROMAN__.TTF

rom__.pfb = ROMANTIC__.TTF

romb__.pfb = ROMAB__.TTF

romi__.pfb = ROMAI__.TTF

sas__.pfb = SANSS__.TTF

sasb__.pfb = SANSSB__.TTF

sasbo__.pfb = SANSSBO__.TTF

saso__.pfb = SANSSO__.TTF

suf__.pfb = SUPEF__.TTF

te__.pfb = TECHNIC__.TTF

teb__.pfb = TECHB__.TTF

tel__.pfb = TECHL__.TTF

Drawing Text as Attributes

An alternate method to drawing text objects that are to be incorporated into block definitions is to draw attributes. Attributes behave much like text objects but have additional functions beyond displaying text. Attributes are discussed in more detail in Chapter 12, "Creating and Using Blocks."

Dragging and Dropping Text Files

In Windows 95 and NT, you can drag a text file icon from the desktop and drop it into your drawing. AutoCAD will automatically draw the file contents as an mtext object, using the current text settings for the text height, rotation angle, and text style.

Copying Text Using the Clipboard

You also can copy text from any application to your clipboard and then paste the contents into your drawing. If you use the PASTE command, the contents are dropped into your drawing as an embedded object. If you use the PASTESPEC command, you can choose to paste the clipboard contents as text, in which case the text is drawn as an mtext object.

Be prepared to perform some experimenting if you are going to use the clipboard. The clipboard operations depend on OLE (Object Linking and Embedding), which is a constantly evolving feature. Some windows applications support older versions of OLE and may limit what operations you can carry out and how much information you can copy to the clipboard.

Another consideration is that the form in which the data is pasted into your drawing may limit how much information can be pasted from the clipboard. For example, I copied three pages of text from WordPerfect 7.0 onto the clipboard. I then pasted the data into an AutoCAD drawing, but only one page of the text was displayed. But by using PASTESPEC and specifying that the data should be pasted as text, all three pages appeared in the drawing (of course, I lost all the WordPerfect formatting).

Creating Your Own Shape File

You have the option of creating your own shape file containing the characters you want to use. Creating the instructions that define each character is a laborious procedure because you have to break each character into a series of strokes and enter the codes for those strokes into the new font file. In the earlier versions of AutoCAD that did not support the use of TrueType fonts, defining your own shape file was the only way to add to the font files supplied with AutoCAD. With R14 and the support of TrueType font families, it is much more sensible to simply use one of the fonts supplied with Windows. You can also purchase additional fonts from a number of software vendors at a very low cost.

Using the Bonus Text Routines

In the Text submenu of the Bonus menu and on the Bonus Text Tools toolbar, you will find several powerful routines for drawing and editing text (if you do not see the Bonus menu or toolbar, then follow the installation instructions in the "Using Bonus Tools" section of Chapter 11, "Advanced Geometry Editing"). The tools enable you to create some very interesting effects with text and are covered in the following sections.

Adjusting the Width Factor with TEXTFIT

TEXTFIT is issued by choosing Text Fit from the Text submenu of the Bonus menu or from the Bonus Tools toolbar. It is designed to work with text objects only and will not operate with mtext objects. You use TEXTFIT to adjust the width factor of the characters in a text object. After selecting the text object, the following prompt is displayed and a rubber band is displayed:

Select Text to stretch/shrink:
Starting Point/<Pick new ending point>:

The rubber band is anchored at the left endpoint of the text object. The length of the rubber band represents the distance the line of text is to occupy. The default option is to pick the endpoint of the rubber band, to define that distance. TEXTFIT then calculates and applies a width factor to the text object that will stretch or shrink the line of text to fit the specified distance. Specifying the Starting Point option enables you to move the text to a point you select and then adjust the width factor.

If the selected text was drawn with any justification other than left justification, the point you pick as the endpoint of the rubber band is also used as the new justification point for the text object.

WARNING: If you have to undo the TEXTFIT command, be careful. TEXTFIT changes the UCS (User Coordinate System) during its operation. Unfortunately, issuing a single U will not undo the effects of TEXTFIT, so you will have to issue several U commands to undo the entire command. If you do not issue enough U commands, you may end up restoring the UCS implemented by TEXTFIT, so always check your UCS when undoing TEXTFIT. Instead of using TEXTFIT, you can use the DDMODIFY command to change the width factor of a selected text object and not have to worry about the status of the UCS.

Creating a Mask with TEXTMASK

TEXTMASK is issued by choosing Text Mask from the Text submenu of the Bonus menu or from the Bonus Tools toolbar. It is designed to work with text objects and will not operate with mtext objects. You use TEXTMASK to create a clear area around the text object. Figure 16.17 illustrates a text object with two lines drawn through the text.

Figure 16.17 Using TEXTMASK to obscure the objects running through a text object.

By using TEXTMASK, you can create a clear zone around a text object so that the lines do not obscure the text object. The result of using TEXTMASK illustrated in figure 16.17 suggests that the lines were trimmed. In fact, the lines are still intact. TEXTMASK creates a new type of object named wipeout. A wipeout object acts as a barrier that obscures objects that it covers. TEXTFIT draws the wipeout object in such a way as to obscure all objects except the text object. After selecting the text object, the following prompt is displayed:

Enter offset factor relative to text height <0.35>:

The offset factor defines the size of the wipeout object and is a factor that is multiplied with the text height to obtain the final offset distance (see fig. 16.18).

Figure 16.18 The offset used to size the wipeout object relative to the text object.

The wipeout object is completely invisible, and the rectangular boundary shown in figure 16.18 is not actually visible. Because a wipeout object is completely invisible, TEXTMASK automatically creates a group to link the wipeout object created with the text object for which it is created. So long as the Object Grouping setting in the Object Selection Settings dialog box is enabled, the invisible wipeout object is automatically selected whenever you select the text object for any editing command.

WARNING: In order for the wipeout object to function correctly, the system variable SORTENTS must be set to 127, which TEXTMASK automatically does. Changing the value of SORTENTS can disable the correct functioning of the wipeout object. SORTENTS is set by choosing the Object Sort Method button of the Object Selection Settings dialog box.

Changing Text with CHT

CHT is issued by choosing Change Text from the Text submenu of the Bonus menu or Change Multiple Text Items from the Bonus Tools toolbar. It is designed to work with both text and mtext objects. With CHT, you can change the following parameters of the selected text:

You can use DDMODIFY to change the same parameters that CHT affects; however, the advantage of using CHT is that you can select multiple objects, whereas DDMODIFY can only be used on one object at a time.

WARNING: There seems to be a bug with CHT's Location option (enables you to move the selected object) when an mtext object is selected. With a text object, specifying the Location option enables you to move the object. With an mtext object, the Location option has no effect.

Exploding Text with TXTEXP

TXTEXP is issued by choosing Explode Text from the Text submenu of the Bonus menu or from the Bonus Tools toolbar. It is designed to work with both text and mtext objects. TXTEXP replaces the selected text with a group of polylines. Each character in the text is replaced with a polyline that follows the shape of the original character. The end result of using TXTEXP on a text or mtext object is a group of polylines that resemble the original text characters.

Drawing Text Along an Arc with ARCTEXT

ARCTEXT is issued by choosing Arc Aligned Text from the Text submenu of the Bonus menu or from the Bonus Tools toolbar. It is used to draw text along the outside or inside of an arc (see fig. 16.19).

Figure 16.19 Text drawn along the outside and inside of an arc with ARCTEXT.

ARCTEXT generates a new type of object, the arctext object. After issuing ARCTEXT, you are prompted to select either an arc or an existing arctext object. Select an arc if you want to draw a new arctext object, and select an existing arctext object if you want to edit the object. After selecting the arc or arctext object, the ArcAlignedText Workshop dialog box is displayed (see fig. 16.20).

Figure 16.20 The ArcAlginedText Workshop dialog box of ARCTEXT.

You set the parameters that control the generation of the arctext object with the Format pull-down menu or with the buttons that run along the top of the dialog box. The usage of the controls labeled 1 through p in figure 16.20 is described in the following sections.

Drawing Reverse Text

If you press button 1, the text is drawn backward. This option is similar to the Backwards setting in the Text Style dialog box. The button next to 1, button 2, is inactive as of the time this book was written. Pressing button 2 has no effect whatsoever.

Controlling the Alignment

Buttons 3 through 6 control how the arctext is placed relative to the selected arc. If button 3 is selected, then the arctext object is positioned relative to the left endpoint of the arc. The offset from the left endpoint is set through the Offset from left text edit box.

If button 4 is selected, then the arctext object is positioned relative to the right endpoint of the arc. The offset from the right endpoint is set through the Offset from right text edit box.

If button 5 is selected, then the arctext object is positioned relative to the midpoint of the arc.

If button 6 is selected, then the arctext object is positioned relative to both the left and right end points. The offset from the endpoints is set through the Offset from left and Offset from right text edit boxes.

Positioning the Text

You use buttons 7 and 8 to position the text along the outside 7 or the inside 8 of the arc. Refer to figure 16.19 for an example of both positions.

Setting the Character Direction

You use buttons 9 and j to choose whether the characters are drawn away from the center of the arc 9 or toward the center of the arc j. Figure 16.21 illustrates arctext objects drawn in both directions.

Figure 16.21 Arctext drawn toward and away from the center of the arc.

Setting the Typeface

The Bold k, Italic L, and Underline m buttons are used to set the typeface of the characters and whether the arctext is underlined.

Setting the Color

The color drop-down list (control n) is used to set the color of the arctext. The default color is ByLayer.

Setting the Text Style

The Text Style drop-down list (control o) does not seem to have any effect on an arctext object. You set the font file with the font drop-down list (control p). The text height and width factor of the characters is set with the Text height and Width factor text edit boxes.

Performing a Search and Replace with FIND

FIND is issued by choosing Find and Replace Text from the Text submenu of the Bonus menu or from the Bonus Tools toolbar. It is designed to work with text objects only and will not operate with mtext objects. Use FIND when you want to replace one text string with a new text string. After FIND is issued, the Find and Replace dialog box is displayed (see fig. 16.22).

Figure 16.22 The Find and Replace dialog box of FIND.

Type the text you are searching for in the Find text edit box. Type the text you want to replace the found text with in the Replace With text edit box. If you want to have the search be case-sensitive, then enable the Case Sensitive setting. If you want to automatically search all text objects in the drawing, then enable the Global Change setting. If the Global Change setting is not enabled, then you will be prompted to select the text objects to be searched.

After you set the parameters for the search, click on the OK button. When the first occurrence of the search string is found, a new Find and Replace dialog box is displayed (see fig. 16.23).

Figure 16.23 The Find and Replace dialog box is displayed when the specified text is found.

The number of text objects that have been found to contain the specified text is displayed in the lower-left corner of the dialog box. Click on the Replace button if you want to replace the found text with the replacement text. Click on the Skip button if you do not want to replace the found text. Click on Auto if you want all occurrences of the found text to be automatically replaced.

Summary

AutoCAD provides a variety of tools to deal with drawing and editing text. This chapter covered the basic steps needed to deal with single lines of text in your drawings, as well as how to add multiple paragraphs of text using the MTEXT command. Editing text and defining and changing text style to control the appearance of text was also covered. But remember, using the simple font files such as SIMPLEX.SHX will make text-rich drawings easier to deal with in the long run.

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