Osnap From

Sander Wel

 Hi Everyone,

Coming from an AutoAD background i've been trying to get the hang of BricsCAD. Works fine so far but i do have a question about esnap functionality. in Acad i use one particular osnap command a lot, it's called From. With this command i can draw for instance a polyline relative to another line by specifying numerical distances relative to the existing line. Does BricsCCAd have a similar function or is it named differently?

Sincerely,

Sander

Roy Klein Gebbinck

https://www.bricsys.com/bricscad/help/en_INTL/CurVer/CmdRef/source/F/From.htm

Louis_Verdonck

 To start drawing at a distance from an existing entity you can use temporary tracking points (first icon on the Entity Snaps toolbar) or acquire entity snap tracking points using Entity Snap Tracking (STRACK field in the Status Bar). See the BricsCAD Help under Drawing Accurately for more information.

Sander Wel

 Thanks! I do however feel the Acad way of implementing this feature is much more convenient. Why not incorporate this in the esnap menu...

Hans De Backer

Hi Sander,
'From' snap has been replaced in the menu by 'tk' (tracking) snap because it is more convenient and powerful, allowing any desired number of steps in any direction before concluding.
It would be interesting to learn why you feel 'from' snap is much more convenient than 'tk' snap?

Kind regards,
Hans

Jason Bourhill

@Hans De Backer:

Hi Sander,
'From' snap has been replaced in the menu by 'tk' (tracking) snap because it is more convenient and powerful, allowing any desired number of steps in any direction before concluding.
It would be interesting to learn why you feel 'from' snap is much more convenient than 'tk' snap?

Kind regards,
Hans

Hans, I recently tripped myself up in client training with 'Temporary Tracking'. To use, you must have snap tracking on, even for the 'From' option. This initially confused me, because I had successfully used it before. As far as I can see this command isn't documented in HELP, and because BricsCAD implements this feature differently, looking at AutoCAD reference material doesn't help. Once you realise snap tracking needs to be on, it is indeed a more convenient and powerful option to FROM.

FROM is of course still available, the regular point option doesn't require snap tracking (offset option does), and is documented in HELP :-)

Regards,

Jason Bourhill

CAD Concepts

Louis_Verdonck

 Hi Jason

I just tested what you wrote "...you must have snap tracking on, ...". It appears that POLAR must be ON and it is also recommended to have dynamic dimensions (DYN) active.  I will add this in the Help.

Jason Bourhill

@Louis Verdonck:

 Hi Jason

I just tested what you wrote "...you must have snap tracking on, ...". It appears that POLAR must be ON and it is also recommended to have dynamic dimensions (DYN) active.  I will add this in the Help.

Thanks Louis, this will be a great help, no pun intended. With so many drawing aids it is easy to misinterpret where they are all doing. This is why for training I initially turn them all off, then turn them on one by one so that you can see there effect. Clearly in this case I got a taste of my own medicine, I'm so use to working with them on I forgot :-)

Regards,

Jason Bourhill

CAD Concepts

David Bolger

Just wanted to say THANK YOU for starting this thread, and THANK YOU to those first couple responses which were so helpful.  I've been beating my head against the wall for like a month trying to figure this out and almost gave up.

Also wanted to chime in as an AutoCAD refugee that I don't draw with Snap toggled to on because then it grabs every spot on the grid and I never use the grid as a reference point.  So, the "from" command works far better for me than the Temporary Tracking option, just because of that.  Until there's a button added in the right-click menu, the button on the toolbar works best for me because then I don't have to take my hand off the mouse to type in a keyboard command.

Okay.  My two cents.  Cheers, y'all! -- Dave