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Thread: AutoCAD Groups and Blocks

  1. #1
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    Default AutoCAD Groups and Blocks

    Hello. I work for a civil firm and the firm purchased a smaller civil firm a year or so ago. We mostly do utility design and land development. I have started discussions with people from the other firm to get a feel for how they use AutoCAD and what their "standards" are? I have learned that they use groups in many of their drawings. For example when they are doing a property survey they group all the lines for a deed into an AutoCAD group and then they compile all the deed groups into a larger group. In my firm we typically would have created a block on all the common property lines. I have never used groups so part of me wants to blow it off and say don't use groups use blocks but I want to have a better understanding of groups.

    Do you use groups? When do you use groups versus blocks?

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    Default Re: AutoCAD Groups and Blocks

    To me they're two completely different things. Using groups was made easier in recent versions since it defaults now to unnamed and can be made with a single click no input needed.
    I use both extensively, groups are much simpler & quicker to use but are no substitute for blocks.
    Grouping a selection of objects makes them easy to copy or modify anytime you wish. You can toggle group selection on/off with Ctrl+H to edit or remove individual objects.
    I've even added a macro for inserting objects from another drawing as a group so they're easily editable.
    Code:
    ^C^C_pasteblock;\(setq LstBlk(vla-get-Name (vlax-ename->vla-object (entlast))));_explode;_last;_-group;_create;*;;_previous;;(command "-purge" "B" LstBlk "N")
    (setq LstBlk nil)
    You lose all of a drawings groups when they're inserted into other drawings as they're not actually objects like blocks are and don't have all the power or abilities of blocks.
    I don't see it as one or the other and would never discourage using either in general.

    Making it company policy to use blocks in certain situations sounds fine if that helps workflow though assuming layer standards were already in place wouldn't selecting all the common property lines with Quick Select or Select Similar be easy enough not to need either method?

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    Default Re: AutoCAD Groups and Blocks

    A word of caution before you start making alot of changes look at their work flow there might be some good reasons why they are doing what they are doing. I have some people tell me that we are wrong because we don't use a the latest dynamic stuff or bells and whistles. We have some very good thought out reasons why we do what we do and in the end it all comes down to the bottom line and profit/loss

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    Default Re: AutoCAD Groups and Blocks

    As an outside observer I might suggest both offices should review their practices.

    Here is my accumulated process for survey information.

    Any plat, is created in an individual file in the project with the name of that document/map as an independent entity in model space.
    IT can then later be XREF into a new survey file and aligned to the coordinate system used in that file.

    Any Record of survey file, is created in an individual file in the project with the name of that document/map as an independent entity in model space.
    Within this file any deed or title encumberance is drawn in it's entirety on a layer named after the document that creates the easement, right of way, dedication, etc.
    In this way all records have their own linework, and the layer naming idenetifies what instrument created the line.
    IT can then later be XREF into a new survey file and aligned to the coordinate system used in that file.

    No real need to group or block any of the linework because it exists whole and complete on it's own layer(s).
    Draworder and or use of Parcel Style Hierchy can ensure lines don't overwrite each other.
    If not using Parcels, then some lines may need to be moved to an 'ovelap' layer and frozen.

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