One of the most powerful features of tool palettes is the ability to create a palette that contains references to all the block definitions in a single reference drawing. Because you undoubtedly already have one or more symbol library drawing files, let's start there. Most of you have a set of sample files that were copied into the C:Program FilesAutoCAD 2008SampleDesignCenter folder during the default installation. I'll use the blocks defined in one of those files—Landscaping.dxf—for this example, so the resulting tool palette is named Landscaping. The following steps walk you through a number of things you can do with tool palettes:

It's easy to create a new tool palette containing all the block definitions in a symbol-library drawing—so easy that it probably makes sense for you to create one for each of your symbol drawings. You may notice that AutoCAD 2007 displays a lot of long tool palettes. To reduce the clutter on the screen, you can make a new group for the tool palettes you're creating and turn off all the others. Here are the steps:

Now that you have a new palette that contains block references, let's control the properties that one of those blocks has when inserted into a drawing. For this example, use the block named Tree - Deciduous Plan. The tree symbol as drawn measures 120 units across. It would accurately represent a tree 10 feet across if I were using it in an architectural drawing where the basic units were inches. However, I want to use it in a civil drawing, where the units are feet. A tree 120 feet across would be much too large. I'd also like the symbol to be placed on the layer L-PLNT-DEMO automatically, so I don't have to remember to set that as my current layer or to change it after the fact. I also don't like the rotation angle at which it the symbol was created, because it looks too regular with the horizontal and vertical lines used for the symbol. Here are the steps you can take to change the properties:

Figure 3.6. Turning off tool-palette groups

Figure 3.7. Opening the Tool Properties window

Figure 3.8. Changing the properties of a tool

Now that you know how to create a tool palette and add it to a new group, let's create a blank palette and add some other kinds of tools to it.

Create a new tool palette by right-clicking a tool palette title and selecting New Palette. Name this one Drawing. Notice that the first item on the empty palette is Learn About Customizing Tool Palettes. Selecting this option opens the New Features Workshop.

To create a new tool from any existing object, do the following:

In Figure 3.9, I've already dragged a polyline onto the tool palette, and I'm in the process of placing an aligned dimension just below the polyline.

For each of these tools, a flyout is created automatically. This flyout gives you access to all the commands related to that object. Even though you used a polyline as an example when creating the drawing tool, if you select the small arrowhead in the lower right corner of the icon and pause, a flyout with tools for lines, arcs, circles, splines, ellipses, rays, and xlines appears. And no matter what kind of dimension you place, the flyout gives you access to all of them: Aligned, Linear, Arc Length, Radius, Jogged, Diameter, Angular, Ordinate, Quick, Baseline, Continue, Quick Leader, and Tolerance (see Figure 3.10).

The toolbar displays the last option you selected from the flyout. I often place the draw and dimension commands on a tool palette more than once. There are two reasons: First, I can use one tool for lines that are to be placed on a specific layer and a different tool for lines on a different layer. Second, I can place all dimensions on a DIM layer but have different dimension commands displayed so I don't have to go through the flyouts each time I want a different one. (See Figure 3.11.)

Figure 3.9. Dragging a tool onto a tool palette

Figure 3.10. Tool palette flyouts

You can also add hatch patterns to a toolbar. You can either drag an existing hatch pattern from the drawing onto the toolbar, as I did with the line and dimension commands, or you can use the file-management pane on the left of the ADC to locate a specific hatch-pattern file. The default file is ACAD.PAT for Imperial drawings and ACADISO.PAT for metric. Because they're both buried in your personal settings under the C:Documents and Settings folder, it's far easier to place a hatch pattern using the HATCH command and drag it onto the toolbar. Once it's there, right-click the pattern icon, select Properties, and set the angle, layer, and so on.

Prior to the development of the CUI in AutoCAD 2006, you could drag commands directly from the Customize dialog box. That isn't possible as of AutoCAD 2006. If you want a command that's not represented by an object that can be dragged onto a palette, copy (right-click) an example from the sample Command Tools palette that ships with AutoCAD (See Figure 3.12), and paste it (right-click again) onto yours.

Figure 3.11. Displaying different flyout options

Figure 3.12. Copying existing tools from the sample tool palette

Figure 3.13. Editing the command string

Once the command is on your palette, you can right-click and edit the properties to add any command string you want. This is particularly useful for running Lisp programs or menu macros from the tool palette, as shown in Figure 3.13.

You can easily export a tool palette for use on a different computer or as a backup. Once you export a tool palette, a different user can then import it. The result is an XLM file, but its extension is .xtp. To export a tool palette, open the Customize dialog box, and right-click the name of the palette you want to export. Give it a name, and save it in the location of your choice. AutoCAD creates a folder with the same name as the tool palette to hold the image files used on the palette.

A different AutoCAD user can't access to this tool palette unless they import it using the same process. The default location of the tool palettes used by AutoCAD is C:Documents and Settings%username%Application DataAutodeskAutoCAD 2007R17.0enuSupportToolPalette (%username% represents the logon name of the current user).

The CUI is nice, even for long-time users who have done a lot of customizing in the past. The best thing about the CUI is that most, but not all, customizing is performed using the same techniques, whether you're modifying pull-down menus, toolbars, or any other menu-related item. Here's how to customize the CUI:

The completed toolbar, shown in Figure 3.17, includes some commands, an express tool, and two control windows. Here's a complete list:

Because this toolbar contains all the tools I want on a toolbar, I can turn off all the toolbars I don't need and get more drawing space. It's like getting a larger monitor.

Maybe you want to reorganize your toolbar buttons. You do that in the listing in the CUI shown in Figure 3.18, not on the toolbar itself. To rearrange any of the elements, just drag and drop them to new locations.

You can also edit the toolbar or any element of the toolbar by right-clicking the element you want to edit. Using the menu that pops up, you can do any of the following:

Figure 3.17. Custom toolbar

Although it's possible to add an empty button to a toolbar, if you want it to be useful, it must be based on a command. If the command doesn't exist, you have to define it yourself. So, let's start by creating a new command.

The purpose of this particular command is to create text that's always based on the romans.shx font and always placed on the correct layer, at a height of 0.125 for use in a layout. This is an example of how you can use menu macros to enforce office standards by making those standards easy to follow. When the command is complete, the original layer is made current. You just select the location of the text and type.

Use the following steps to create a new command:

Figure 3.18. CUI panel for the custom toolbar in Figure 3.17

The new line should read as follows:

^C^C-style;romans;romans.shx;0;1;0;;;;-layer;m;text;;dtext;.125;0;layerp

The purpose of each element in this macro is identified in Table 3.1.

Figure 3.19. Creating a new menu macro

Once you've created a new toolbar button, you must try it to see if it does what you want it to. It probably won't the first time, but don't get discouraged. Customizing requires troubleshooting. If your button doesn't work, you probably left out a semicolon.

At first blush, it may be hard to imagine why you'd want to add anything to the pull-down menu structure. It seems pretty complete, after all. However, if you use the pull-down menus, you may find something missing, or, more likely, you may want to simplify or rearrange the many existing items. So you can see how to edit the pull-down menu, let's add one overlooked command to the File pull-down: the SAVE command.

I know it looks as if the SAVE command is already there. It's not the same SAVE command you get at the command line, however; it's actually the QSAVE command. But I like the command-line version, because it does something I wish all Windows software did: It lets you save a backup file to a different location, or with a different name, without changing the default path or filename. That's how the SAVE command differs from the SAVEAS command in AutoCAD.

Here is where the CUI starts to look really good, because adding a command to the pull-down menus is almost exactly like adding a new button to a toolbar. First, to avoid confusion, change the name of the existing Save command on the File pull-down menu to Qsave, as shown in Figure 3.20. To do so, select the command, and make your changes in the Properties pane of the CUI. (Notice that the existing macro is ^C^C_qsave.)

Now you can create the new version of the Save command and drag it onto the File pull-down menu. Follow these steps, and look at Figure 3.21 as an example:

Figure 3.21. Adding the command-line version of SAVE to a pull-down menu

Just so you can see the possibilities, let's modify the OSNAP cursor menu—the one shown in Figure 3.22, which pops up when you hold down the Shift key and press the right button on your mouse (or the middle button if MBUTTONPAN is set to 0). If you've ever wished this menu were shorter or organized differently, here is your chance. The OSNAP menu is known as a shortcut menu in the AutoCAD 2006 CUI. The process of editing the shortcut menu is the same as that to edit the toolbar menu:

Figure 3.22. Existing OSNAP cursor menu

Figure 3.23. Customized OSNAP cursor menu

Here is a nice change you can make to the grips menu that will let you grip an object to rotate and copy it at the same time.

This task normally requires three menu picks when using standard grips. Let's get it down to one pick using the following steps (see Figure 3.24 as a guide):

If you use grips, begin noticing where you make more than one menu pick, and consider creating other combination commands for those actions.

Figure 3.24. Adding a command to the Grips menu

I don't think I'm the only AutoCAD user who frequently presses the F1 key when I intend to press Esc, particularly on my laptop. Well, not only can you redefine the F1 key, you can redefine many other keys on the keyboard and have them do something immediately when they're pressed. The function keys are the best candidates for customizing; if you don't use the default settings, why not redefine them? Because I don't use the F1 key to get help in AutoCAD or any other Windows program, I define it as a cancel key in AutoCAD. Because I often snap to a point halfway between the endpoints of two lines, I assign the MEE function of the CAL command to the F4 key (this forces a running osnap of endpoint, where M2P would use the current setting for running object snaps). I often need to use a paint program, so I've assigned the F8 key to open it. I like to place a mark using the UNDO command, so I've assigned that function to the F9 key.

Figure 3.25. Grips menu with the new CopyRotate command

You should consider using all the other function keys for something useful as well—your favorite object snaps, undoing multiple steps, performing various zoom commands, flipping from a layout to the Model Space tab, or issuing any commands that are difficult to type or to find on a menu.

When you select Keyboard Shortcuts in the top pane, you see a listing of the shortcut keys and their current assignments, as shown in Figure 3.26. There are two kinds of keyboard shortcuts: accelerator keys and temporary overrides.

Before you can assign an action to an accelerator key or combination of keys, that action must first exist as a command. Although two versions of a cancel command are already defined—one with a single cancel represented by ^C, the other with a double cancel represented by ^C^C—this example uses a triple cancel. That will cover any situations in which you must press the Esc key three times to return to an open command prompt from a deeply buried command option. Figure 3.27 shows the sequence for creating a command and assigning it to a shortcut key.

To assign a command to a shortcut key, follow these steps:

You now have a new shortcut key.

The fours keys I've assigned are shown in Figure 3.29; they use the macros listed in Table 3.2. Any command name can be preceded with an underscore to internationalize it, and/or you can add a period to let the command be used on a system where the native command has been undefined.

Figure 3.28. The Shortcut Keys dialog box

Figure 3.29. New shortcut keys

Linetypes come in two flavors in AutoCAD: complex and basic. Most people never have any reason to create a basic linetype, but I have made several, including dotted linetypes that can be used to create grid paper at 4, 5, 8, or 10 dots per inch; and a hidden linetype that starts with a gap. Let's look at the beginning of the ACAD.LIN file and see how a linetype is defined, and then I'll illustrate several possibilities for customizing.

The beginning of the ACAD.LIN file looks like this:

;;
;;  AutoCAD Linetype Definition file
;;  Version 3.0
;;  Copyright (C) 1991-2006 by Autodesk, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.
;;
;;  Note: in order to ease migration of this file when upgrading
;;  to a future version of AutoCAD, it is recommended that you add
;;  your customizations to the User Defined Linetypes section at the
;;  end of this file.
;;
*BORDER,Border __ __ . __ __ . __ __ . __ __ . __ __ .
A,.5,-.25,.5,-.25,0,-.25
*BORDER2,Border (.5x) __.__.__.__.__.__.__.__.__.__.__.
A,.25,-.125,.25,-.125,0,-.125
*BORDERX2,Border (2x) ____  ____  .  ____  ____  .  ___
A,1.0,-.5,1.0,-.5,0,-.5

*CENTER,Center ____ _ ____ _ ____ _ ____ _ ____ _ ____
A,1.25,-.25,.25,-.25
*CENTER2,Center (.5x) ___ _ ___ _ ___ _ ___ _ ___ _ ___
A,.75,-.125,.125,-.125
*CENTERX2,Center (2x) ________  __  ________  __  _____
A,2.5,-.5,.5,-.5

Each linetype definition requires two lines of text: a description line and a definition line. The description line has two fields separated by a comma. The first field gives the linetype a name, and the second field contains the description you see when you load the linetype. The definition line has multiple fields separated by commas; it always starts with the letter A, which stands for aligned.

The other fields in the definition line define the linetype as containing a dot, a space, or a line segment. Once you've defined the repeating pattern of the linetype, there are no more fields. A linetype can't start with a space. If you want a space at the beginning of a linetype, start with a dot, then the space, and then the line segment. See Table 3.3 for a description of each field.

I've added two new linetypes at the end of this file. One is a dotted line with a dot spacing of 0.1 to use for making grid paper. The other is a hidden line that has a gap at the beginning for use in special situations (see Chapter 4, "Applying Graphics Standards"). Because of the way linetypes are generated, the first gap is larger than those that follow, and a dot will be at both ends of the line. Because this linetype is used to represent a feature that starts at a visible line, the dot won't show:

;;  User Defined Linetypes
;;
;;  Add any linetypes that you define to this section of
;;  the file to ensure that they migrate properly when
;;  upgrading to a future AutoCAD version.  If duplicate
;;  linetype definitions are found in this file, items
;;  in the User Defined Linetypes section take precedence
;;  over definitions that appear earlier in the file.
;;
*Grid01, 0.1 dot spacing for grid paper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
A,0,−0.1
*Hidden-gap, specialty hidden line .  --.  --.  --.  --.  --.  --.
A,0,−0.125,0.25

There are two kinds of complex linetypes: those that include some text, like "Hot Water"; and those that include a shape, like Batting. This section will cover two different techniques for creating linetypes: The first modifies the ACAD.lin or ACADISO.lin file, and the second uses two Express Tools. I like the first technique for complex linetypes containing text and the second for complex linetypes using shapes.

HOT_WATER_SUPPLY,Hot water supply ---- HW ---- HW ---- HW ----
A,.5,-.2,["HW",STANDARD,S=.1,R=0.0,X=−0.1,Y=-.05],-.2
*COLD_WATER_SUPPLY,Cold water supply ---- CW ---- CW ---- CW ----
A,.5,-.2,["CW",ROMANS,S=0.1,R=30,X=−0.1,Y=−0.07],-.2

Using Express Tools to Create Complex Linetypes

Creating complex linetypes based on shape files is fairly easy with the Express Tools MKSHAPE (Make Shape) and MKLTYPE (Make Linetype). It's a two-step process: First you use the Make Shape tool to create a shape, and then you use the Make Linetype tool to create a linetype that uses that shape. Let's start with the Make Shape tool:

1. Draw a shape consisting of vectors with no solid or gradient hatch patterns. Use a shape that's about one unit long.

2. Select Express → Tools → Make Shape (see Figure 3.30).

   

   Figure 3.30. Make Shape Express Tool

3. Save the shape file with an appropriate name in a folder that's in AutoCAD's search path. This should be a folder that has been placed at the top of the search path using OPTIONS (I discuss the OPTIONS command in Chapter 2, "Managing Your System").

4. Give a name for the shape when prompted at the AutoCAD command prompt.

5. Identify a resolution. The default value of 128 is normally fine for straight lines.

6. Pick an insertion point that will locate the shape properly when used as a linetype.

7. Select the objects you want to use as a shape. Your shape is saved in the file you specified.

Once you've created a shape, you need to use it to create a linetype:

1. Use the SHAPE command to insert one instance of your new shape using the default height and rotation.

   Note

   Because AutoCAD's SHX fonts are actually shapes, you can use text based on one of them with the Make Linetype tool. You may find that easier than editing the ACAD.LIN file.

2. Select Express → Tools → Make Linetype.

3. Create a linetype file in which to place the new linetype definition. Don't select an existing linetype file, such as ACAD.LIN, or it will be overwritten. You can copy the definition into the ACAD.LIN file later, if you choose.

4. Give the linetype a name. It can be the same as the filename, but it doesn't have to be.

5. Give the linetype a description.

6. Pick a starting point and an ending point that have enough room between them for the shape plus some space. (See Figure 3.31.)

7. When prompted, select the shape you inserted, not the original objects used to create it.

8. The linetype is created and loaded. If you want to load it into a different drawing, you can select the file it's in from the Linetype Manager dialog box and load it manually.

9. Select it like any other linetype, and assign it to a layer. The results of using a spline on a layer with the new arrow linetype are shown in Figure 3.32.

Figure 3.31. Defining the starting and ending points of the linetype definition

Figure 3.32. Arrow linetype

Linetype definitions become part of the drawings database when they're loaded. This presents no problem with the linetypes based on text, as long as the text font you use is a standard AutoCAD font. However, you may have a problem with the shape-based linetypes if you send the drawing file to someone else. Unless the shape file is on their computer and in the AutoCAD search path, the shapes won't display.

I've used an arrow linetype for creating egress plans for public buildings. But because the files use linetypes that may not be readable on someone else's computer, when you need such a linetype, you may want to make a block representing an arrow and then insert it along a polyline using the Block option of the MEASURE command. It looks best if you change its properties to spline-fit the polyline.

Note

Enable Linetype generation for each polyline that is either spline-curved or fit-curved when using complex linetypes., Otherwise the linetype pattern may not display uniformly along its entire length. As an alternative, you could set the variable PLINEGEN to 1, but that may adversely affects the appearance of other lines.