Simplify?

Perhaps someone here can shed some light on this for me. I'm not great at
lsp (old-school I know ), but I can follow along...
Our office uses a custom mnu file for drawing files. Basically it automates
most of the repetitive operations, except one. In order for the block and
text scales to insert properly at plan scale we have this:

[1:1000 ](setq scale 1.00)(setvar "LTSCALE" scale)(setvar
"USERR1" scale);limits;off;-UNITS;2;2;2;4;90;Y;-UNITS;;;;;270;;GRAPHSCR

- and there are a number other common scale choices. This is used to scale
the blocks on insert as well as to set text height as such:

[ Leroy 80 ](setq textscale (* scale
2.0));-STYLE;LEROY80;ROMANS;!textscale;1;0;;;;

- and there are a number of text styles...

It all works pretty well, until you have to change scales (for Details and
Layouts), in which you have to reset the text height for each text style you
are using.

What would be great is if after setting the scale it would automatically
update all the text style heights with one click of the mouse. If it set all
the text styles it wouldn't be a problem as the unused ones would simply be
purged out later. If someone could point me in the right direction for this
operation that would be great.

 

Consider defining the text styles with zero height, so that it will ask for
the height each time you use them. Then in the menu item by which you
invoke the use of the text, have it feed in the height (as a multiplier of
the current LTSCALE or DIMSCALE or something) in the appropriate place in
the prompt sequence. Then you don't ever have to redefine the text style.

Kent Cooper, AIA


...

 

You could use the "tblnext" function to search for all the styles. Then set the default text height one by one until you get them all.

Tim

 

my guess is you like to have predefined text heights and so kent's advice
might not be acceptable
So another approach might be to create your text styles with the name
containing the scale of the main scale you will use.
(sorry sounds confusing) ie "1000-Leroy 80" for example would be for you
main working scale. And other layouts having other scales would use a text
style of 200-Leroy 80 (if we assume a new layout scale might be at 1"=200').
Or insted for details you could add something like "Det40-Leroy 80" for a
detail text style drawn at 40' scale.

 

containing the scale of the main scale you will use.<

No doubt a good way to keep track of the details and their scales. In
addition to my first post, there is a custom dimensioning routine that
relies on the current textstyle and is fully automated, so a prompt for the
text height in every instance would drive anyone nuts. What I'm looking for
is a way to: 1. Set scale (for details or main), 2. Have the text styles
update automatically according to the scale selected. Maybe a subroutine
appended to the scale routine? Perhaps "tblnext" as Tim mentioned, that can
be automated right?

Greg

 

I only use 1 text height but I have many scales in my drawings so to switch
between the scales I use a pulldown menu that switches my dimstyle & text
height etc.. here is a line from my menu to switch to 1/2" : ft.

[24 1/2"=1']^C^C-DIMSTYLE;;24;-STYLE;standard;;2.25;;;;;LTSCALE;9

You could add more text style switches for your different heights & styles.

Rick

 

You could redefine the scale command to update the dimlfac of the dimensions
by the scale factor (dimlfac would go down as the scale goes up)

 

LTSCALE has no relation to text heights or DIMSCALE as it is set to how one
likes the linetypes to display. Some like LTSCALE to equal one, some like
0.5, some like 1/3, etc. so if the LTSCALE was changed it would change your
heights etc. Why not use the DIMSCALE which is set up on the plot scale no
matter what the LTSCALE factor is?

heights for L80, L100, & L120 at 1:1 scale. In this case, they are hard
coded to 0.08, 0.10 & 0.12 respectively. This allows for a multiplication
factor with respect to the new ltscale. I'm working as an engineer, so I
will use an example as it applies to decimal feet.

achieve the following style changes:

you may ever have and their 1:1 text heights, you will be able to apply the
LTSCALE as a scaling factor and achieve your new style heights.

 

(defun c:TextDefaultHeight ()

(setq dh1 0.125); whatever you text height is when plotting 1:1
(setq tsf1 (getvar "dimscale")); text scale factor
(setq nh1 (* dh1 tsf1)); get new height for text
(setq tbl1 T); used to search style table

(while (setq tb2 (tblnext "style" tbl1))
(setq to1 (entget (tblobjname "style" (cdr (assoc 2 tb2)))))
(setq to2 (subst (cons 40 nh1) (assoc 40 to1) to1))
(entmod to2)
(if tbl1
(setq tbl1 nil)
)
)

(princ)

)

Here is something quick. It changes all the style default height per the dimscale. If you use another factor then just substitute that in where the text scale factor is.

Maybe someone can tell us how to hook this up to a reactor, so that whenever the dimscale changes the program will run automatically.

Hope it helps,

Tim

 

Andrew,

With a couple of changes (ft to m) it works very well. I should have no
trouble adding it into our lsp routines. I really like the way it's so
unobtrusive on the command line, very neat and clean. This will allow me to
make a few more tweeks and clean ups of our custom lsp, I can now have the
styles defined in the template and add a simpler style change using
"textstyle" instead of all that gobbly gook there is now. I'll have to keep
the old code around the mnu file, but I think I will almalgamate it all into
one menu item in cases where the template is not used.

Greg

heights for L80, L100, & L120 at 1:1 scale. In this case, they are hard
coded to 0.08, 0.10 & 0.12 respectively. This allows for a multiplication
factor with respect to the new ltscale. I'm working as an engineer, so I
will use an example as it applies to decimal feet.

achieve the following style changes:

you may ever have and their 1:1 text heights, you will be able to apply the
LTSCALE as a scaling factor and achieve your new style heights.

 

Now all I need is a cool little toolbox that shows the current scale and
test style.... Hmm

Thanks for your help!

Greg

heights for L80, L100, & L120 at 1:1 scale. In this case, they are hard
coded to 0.08, 0.10 & 0.12 respectively. This allows for a multiplication
factor with respect to the new ltscale. I'm working as an engineer, so I
will use an example as it applies to decimal feet.

achieve the following style changes:

you may ever have and their 1:1 text heights, you will be able to apply the
LTSCALE as a scaling factor and achieve your new style heights.

 

Greg,
I'm glad it worked for you. As previosly stated, you may want to alter where the program gets its current scale factor. Relying on LTSCALE is a bad habit I've gotten into with our company standards.

As far as a toolbox for current scale and text style, I haven't had much experience with creating toolbars, but I agree and wonder why they haven't made the Text toolbar like the Dimension toobar, where you can not only see your current style, but select the desired one from a combo box.

(setvar "MODEMACRO" "TextStyle: $(getvar,textstyle) | Scale:
$(getvar,ltscale)")

The above code will show your current text style and the value of LTSCALE in the lower left corner of AutoCAD. Maybe you can settle with that.

Andrew