Dimension in Paper Space or Model?

[Borgster]

When paper space was added to AutoCAD years ago, if I'm not mistaken, the school of thought was that all dimensions should be placed in paper space.

I got out of the engineering field a few years back and now I have returned. I am currently using ver 2011.

Paper space is not used at this office. However, I and a few others have been tasked with developing new CAD standards. They have not been updated for years and in my opinion, largely ignored.

Back to my question. We have a young guy in the office fresh out of a 2 year college. I asked him to give me a little crash refresher course on using paper space. He says that he has been taught that all dimensions, text, etc., should be placed in Model space with annotative properties set.

I would like to hear what others are doing. What are the advantages of each? Anything else you have to offer would be appreciated also.

[cadtag]

Dang, that's asking for a religious war to fire up!

But, after some odd years of doing this stuff, here's my take.

Paperspace is where information belongs that is intended to only be displayed on one sheet in a set of construction drawings. That pretty much covers all dimensions, callouts, and other annotations. Dimensions in particular should ONLY APPEAR IN ONE PLACE in an entire set of drawings. That rule goes back a lot longer than 30 years.

Model space is for information that will be shared between sheets, or used as an xref. That pretty much covers everything that is an object line in the drawing. Might add room number tags, but not a whole lot else.

Annotative properties are of limited utility, generally a bad idea for everything other than hatch patterns or symbolic blocks. Annotative properties should never be applied to either dims or callouts. That's what paperspace is for.

[dgorsman]

Highly dependant on industry, type of drawings, and personal preference. For example, I consider dimensions (even annotative ones) in model space a big no-no for 3D models; way to many complications. XREF the model into the ortho drawing (piping industry, BTW), viewport in paper space, and all annotations in paper space.

From what Iv'e seen there is still a lot of 2D work in the architectural world, mapping, and maybe some others as well. This is where the annotative dimensions in model space come in: where you want something annotated in a single place (in the root DWG) but the source may be referenced in many places at different scales.

Either way has its advantages and disadvantages, the latter being mostly tied to lack of consistent application.

[Borgster]

I guess I should have mentioned that we are a multi-disciplinary engineering firm involved in Civil(concrete), structural, piping etc. A typical project for us is expanding or adding a new process unit
in a process plant.

[sinc]

The Civil field has moved more toward dimensioning in modelspace, at least in Autodesk products. In fact, most Civil 3D annotation MUST be in modelspace - it doesn't work correctly and/or cannot even be placed directly in paperspace.

We primarily use a combination of Civil 3D labels and Annotative MText/MLeaders/Dimensions, mostly in modelspace.

[kiwigraham]

Annotative and in Model Space
Can not imagine why you would want to do it any other way, possibly for 3D models.
Most of our Civil work is 2D and we would not consider putting anything other than title sheets in Paper Space (isn't that what's its for?)
Surely doing it any other way would be a step backwards?

[Kung Fu Drafter]

Working for a Civil and being a loud-mouthed CAD manager I feel that I have to thrown my votes behind Cadtag and Sinc. It is true that the vast majority of Civil 3D automated notation is in modelspace. But it is also scalable. In my office we place "Per Sheet" annotation such as dimensions, callouts and notes in paperspace.

We find that this works well for us and in fact it's been my personal practice since paperspace was added to AutoCAD. That being said, our biggest client, TxDOT Aviation, has some strict CAD standards in certain cases and those standard require 99% of annotation to be in modelspace. So who knows, maybe something will change in the future.

Standard are meant to be broken, right?

- KFD -

[cadtag]

I guess I should have mentioned that we are a multi-disciplinary engineering firm involved in Civil(concrete), structural, piping etc. A typical project for us is expanding or adding a new process unit
in a process plant.

Ok, then it's fair to presume that a lot of your drawings are used as bases in other disciplines, eg the pipers reference in the structure, the structural reference in the civil. In that situation, I would definitely push for doing as much annotation and dimensioning in paper space as possible. Pipe guys do not need to deal with the concrete notes when they xref in the walls and slabs. and dang sure should not need the dimensions -- things are drawn correctly aren't they?

Civil3D labels in models space -- yeah, that's a right pain in the tush. just too frackin bad the civil3d devs were'nt bright enough to understand how to take advantage of paper space. Really, with object IDs stable between sessions, it shouldn't have been that difficult to match a pspace c3d label to the c3d object. but then again, they haven't really cared enough to figure out how to work with the Map tools underneath c3d.

[Misteracad]

Yeah, religious war is right LOL!!!

IMO all text and dimensions should be ANNOTATIVE and placed in Model Space nowadays. Doing it in Paper Space is no longer necessary, and a PITA to use it correctly. Leave that area for Title Blocks, General Notes, things of that type, but any annotation that relates to objects that tend to change, I would show in Model Space and setup whatever scales I need.

'Course, those who are not familiar with Annotative Scaling tend to muck up what has been set, but that's a discussion for another thread

Again, this is MY opinion, and I've been doing this since R9, but this is the way I choose to teach newbies. Let the war rage on!

[sinc]

Civil3D labels in models space -- yeah, that's a right pain in the tush. just too frackin bad the civil3d devs were'nt bright enough to understand how to take advantage of paper space..

Actually, it works quite well... Better than putting all annotation in paperspace.