Discover how to configure AutoCAD using the ACAD.CUIX user interface file and the drawing template file. Learn the process of importing text styles from other drawings to create a customized template file.
Key Insights
- AutoCAD configuration involves working with two files: the drawing template file and the ACAD.CUIX user interface file. The latter controls the appearance of the screen.
- In creating a drawing template, it is common to import data from other drawings rather than starting from scratch. This process includes text styles for customization and standardization in the template.
- When creating a new text style, you assign a font to that style, give it a height of zero, and a width factor. This width factor can be adjusted to control the width of the text and compress dimensions and text into a narrower area.
Note: These materials offer prospective students a preview of how our classes are structured. Students enrolled in this course will receive access to the full set of materials, including video lectures, project-based assignments, and instructor feedback.
When we configure AutoCAD, we're really working with two files. There's the drawing template file, and there is the AutoCAD user interface file. The AutoCAD user interface file, or ACAD.CUIX, is what's controlling what the screen looks like.
And so when we put in the menu bar up here, that data was actually saved to the CUIX file. What we're going to want to do, in addition to that, is to start working on a drawing template file. So I'm going to begin by saying File Save, and I'm going to save the drawing over on my C drive in CAD 304, and I'm just going to call this drawing Temp1.
So I'm in a drawing called Temp1. You can see down here that it's saving it in the AutoCAD 2010 format, and again, that saving in the AutoCAD 2010 format was carried along in the CUIX file. We're just in a drawing called Temp1.
But what I'd also like to do is to begin saving a new drawing template file. So I'm going to go to File. I'm going to choose Save As.
Instead of a DWG format, and you can see again right now I'm in my CAD 304 folder, I'm going to save it as a DWT file. You can see that I'm now in a new folder. So I'm on my C drive, and we'll get into this later, but I'm in my template folder, and I'm just going to call this vdci-01.drawingtemplate, DWT file.
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It's going to say what kind of a name do I want to give it. I'm just going to say vdci-template01. So again, I'm now in my drawing template file, and you can see right here that's the drawing that I'm in.
Now, if I go up to Format, and if I go down to Text Styles, you can see that there's only one text style that comes with AutoCAD, and it's called Standard, and so what's happening is that the Standard font is using Arial, and it has a width factor of 1. What I'm going to do is I'm going to bring in some text styles from a drawing that I like. So I'm going to go to the Insert tab, go over to that ribbon, I'm going to go over to the Design Center. Now, I've already provided you a copy of this drawing in the source files for the class.
I'm going to begin by changing my format to say Details. I'm going to expand this bar to the right. I'm going to slide up.
I'm going to collapse Program Files. On the C drive, I have a folder called CAD304. If I expand that, you see the contents of the folder.
I've created for you a drawing called CAD304 Design Center. Frequently, rather than creating a lot of things for your template file from scratch, people will import data from other drawings into theirs to create their own template file, and so I have three text styles that I like that we've been using in our classes, and those text styles are named Text01, Text02, and Text03. So I want to go on and bring those text styles into the drawing.
I will select the first one, hold down Shift, go down to the third, pick the wheel, hold down, drag, bring it in. I will close the Design Center. If I go up to Format Text Style, you will see that I now have these three styles that I've brought in, Text01, Text02, and Text03.
What you'll notice with all of them is that the height value is set at zero. So what we normally do is we create a text style, we assign a font to that style, we give it a height of zero, and then a width factor. So right now, I'm using a width factor of.75, and let me just show you if I were to change it to one, you can see how much wider the text is than when it was a.75 width factor.
What this allows me to do is to compress dimensions and text into a narrower area. So I'm going to take Text01, and I'm going to make it my current text style. Now if you ever want to create a new text style, you could go New, you could give it a name.
I'm just going to call it Temp01, and then I choose a font for it. I'm just going to choose Bell, just to have something there. I give it a height of zero, and I would give this potentially a width factor, I'm going to say of.85. So you can again see, by changing the width factor, what it looks like.
I'm going to go back and make Text01 my current, and I'm going to get rid of this Temp01. So I just clicked on it, right button, delete, and go close. So what I've done is I've been able to import text styles from other drawings to use in my template.
And then I'm just going to go File, Save, and I'm now saving my template file. If, for example, if I were to go File, New, and if I were to use my BDCI template drawing file, you can see that this new drawing, which I have not yet saved with a name, if I go to Format, Text Style, you can see that by having brought in those text styles from my Design Center drawing into my template file, now the new template file is carrying that information with it, and I can begin standardizing information such as text styles within the drawing. I'm going to close the drawing and discard the changes, and what we're going to work on next will be importing dimension styles.
