KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS VS. TOOL PALETTES

[jnj1502]

My company has been fiddling around with customizing the tool palettes in ADT2005 with limited success. The problem is primarily with the images associated with the palette items, and until the problem is fixed I am finding the palettes very aggravating to use.

I am primarily a keyboard user, and I would like to be able to call up, for example, the reference keynote with leader via a keyboard shortcut. However, ADT does not respond when I enter the command "AecDtlAnnoLeaderAdd" at the command prompt. Can anyone suggest a method for bringing this tool to life via the keyboard?

[arcadia_x27]

I've done a search in the help file and the Autodesk Website. It would seem that it is not possible to insert a keynote using Keyboard commands. This was the only item I could find on keynotes using the Autodesk support Knowledge base and it basically states that when the Detail Component Manager was revamped for ADT 2005 alot of the menu driven commands were moved to the Tool Palettes. I dont use the Keynote functionality at all so I dont have alot of expertise with it but it maybe possible to create a macro or custom script to do on the keyboard what has to be done on the Tool Plaette.

What are the specific issues youre having with the images on the Tool Palette?

Heres the link to the doc on the Autodesk site:
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/item?siteID=123112&id=4136893&linkID=2476059

[richard.binning]

Can you describe the image problems you are referring to?

RLB


My company has been fiddling around with customizing the tool palettes in ADT2005 with limited success. The problem is primarily with the images associated with the palette items, and until the problem is fixed I am finding the palettes very aggravating to use.

I am primarily a keyboard user, and I would like to be able to call up, for example, the reference keynote with leader via a keyboard shortcut. However, ADT does not respond when I enter the command "AecDtlAnnoLeaderAdd" at the command prompt. Can anyone suggest a method for bringing this tool to life via the keyboard?

[jnj1502]

It's really just a maintenance issue. The IT guys haven't gotten around to finalizing the customization of our company's palettes, and so there are no graphics or titles to the tools. It's been this way for weeks, but they will fix it one of these days. In the meantime, I can switch back to the out-of-box experience and use the standard issue ADT palettes.

I just don't like them, is all. I'm an old keyboard fart, and I don't like menus, icons, and palettes cluttering up my workspace. I use over 150 keyboard shortcuts to call up most of my commands and lisp routines.

It seems strange that you can't call up whatever it is that brings the keynote to life from the keyboard. I see a command at the command line whenever I invoke keynotes from the palette, but if I enter the same command via keyboard ADT does not respond.

I'm semi-adept at customizing ACAD with lisp routines. I looked into the program code file for the palette that does keynotes, but I did not see anything that looked like a launch command. Any clues, or has Autodesk truly removed the command from casual access?

[david_peterson]

I believe what they have done was try to remove the lisp routines and covert them to a visual lisp. Or at least I thought I heard something like that. If it's not a commend that you can type in, I don't think you can make a short-cut keyed commend. At least I haven't been able to figure it out.

[chris.yanchar]

I believe what they have done was try to remove the lisp routines and covert them to a visual lisp. Or at least I thought I heard something like that. If it's not a commend that you can type in, I don't think you can make a short-cut keyed commend. At least I haven't been able to figure it out.

The keynoting is not lisp or visual lisp based. The issue here is that in ADT 2005 we introduced a new tool type, the Annotation Tool, which supports basic text annotation, leader-based annotation, and block symbol annotations. These scale and layer like anything else in ADT. AutoCAD 2005 introduced Field Codes which ADT 2005 leveraged for Keynoting from a central Microsoft Access Database. In the Annotation Tool is a property called "Default Text" which is where the tool knows which type of keynote field type to use, along with which layer key, dimension style to use for a leader, and a few other parameters. Rather than answer all these questions at the command line for every type of annotation, including keynotes, you need only set up all our common annotations and add them to your drawing in one-click. Once you have a keynote in your drawing, you can right-click on it and choose 'Add Selected' and the same creation parameters set on its originating tool will be re-used.