Michael’s Corner

Michael's Corner is a monthly publication written by Michael E. Beall, Autodesk Authorized Author and peripatetic AutoCAD trainer. Michael travels all over the USA, bringing his fantastic experience and great understanding of AutoCAD to his clients. Michael's Corner brings together many of the tips, tricks and methods developed during these training sessions for the benefit of all users.

Michael's Corner provides something for every AutoCAD user. Every month, a number of articles cover a wide range of topics, suitable for users at all levels, including "The Basics" for those just starting out. Essentially, the aim of Michael's Corner is to help all AutoCAD users work smarter and faster.

This month…

From the Vault

Originally published November 2005

Dynamic Block Multiple Insertion Points

This is so excellent! I knew about the ability to assign the Alignment Parameter, but I just learned from Heidi Hewett's webcast that you can have more than one… and toggle between them with the CTRL key!

Although this is my first article on dynamic blocks In these pages, the Alignment Parameter is the easiest to apply and I will have more coverage on dynamic blocks in the months ahead. For additional reading enjoyment, Mark Douglas has a blog called "In the Dynamic Interface" which contains prolific references to dynamic block features. He was very helpful to me as I began my investigation of dynamic blocks in the early days of A2006. [http://mdouglas.blogs.com/in_the_dynamic_interface]

Setup: Start with an existing block. Period. Now you're ready to turn it into a "dynamic block". I'm using a collection of office furniture in the following example.

Instructions to Add an Alignment Parameter to a Block

1. Double-click the block to open the Edit Block Definition dialog box (displaying your block). Click OK to open the Block Editor. It caught me off-guard the first time I opened it, too, but don't panic, you're still in AutoCAD.
2. The Block Authoring palette has three tabs. On the Parameters tab, click Alignment Parameter.
3. Pick two points on the block that define a vector to be used as an alignment axis when the block is inserted. A blue alignment icon is added to the first point specified. In the figure, I picked the lower left and lower right corners of the geometry for the first parameter.
4. Add at least one more alignment parameter. When you insert the block, you can toggle to these alignment "handles" using the CTRL key.
5. Click Close Block Editor and click Yes to save the changes.
6. Use the Insert command and select your block. Before taking the block over to existing geometry, go to an empty area in the drawing and just press the CTRL key to see how you can cycle between the alignment parameters.

Note: When you insert a block with alignment parameters, AutoCAD automatically toggles on the Nearest object snap. That makes sense, but here's the question: Since an alignment parameter is designed to automatically align the block to the geometry it is nearest to, just exactly which side of that geometry does it align to, hmm?

As it turns out, if you approach the geometry from side A, the block will align to one side, if you approach the geometry from side B, the block will make the necessary adjustment to align to the other side. It's pretty cool, but you'll have to play with it to get the feel.

7. Approach the alignment object (the red line in the figures). In the first figure, you see that the cursor is just slightly below the line and the alignment axis runs the length of the block. In the second figure, the cursor is slightly above the line, causing the block to re-orient to the opposite side. It takes some finessing, but it's very cool.

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