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 August 2009

Custom Button #13: Insert Your Favorite Settings From a Button

You open a drawing and want to add a note… but your company's recommended layer and text style are not in the drawing. Or say you're just reviewing the drawing, and need to add a Revision Cloud… but the layer you like to use isn't there.

There are two ways of working with AutoCAD: Begin a New drawing - possibly using your template (.DWT) - or open an existing drawing. When you use a template, ideally, your favorite layers, text styles, dimension styles, etc. are already there.

Note: You can go to Michael's website on the "AutoCAD Stuff" link and download his sample template. Also, for coverage on creating a template and its contents, see Basics, February 2004.

But when you open someone else's drawing, the Named Objects from the template aren't there. (For coverage of the Rename dialog box which lists all the values for the current drawing's named objects, see Power Tool, June 2003).

This month's tool palette button automates the loading of your favorite settings.

Here's What We Know

• The Template (.DWT) has all our favorite settings (named objects) for Layers, Text Styles, and Dimension Styles.

• The Insert command enables you to insert a DWG into your current drawing.

• When a drawing is inserted, the named objects of that drawing are added to the list of existing named objects.

• Therefore, if we could make a .DWG from our .DWT, we can then make a button to Insert that DWG!

The Goal: To insert the CT_Master drawing into the current drawing.

The Problem: The Insert command opens the Insert dialog box… and a macro will come to a screeching halt.

Instructions to Prepare and Create a Button to Insert Your Settings

1. Begin a new drawing with your template.

2. Save that drawing to your AutoCAD's ..\Support folder as CT_Master.DWG, or with whatever name you prefer.

   Note: The reason I'm having you put it in the ..\Support folder is because that folder is typically in the default collection of support file search paths. (OptionsFiles Tab, Support File Search Path). If you have another location where you would prefer to save this file, be sure that location is added to (or already exists in) the Support File Search Path collection. This will save a step when creating the Command String for the button.

3. Open the Tool Palette window, then you will need a blank button to work with (see Michael's Corner Odd Spot, April 2007).

4. Right-click on the blank button, then click Properties.

5. Edit the Command String field to read as follows:

   ^C^C-INSERT;"CT_Master";0,0;1;;;

   To suppress the dialog box and issue the command line version of a command, you can place a hyphen in front of the command; in this case –INSERT. The following are the prompts you will see along with the responses you have in the macro.

   Enter block name or [?]: "CT_Master"
   Specify insertion point or [Basepoint/Scale/X/Y/Z/Rotate]: 0,0
   Enter X scale factor, specify opposite corner, or [Corner/XYZ] <1>: 1
   Enter Y scale factor <use X scale factor>: [Enter]
   Specify rotation angle <0>: [Enter]

   

6. Enter a Name and a Description (optional) for this tool, then click OK. Ah, and if you right-click on the empty image location, click Specify Image and go find one of five different raster image file types.

7. To test it, open any drawing that doesn't have the layers, etc. from the master drawing, then click the button… then check the layer list!

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