Plot Stamps

H Bruce McCrory

In my experience, plot stamps serve several important functions, including plot date and time registering, showing: previous drafter, drawing file name and drawings (and, xrefs) in the drawing file. Am not sure, but think the stamp was custom to the office where I started doing CAD. For my Bricscad use, I don't have the army of experts I was used to relying upon in an office setting. My drafting is all trial-and-error.

Here's what I have learned about Bricscad Plot-Doc's, or, plot documentation, plot stamps, etc..

The easiest to notice is on the Printing/Plotting pop-up. "Plot Stamp" has two choices: header stamp, or footer stamp. Either way, it is 0.15 inches (bigger than my letter sheet Title text) that plants itself mid-point at top or bottom margin of a sheet, shoving the designed borders out of its path. You only see it in a Plot preview and as a brand scorched onto a printed sheet. Plot Stamp in the <Print> menu sucks green boogers.

The next one I found is part of the Fields-Insertion-Menu. There are several. A whole bunch of fields. I had a few on a drawing trying to find a combination that was comfortable to use. The first I tried was a simple date-time stamp from the Plot sub-menu. It refreshed during a print command but defaulted to several dashes during a save. I settled on a [sub-menu] Date>date-time field. The field goes where ever I want it. Then, I tackled the monster text. Text height does not change in an entity listing, so scale away.

The plot doc is not what I am used to, but it does work.

Now, be advised, don't use Fields for Title Block attributes. They are character limited, and a real pain. (I never liked them in AutoCAD.) So, my titles are stripped of attributes (fields) and insert over a border xref as an exploded block. The dummy information text is simple text strings. The Block does not like being inserted into a drawing, and fails, but will as an internal block (insert from drawing's block list.) The plot doc.' even survived.

After one month, one week of license the above is information I have learned.

 

Its_Alive

Strange, I try to only use fields in my title blocks, as I import data in from the office database (saves a lot of typing) , I've never noticed any character limitations.  I also use a field for my plot stamp (the plot date field)  as well, and it works great, it always shows the date of the last plot.

 

Something else I use is a little utility called fineprint (http://fineprint.com/). I have setup watermarks that run across the page to let the reader know if they are looking a draft or production set  of drawings.

H Bruce McCrory

Sorry, Daniel. I'm sure it is my inexperience with creating fields that leads to my bias. It is disconcerting to make numerous entries, while blind. Then, out of malice, the creator of the title block always starts to repeat prompts. Nine of ten people will open a drawing with a bunch of xxx's in the title block.

Roy Klein Gebbinck

@ Daniel:
You seem to suggest that you use Bricscad fields to display database information. If I try inserting a Bricscad field I don't see a 'Database link' option. Please clarify your procedure.

Its_Alive

Hello Roy : )

I am not directly connecting fields with a database per say, but reading in custom drawing properties in from a database, then linking the fields with those properties.

 

An example would be... I  preset a block attribute, let's say;  tagged JobName with a field

%<\AcVar CustomDP.Job Name \f "%tc3">%  

I then add a key/value to the custom drawing properties, eg. Job Name = Rolling Stones Concert Stage, Shanghai.  Now the field will evaluate to "Rolling Stones Concert Stage, Shanghai" in every block with that field.

 

That said,  I use a tool a I wrote to move the many hundreds custom drawing properties around,  see www.cadext.com/downloads/ExtTools.msi  (under the field tab).  The tool lets you move these properties between drawings and a SQLite Database.

 

I do have an actual SQLite field evaluator that I prototyped, see http://www.theswamp.org/index.php?topic=33374 .. but it still needs work.

Anyway the only attributes I edit by hand are room, plan, elevation and section tags otherwise it's a field. I was all happy when Bricsys this brought out this awesome tool.

BTY check out the drag and drop field leader in ExtTools, it's the BOM

Danny

Damian Harkin

Hi Daniel,
How do you use a Custom Drawing Property in a Field?  I don't see these properties in the available field names in the 'Field' dialog.  The dialog doesn't let me type it in.  Help?

Jason Bourhill

Hi Damian,

To see a Custom Drawing Property in the Fields dialogue you must first create one. On the pull down Go to File->Drawing Properties (_dwgprops). In the dialogue click on the custom tab, then add to create a new custom property. Once you have done this return to the Fields dialogue, and you should see your custom field under the Document section. See Attached screen grabs for a custom property called "TestProperty", set to "Test Custom Property".

You can also pull system variables, such as CTAB for the current layout name, lisp variables, etc.

I'm not sure that Bricscad fully supports Fields to the same level as AutoCAD. For example Hyperlinks,  using a Field to reference the properties of a Dynamic Block.

Regards,

Jason Bourhill

CAD Concepts

FieldLispVariable.png

FieldSystemVariable.png

CustomProps-FieldsInsert.png

CustomProps-Fields.png

Its_Alive

Just like Jason, explained.

Also you can use exttools to add or transfer the custom keys/values in dwgprops from dwg to dwg, and also drag in the fields as mtext or as a leader

Cheers : )

Damian Harkin

Thanks you chaps, very helpful!

Damian Harkin

It was there all along, I just didn't see it.  I didn't expect the Custom props to be mixed in with the standard properties.  I should have used a name like "DAMIAN's_TEST_PROPERTY_HELLO_HELLO!!!"