ACA 2017: Grip Editing of a Roof Object Outline

It is that time of year again, when the new releases of Autodesk software come out. One of the new features you can look forward to in AutoCAD^® Architecture is the ability to grip edit a Roof Object's outline, allowing you to modify it after the original placement.

As you can see in the image above, in 2016, all of the grips on a Roof are single-function square stretch grips. In 2017, the grips on the Roof outline are enhanced, multi-function grips. Hover over the round vertex grips or the rectangular mid-segment grips to get a pop-up menu offering several grip-edit options.

Vertex Options
For a vertex grip, the Move option is the equivalent to the grip behavior in 2016 and prior. Moving the corner grip moves just the corner point; the other vertices remain in place.

The Remove option does just that, it deletes the vertex.

Of the two roof edges that are deleted, the resulting roof edge will assume the properties of the lowered numbered edge. To see what those properties are, on the Roof contextual ribbon tab, on the Modify panel, select the Edit Edges tool and select the edges on either side of the vertex you plan to remove. The properties in the top row (edge "0") will be applied to the resulting roof edge when you remove that vertex.

The Offset Edges option also allows you to move the vertex, but, unlike the Move option, when you use the Offset Egdes option, the two adjacent edges will remain parallel to their original orientation, and the vertices at the far ends will move as required to allow that.

Mid-segment Options
The Offset option offers the equivalent of the 2016 and prior stretch grip. Selecting this option will allow you to move the entire edge, which will remain parallel to its original orientation. The vertices at either end will move as needed, maintaining the line of the adjacent edges.

To add a new vertex to the Roof, choose the Add Vertex option. The two new Roof edges will inherit the edge properties of the edge they replace.

The Convert to Arc option will convert that roof edge to an arc, and the arc edge of the Roof will be approximated by six straignt segments with the segment endpoints on that arc. (You will not get a conical Roof.)

The arc segment will continue to be treated as one Roof edge; if you desire a different number of segments on the arc, on the Roof contextual ribbon tab, on the Modify panel, select the Edit Edges tool and select the arc edge. In the Roof Edges and Faces dialog, change the value in the Segements column to the desired number of edges.

As with other enhanced grips, in addition to selecting an option from the pop-up menus as noted above, you can select the grip and then, before selecting a new point, tap the CTRL key to cycle through the available options. Preview graphics will show the effects of the currently active option, and, for the mid-segment grip, with ORTHO or POLAR active, if you stop moving the cursor, you will get a tool tip with directions for the current option and a listing of the other options. (For POLAR, a tracking vector must be active for the tooltip to show.)

The brief Screencast below shows the various Roof Object outline grip options in action.

ACA: Grip Editing of Doors and Windows with Standard Sizes

One nice feature of AutoCAD^® Architecture is that you can assign standard sizes to Doors and Windows. This allows the user to select a standard size from a list of the sizes entered into the Style, saving time and minimizing the potential for error.

Better still, when grip editing an instance of a Style with standard sizes, the inital default is to restrict the grip edit to one of the values that is part of a standard size. Does that mean that you cannot use such a style to create a non-standard size Door or Window? No. You can always use the Properties palette to enter a non-standard Width or Height. But you can also use grip editing to do so.

Given the wide range of things that grips on AEC objects can do, I highly recommend turning on grip tips, if you do not already have them on. Check the toggle in the Grips area on the Selection tab of the Options dialog or set the GRIPTIPS system variable to 1.

With grip tips enabled, if you select an AEC object and hover over a grip, you will get a tip on how that grip can be used. In the image below, a Window has been placed, using one of the standard sizes assigned to its Style. The Window has been selected, and the cursor is hovering over the grip, but the grip has not been selected (made "hot") yet.

The first line of the grip tip (yellow box) indicates that the Width and Height of this Window are currently a standard size*. The rest of the tip tells you that you have two options when using this grip - either stretching to a Standard Width (the initial default, as it is first on the list) or to a Custom Width - and that you can toggle between the two by pressing the CTRL key. If you start with a Window that has a Width and Height which are not paired as a standard size, the grip tip is nearly identical, with the exception that the first line indicates that the Window is currently a Custom Width*. The initial default remains to stretch to a Standard Width.

Many AEC grips have more than one state or function, and the tip provides a handy reminder of what those are and how to activate them. In general, the CTRL key is used to toggle through the available options.

When you first make the grip hot, you will be restricted to stretching the grip to a standard Width, as defined in the Style. ACA will display a series of lines, indicating the places to which you will be permitted to stretch the Window or Door. You can stretch to any Width that is part of a standard size, even if it is not paired with the current Height as a standard size. To show this graphically, "long" gray lines are used to indicate Widths that are paired with the current Height in a standard size, and "short" red lines are used to indicate Widths that are part of at least one standard size, but which are not paired with the current height in one. A grip tip will appear to remind you of this, if grip tips are active.

If you press the CTRL key once after making the grip hot (but before left clicking to select a stretch point), you will be able to stretch the grip without any restriction.

* - Unfortunately, if the current Window Width and Height are not a standard size, the tip for the Width grip will read "Custom Width", even if that Width does appear in the standard size list, paired with a different Height. The tip really should read "Standard Size" or "Custom Size", to be less confusing. NOTE: Images in this post were made using ACA 2010. Other versions may have slightly different graphics or text.

Hatch Editing With Grips - 2010 & Later

Here is an AutoCAD^® feature that has been around since the 2010 release, and now that I am using that in the office, I thought it worth a mention, given how easy it makes updating non-associative hatches - even those created in previous releases. Given the problems associative hatches can have when an external reference or an AEC object is part of the boundary (when opening the file, the hatch often tries to resolve itself before all of the bounding objects have been loaded and resolved), I had taken to drawing polyline boundaries on a non-plotting layer and making hatches associative to that, so that I could edit the boundary easily should the area of hatch need to be changed in the future. Having been on the 2004 release for quite some time for production work, I was not able to take advantage of the ability to generate a boundary of an existing, non-associative hatch and make the hatch associative to it. The new grip editing feature makes this additional step unecessary.

To demonstrate the grip editing feature, I have created a square, non-associative hatch (and deleted the original bounding polyline), and drawn another polyline, to which I will extend the hatch, using grip edits.
Selecting the hatch reveals a number of grips. The center grip allows you to move the entire hatch, and was present in releases previous to 2010. The Vertex and Edge grips are new in 2010 (and are also present in 2011). ACA users should be familiar with hovering the cursor over a grip to get a tooltip, possibly listing options, and that technique works here as well.Hovering over a square grip at the perimeter of the hatch (Vertex) reveals that selecting that grip will allow you to initially move the Vertex to a new location, and pressing the CTRL key will cycle to the Remove option, allowing you to delete the Vertex.Hovering over a rectangular Edge grip on a straight segment at the hatch perimeter shows that the intial action on selecting the grip will be to add a new Vertex, and that pressing the CTRL key will cycle to converting that Edge to an arc.Hovering over the rectangular grip of an arc Edge of a hatch indicates that the initial action is to stretch the arc and that you can use the CTRL key to cycle to add a new Vertex and then to convert the arc to a line.

ACA users that have used grip edits on AEC objects will have to remind themselves that the Edge grips can NOT be used to stretch a straight segement, as they can for AEC Polygons.

To make the square hatch fill the drawn polyline with grip editing, use the Move option to relocate the four existing Vertices to Vertices on the polyline.To fill in the remainder, select the Edge grip that is not on a segment of the polyline and use the Add Vertex mode to add a fifth......and sixth Vertex......filling the polyline.
You can, of course, accomplish this simple edit in one step, by selecting the original square hatch, right clicking, choosing Set Boundary from the context menu and then picking the polyline.But in a typical drawing, where you have a lot more linework and, perhaps, several adjoining hatches, and where the linework defining the hatch edges is not a single polyline, I have found grip editing of hatches to be a very useful feature, and one that has virtually eliminated the need to delete an existing hatch and then rehatch the area.