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text box width

text box width

text box width

(OP)
I’m setting up our sheet formats again, fun... I'm trying to set it up such that all the title block fields are filled out by custom properties, and we want the drawing titles/descriptions to be one property, that means, that for long strings, the text box has to wrap, which is where I’m having trouble. The property is in the model so I'm using $PRPSHEET:"Title". The best I can figure it out, is to set the property to a short string, say "XXXX", then enter the sheet format, edit the block, (I have the title block fields in their own block, mostly because this is how it was set up in AutoCAD, from where I imported it), and widen the text box to the width I need, save the block definition, and exit sheet format editing. Now, this works, I can change the string to a long one, say "XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX", and it will wrap around, correctly, although it has some minor problems; if I change it back to a short one, it seems to loose its center justification, but not quite, the text sits offset, to the left, at the same start location as it had when the sting was long, but is still center justified. But I can sort of look past that, the big problem is that if I now save the sheet format, and load it into a drawing, which has a model with a long string for that property, it doesn’t wrap at all, it seems to loose the width whenever I save the format.
The dumb thing is, I have about the same need in the revision blocks; we want the revision notes to be one field, but I was able to get those to save right, and hold their width whenever their reloaded, even when embedded in a sheet format, and for almost any length string, although, the property they look for to be filled out, is in the drawing itself, not the model, so $PRP:"RelA_Notes", and it doesn’t keep the exact width, it seems to be slowly shrinking. I really wish solid works had as much precise control over the size and formatting of text boxes as AutoCAD has. If anyone has any insight at all it would help a lot, thanks.

RE: text box width

What version are you using? SW 06 has text boxes for wrapping. I also sent in an enhancement request a while back for the rev blocks.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks Pro 06/PDMWorks 06
AutoCAD 06
ctopher's home site (updated 06-21-05)
FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: text box width

(OP)
Oh, yeah im using 06, havent run across that, where do I find it?

thanks

RE: text box width

In the dwg, dbl-click on text, drag the text box corner to where you like, text will wrap.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks Pro 06/PDMWorks 06
AutoCAD 06
ctopher's home site (updated 06-21-05)
FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: text box width

(OP)
Yeah, thats what I've been doing, but if I save the sheet format and use it in another drawing, it more or less forgets what width I set the box to, and does not wrap.

RE: text box width

Interesting. Could be a bug or need an enhancement request.

Chris
Systems Analyst, I.S.
SolidWorks Pro 06/PDMWorks 06
AutoCAD 06
ctopher's home site (updated 06-21-05)
FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

RE: text box width

In the meantime, there's a settextboxwidth macro at http://swtools.cad.de/macros.htm called mm_28.zip.  Works great for just what you need.  That's pretty much exactly how i used it.

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