Cadapult, Ltd. is offering the following classes at our Newark, DE training Lab.
(Cadapult is convenient to the greater Philadelphia or Baltimore Areas, including Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey and Pennsylvania)
2- Day CIVIL 3D 101
November 13 + 14
Download Agenda and sign up form here
2- Day MAP 3D 101
October 30 + 31
Download Agenda and sign up form here
For more details, more classes and more information, check out the Cadapult Training Calendar
In my post a few days ago about theMiracle and Reality of Autosizing Label Text, it became clear that you would need a strategy to manage labels for different viewport scales.
If you need to manage this in the same drawing, here are some ideas that might help make things more clear. The only method I use below that would not work in Civil 3D 2006 is the General Note Label for duplicate parcel areas.
THE PROBLEM:
The same site has to be shown at 1″=100′ for an over all plan, while my road plans need to be shown at 1″=50′. Not only is text size an issue, but also the content. My parcels don’t have to show nearly as much information in the overall plan. Without a double labeling strategy, this is what I wind up with:
So we need to make a second set of labels. This isn’t hard and it is certainly easier than maintaining two sets of dtext (argh). I remember a piping project that I worked on. I was paired up with an AWESOME CAD guy named Dave. (Hi Dave!) We were constantly changing lengths, inverts and other such on these storm pipes. Since the agency required both overall plans and detailed plans, that meant TWO SETS of dtext that we had to remember to change every time. And since I am a fickle designer, poor Dave was changing a lot of text. It was awful.
Double labeling is different. We anticpate this situation in our Civil3D.dwt, so these styles will be set up once you set them up the first time. And all we have to do is set the labels in- they will change with the model.
THE SOLUTION
EXAMPLE 1- ALIGNMENTS
Copy your label syles in question, or make child styles for them. In the copies, change size and layer (plus anything else you might want different at the other scale) Then make an alignment label set that includes both types. Just choose this label set when you make your alignment the first time, OR if your alignment is already in the drawing pick it, right click choose edit labels and import your label set.
EXAMPLE 2- LINES/CURVES
Same thing. Copy the label style in question, make size and layer changes. Don’t forget to check things like x and y offset.
Parcel “Multiple Segment” label choice is smart enough not to duplicate a label on a given segment, so you will have to use the single segment choice and manually choose your midpoint.
EXAMPLE 3- PARCEL AREAS
This one doesn’t work in 2006 since reference text does not exist in 2006, however it works for this and many other situations in Civil 3D 2007. For those of you in 2006, see below. I am pretty sure you can use the next trick for some tasks.
Make a general note label with a piece of reference text that references parcels. When you insert the label, it will ask you to pick a parcel. Note text isn’t smart enough to find the center of the parcel you pick, so you have to manually place.
PARCEL NAME TRICK WITH FIELDS
I just checked- this works in 2006 as well.
Fields are way underused by most AutoCAD users. Since Civil 3D is built on AutoCAD, you have access to them.
Fields can be called up in dtext, mtext, tables, and more. This is static from a size and rotation perspective, but the data will change with your model.
Make a piece of dtext (or mtext) oriented and sized the way you’d like. Before typing, right click and choose insert field.
In the fields box, find the object section of the pulldown and choose your parcel (push the little picker button circled here) then choose Name. (NOTE: This means your parcel NAME not number. It is easy to make Name=Number if you go into the parcel style and turn off the name template option, or just make your name template=number)
The field will populate with the parcel number. If you haven’t used fields before, don’t let the grey scare you. It just means “I am a field”. It doesn’t plot or do anything stupid.
This is a great solution, but note that it will not react to dview twist nor autosize like Civil 3D labels.
The end result- I apply layer control to turn off my 0.08″ Labels and TADA!
Everyone is happy.
*******
Except James. (Addendum by Dana because I hadn’t thought about things the same way that my mentor, Mr. Wedding did. And I’d like to share his thoughts)
There are a few other ways to deal with this.
1) Using the Note label for the “extra stuff”. For example, in my parcels above, I could alternatively use the note for the Owner, Area, etc. and find a compromise for a readable Lot Number. That way, there is no redundant information. The same technique could be used for many things. These are just ideas.
2) Using the project environment you can create a data reference (see James’s comment below)
There are many ways to tackle this and a lot of it depends on how you work now, how you’d like to work, what requires the least amount of steps and how picky your review agencies and clients are. Keep your comments coming- this helps me help our clients better.
There are a few ways to implement Civil 3D, and I am still trying to figure out which one is the best.
You may have noticed that I do some design work. By day, I am the Mary Poppins of Civil 3D, going from firm to firm spreading sunshine, sugar and good manners. I make sure people take their medicine and make cleaning up CAD standards into a game. But by night and on weekends, I do project work for two local firms.
One of the firms I am working with started implementing Civil 3D in small chunks. The main motivator for the first project was the extreme dislike of Land Desktop/Civil Design’s pipeworks routines.
I coached them through a rather stressful pipe project, but the process helped iron out a template and exposed me (and them) to more of the realities of using Civil 3D as your production tool.
Since then, I came onboard as a “fill in the blank” team member, and we have managed to do more with Civil 3D. I occasionally get stressed out because I have a vision of the “perfect” Civil 3D project that has not a single AutoCAD line, arc, curve, circle or dtext in it. So when I come into the office and hear that Joey took care of the predevelopment soils lines the old fashioned way, I used to get really sweaty and say “STOP RIGHT THERE” but I soon learned that the realities of getting work out the door and keeping the Stone Cutter PMs happy sometimes has to win over.
As long as my model data is not being exploded or damaged, I really can’t complain. So I spent some time educating the other users to help them identify what is a “ask before explode” item in a Civil 3D drawing.
It is a game of give and take. As long as you aren’t approaching things haphazardly- ie you have a semi-established template, you know the parcel rules, you understand how the program works, you’ve had some classes and done your homework- there is nothing wrong with leveraging a new piece of the software every project and continuing to build your skill arsenal and your template at the same time.
This particular group has several projects that were land planned a year ago, but are just now getting the detailed design go-ahead. So in that case, we haven’t parcelized the parcels- just using them as an xref for now- so we can focus on building a great corridor and doing pipe networks.
Other projects, maybe you just do the parceling in Civil3D and the rest gets handed off to another department or designer that just isn’t ready.
That’s ok!
Each project gets easier.
The skill that took you a few days to master on this one (for me it was a giant corridor and multiple challenging pipe networks on my current one), will fly on the next one, when maybe you tackle coming up with a method to use parcels for your stormwater subcatchments (check out my AU class for more on that!)
Just be concious of keeping track of the styles you have made on this project and keep adding them back to your standard template. Don’t get caught in the “make it new every project” game.
So take a deep breath, slow down and realize that even a big geek like me needs baby steps sometimes.
I crack me up.
Anyway, mea culpa, I was wrong. I’ll repeat that, I was wrong. The problems I ran into last week had nothing to do with the _recover file, but with the Pipe Network and Data References I was using.
At the time, I did speak with some brilliant guys, everything else seemed to be working, and the only culprit we could find was the use of the _recover file. A week later, things start going south again, we have a bit more time to investigate, and no _recover was involved. More conversations, e-mails and a full Vault shipment later, and it appears the pipes were the source of my problem. It would appear that the problems will be addressed in the SP2 release (No, I don’t know when,) and we’ll move forward.
In the meantime, _recover still gives me the creeps. If I haven’t done just a ton of work since my last save, I would simply go back to the last saved version, or to getting the Latest Version from the Vault. With that said…
If you’ve done a lot of work, and _recover is your only hope, then try this out. I don’t like the Naming Conflicts that arise, but I think I can work around them. This technique is a best guess! I don’t have a crash suspect handy, but I’ve moved data references using this technique before. Here’s how:
I cannot test this right now, it’s time to go push the kiddo on the swing. If you crash out, and recover is your hope, it’s worth a shot. Let me know how it works. If it doesn’t work, I’ll post that as well!
Well, it seems that wblocking a dwg with data objects in it is NOT the end of the world. My speculation was thankfully incorrect.
There does seem to be an issue the first time you try to check in a wblocked version of your drawing, but if yo uncheck the objects, check in the dwg, then check it out and in one more time, they appear to slide right in. More investigation is still in order, and the whole thing makes me nervous to be honest.
It works, but it’s an exciting ride….
Update Part 2:
_recover might not be the problem. Yep, I might be wrong. It’s been known to happen.
Right now we’re tracking down a problem with pipe networks and certain labels that might be the source of my fun. A full recant to come? Possibly, stay tuned, dear reader.
