progeCAD support, tips and troubleshooting forum. progeCAD works very similar to some versions of AutoCAD. Moderated.

Moderators: caddit, Moderators

#1510 by studoc
Wed May 25, 2011 9:20 am
Just looking to see if I can jump ship from AutoCad, I have found several things I need already, but how to set running snaps to the function keys....?

Currently in Autocad I have set some running snaps to several function keys, for expediency while drafting.

In ProgeCad I have found the function keys listed in the "keyboard" tab of the "customise" dialog box. However in the "available commands" column the only running snap I can find is, "snap to parallel".

I don't actually use this one... how do I create the ones I want and assign them to the function keys I use....?

cheers,

Stu.
#1511 by caddit
Wed May 25, 2011 5:35 pm
Hello studoc,


The simplest answer is to assign various osnap commands called in transparent mode to the desired hotkey. Transparent commands are a concept from the DOS/UNIX days of AutoCAD when the user interface was much more basic. AutoCAD and progeCAD still support them, though.

To use a command transparently in progeCAD (or AutoCAD) simply preface the command with a single quote mark (') ... i.e. you can assign CTRL+F6 to 'endpoint CTRL+F7 to 'midpoint CTRL+F8 to 'perpendicular and so forth. Then the osnap can adjusted mid-command, for example during the line command. This will actually have the effect of toggling the respective osnap on or off, depending on its current status.


Note - the "_PAR" command you discovered in the menu configuration is actually not used yet. The only transparent commands for esnap available are those listed by the ESNAP command. esnap to parallel is only available via the ESNAP control box (not even via the FORMAT -> ENTITY SNAP menu ... hmmmm)

I hope this helps.

#1516 by studoc
Wed May 25, 2011 10:48 pm
Got it thanks...!

#1539 by studoc
Wed Jun 08, 2011 11:56 am
Back on this..... Progecad is too smart for it's own (and my) good....

Have set up function keys to be assigned to snaps, vis. 'ENDPOINT, but when snapping while drawing, Progecad seems to be turning entity snaps on and off and adding the snaps I choose, via preset function keys, to the list of entity snaps held over in the co-ordinate input dialog box....

I want these to be transparent commands, I want them to go away after one operation, like they do in autocad, what can I do to achieve this...?

#1540 by caddit
Wed Jun 08, 2011 4:20 pm
I want these to be transparent commands, I want them to go away after one operation, like they do in autocad, what can I do to achieve this...?


As stated above, such command will actually toggle the state of that particular esnap option. BTW transparent commands means nothing to do with 'going away after one operation' but means that they can be executed mid-command without cancelling the current operation.

At least you can access those snap options from the function keys, even if it is not exactly like autocad i'm sure this is more of just getting to used to something.

Remember you can always check the current esnap status by clicking on the esnap button in the status bar.

#1542 by studoc
Wed Jun 08, 2011 11:23 pm
well.... it's not going to work....
What happens is a whole lot of snaps are set up by me hitting the function keys I have set up for snaps on the fly, therefore as I am working in a dwg with lots of lines, as you can imagine, I end up snapping to things I didn't want to.

I could keep on going down to turn off ESNAP, but that's hardly equitable, this compounding of snaps, toggling of the ESNAP function actually slows the process of drafting down.

So there's no way through this....?