Geoff Briggs

You can do quite a lot with the Custom Too/Attribute command. Format a block of text the way you want. Leave the Text tool selected. Invoke the command. Check the boxes as appropriate, hit OK and name the resulting script. Any such script show up in a script palette which you'll find in the Window menu. You can rename the palette via the Resources Palette , save it with your templates or import it. To use it, select the Text tool then double click the command in the palette. That said, it would be whole lot easier if text attributes were part of class attributes. Then text classes could easily be preconfigured and selected from the pull down. Changing text to one of your style sets would be easy too using the Object Info Palette, something not possible with the script.

I would love a simple method of showing an enlarged view of a small part of a model. For example I might create a model of a piece of furniture, a table say, and want to show an exploded view of one joint or detail. Using layer links I'd need to mask the rest of the model on the linked layer which is cumbersome and doesn't work well with QD3D or RenderWorks. Thanks.

I have heard this requested from many users in my role as trainer and user group organizer. I call it blackboard mode as it resembles the simple uncluttered line drawings one might sketch or draw on a blackboard. Very useful for shop drawings. Geoff Briggs

Hi all, there used to be an option in the replace symbol dialog box to replace all instances of a symbol. This is no more. What's the best way to do it now. Custom selection won't select symbols in walls, so that's not an option. Thanks. Geoff Briggs

There is a neat piece of shareware called Print to PDF by James W Walker which works via the Chooser and only costs 10 or 20 bucks. Works pretty well.<www.jwwalker.com> Good luck. Geoff Briggs

Tim, sorry but you can't link a link. Too bad, think of the trouble you could get into if you could. I'm exploring VectorScript for this. Thanks. Geoff

Mike, cool idea. Thanks. Geoff

Mike et al, I'm quite familliar with layer links. In fact it was in a file with multiple layer links that I discovered the masking phenomenon. Here's the situation: a table is modeled on two layers, the base on one, the top on another. I want a sheet showing both the complete table and just the base. I set up two layers for the purpose of linking, one links both the top and base, one just the base. By making only these two layers visible, adjusting the scale and unlocking/moving the links I can show both models simultaneously. This works just fine when rendered solid, or when only the bottom layer is raster rendered. But raster render both and only the top (as set in the Layers dialog) is visible. It seems that raster rendering paints a white background even where there are no objects, thus obscuring any visible layers below. Since you cannot link a link, I am hoping there is another solution. Thanks. Regards, Geoff

Howdy, is there any way to view more than one layer rendered in either QD3D or RenderWorks? It appears that both these rendering options obscure any layers below them making any scenario where two rendered layers are both visible impossible. Cheers, Geoff

Hi, I'd like to be able to re render all the visible layers in VW file so if I have multiple layer links on screen at once (what I call a multiview) I can re-render all with a single command. This is needed to update the multiview if a change is made to one of the source layers. Currently I have to make each layer active and then re-render one at a time. Thanks, Geoff