Retasking '#' symbol for mtext

Is there a way to use another text symbol for diagonal stacking in mtext
other than the # symbol? I do electrical drawings and we generally show our
conduit and wire sizes like this: 1 1/2"C: 3#1/0, #6G; meaning, 1 1/2"
conduit with three (3) number (#) 1 ought hot wires and one (1) number (#) 6
ground wire. The 1 1/2" I like to show as a stacked, diagonal fraction
without the space between the 1 and the 1/2". TIA

 

Can't you set Mtext to do that for you? (Maybe that depends on what version
you're running.)

If not, a bit cumbersome perhaps, and I think it only does
vertically-stacked, and I haven't tested it in Mtext, but how about the
age-old

{\H0.75x;\Sn/d}

where 0.75 can be replaced with anything you want (the stacked-number size
relative to the main text size), n is the numerator and d is the denominator
of the fraction you want. Those are squiggly-brackets at the ends, and if I
remember right, the H and S must be upper-case.

Kent Cooper, AIA


...

 

Thanks for the reply Kent. You are correct, I think, about the hard code of
mtext, but what I'm needing is to have some other symbol to use for # for
autostacking. I apologize for not making that a little clearer.

 

I doubt you can change which characters are used to trigger stacking, but
that's deeper into the program than I can go.

It's a little cumbersome, but you could enable the stack dialog box and give
it a yes or no answer for each condition. [If it's suppressed, Help says:
"Note To display the AutoStack Properties dialog box when you have
suppressed automatic display, select stacked text, right-click, and click
Properties on the shortcut menu. In the Stack Properties dialog box, click
AutoStack."] But that would also require you to say yes to stack the 1 1/2"
one.

You can also let it stack them, and then pick on them and un-stack them with
the button on the Mtext toolbar. But if you've got a diagonal stack from a
/ (as in your 1/0), it unstacks it into a # instead (1#0).

One more possibility: leave AutoStack running to do the 1 1/2" for you.
Then, since the stacking is triggered by the entering of a space or
non-numeric character immediately after numeric characters with a / or #
between them, you can "fool" it by not putting the / or # between numeric
characters. Put in spaces or punctuation characters or letters before them:

1 1/2"C: 3_#1_/0, #6G

(i.e. with something non-numeric before the first # and the second / -- I
put underscores in for clarity, and that works, but spaces do, too, or
letters). Then go back and delete or backspace those non-numeric characters
out of there. It won't stack the 3#1 or the 1/0 that way, unless you later
go in and enter something else after that 1 or 0.

Kent Cooper, AIA


...

 

Thanks again Kent for your reply. What you have outline isn't much better
than what I am doing currently. Right now I have autostack turned off and
type in 11#2"C: 3#1/0, #6G, then I go back and highlight 1#2 and click on
the stack button. It's a PITA because it takes too many steps to
accomplish, plus it requires me to go from keyboard to mouse and back again
which makes putting in this info even slower.

I guess there is no real solution at this time. Maybe a release down the
road will resolve this issue. Thanks again for your comments. They were
well received.

 

Are there few enough varieties of this kind of thing that you could insert
blocks? (Probably not, with all the possible combinations of conduit size
and number and gauge of both types of wires, especially if you might
sometimes run more than one circuit's wiring in the same conduit.) Or maybe
use blocks with attributes? (I guess that could be tricky to get the
attribute positions to work for any of the range of number of characters in
conduit sizes and wire-gauge designations.)

Kent Cooper, AIA

...

 

Or, long that same vein, a dialog box that would construct the proper
combination and insert it as mtext?

 

You could just type it he first time with a space between the '#' and the
next or preceeding character.

When finished, you can delete the unwanted spaces if you like, this should
retain the '#' and not autostack.

Again, still a PITA but it is a workaround than can be done without touching
the mouse.

 

If its not a long sentence, Dtext is an option.
or for mtext another way I have done is enable autostacking
when you type 1 1/2"C: 3#1/O, #6G is type ## where it stacks like: 1 1/2"C: 3##1/O, #6G then after your finished all the labeling then use search and replace "##" with "#" globally. "just have to remember to S & R".