Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
Setting Up the Drawing Limits
One of the big advantages of using AutoCAD is that you can draw at full scale; you aren't lim-
ited to the edges of a piece of paper the way you are in manual drawing. But you may find it dif-
ficult to start drawing without knowing the drawing boundaries. You can set up some arbitrary
boundaries using the Limits feature. You got a taste of the Limits feature in Chapter 2. You'll use
it again here to set up a work area for your next drawing.
THINGS TO WATCH FOR WHEN ENTERING DISTANCES
When you're using Architectural units, you should be aware of two points:
Use hyphens only to distinguish fractions from whole inches.
•u
You can't use spaces while specif ying a dimension. For example, you can specif y eight feet, four
•u
and one-half inches as 8´4-½˝ or 8´4.5, but not as 8´-4½˝.
These idiosyncrasies are a source of confusion to many architects and engineers new to AutoCAD
because the program often displays architectural dimensions in the standard architectural format
but doesn't allow you to enter dimensions that way.
Here are some tips for entering distances and angles in unusual situations:
When entering distances in inches and feet, you can omit the inch (˝ ) sign. If you're using the
•u
Engineering unit type, you can enter decimal feet and forgo the inch sign entirely.
You can enter fractional distances and angles in any format you like, regardless of the current
•u
unit type. For example, you can enter a distance as
@½<1.5708r
, even if your current unit sys-
tem is set for decimal units and decimal degrees (1.5708r is the radian equivalent of 90°).
If you have your angle units set to degrees, grads, or radians, you don't need to specify
•u
d
,
g
, or
r
after the angle. You do have to specify d, g, or r, however, if you want to use these units when
they aren't the current default angle system.
If your current base angle is set to something other than horizontal from left to right, you can
•u
use a double less-than symbol (<<) in place of the single less-than symbol (<) to override the
current base angle . The << assumes the base angle of 0° to be a direction from left to right and
the positive direction to be counterclockwise.
If your current angle system uses a different base angle and direction and you want to specify
•u
an angle in the standard base direction, you can use a triple less-than symbol (<<<) to indicate
angles. Note that this works only if Dynamic Input is turned off.
You can specify a denominator of any size when specifying fractions. However, be aware that
•u
the value you've set for the maximum number of digits to the right of decimal points (under
the Precision setting in the Length group of the Drawing Units dialog box) restricts the frac-
tional value AutoCAD reports. For example, if your units are set for a maximum of two digits
of decimals and you give a fractional value of
5
⁄
32
, AutoCAD rounds this value to
3
⁄
16
. Note that
this doesn't affect the accuracy of the actual drawing dimensions.
You can enter decimal feet for distances in the Architectural unit type. For example, you can
•u
enter 6´-6˝ as
6 . 5´
.
