Chapter 1

Select Objects

Subsections of Select Objects

Searching Objects

To search items within a project select **Edit ▸ Find… **to open the “Find” window.The Find dialog lets you search items within the current sheet setting criteria to reduce the scope of the function. 

The upper section of the Search window shows the buttons corresponding to the graphic objects you want to find within the currently selected sheet. These objects are arranged in three groups: Drafting objects, Documentation objects and Architectural elements.

The optional search criteria offer the menus and fields needed to filter the search.

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Search Criteria

  • Object Class: push the button corresponding to the object class you want to find; 
  • Sheet: select the sheet, drafting sheet, detail or layout (SE& Pro); 
  • Style/Type: search items with a style or type (Pro);
  • Layer: search items within the selected layer;
  • Pen Color: stroke color of the objects to find;
  • Line-type: line type of the items to find; 
  • Pen Weight: pen weight of the items to find; 
  • Text: search for all occurrences of the text in the drawing; 
  • Tag: enter the known tag to search elements with that tag (Pro);
  • Name: enter the name of architectural elements (Pro); 
  • Description: enter the description to search matching architectural items (Pro).

The option “Zoom to selection” focuses the view on the objects that match the criteria.

The command Find All selects all the objects that match the criteria.

The command Find selects the objects one by one.

Selection Commands

The Edit menu includes commands to quickly select items with some conditions. Apart from the “Select All Sheets” command, all selection functions apply to the current sheet. The selection commands follow the state of layers, and items on hidden or locked layers are not selected. 

  • Select All Sheets selects all elements on all drafting sheets (SE & Pro);
  • Select All command selects all the elements on the current sheet; 
  • Select Current Layer to select all the objects with the current layer; 
  • Select All <object class>… selects all the elements on the current sheet of the sameclass as the currently selected drawing tool; 
  • Invert Selection selects all the elements and deselects those that were already selected; 
  • Deselect deselects all the currently selected items. 
  • Restore Last Selection: restores the last used selection even after having beendeactivated. 

Selection Tool

The Selection (Arrow) tool lets you select drawing objects by clicking directly on them or by defining a selection area. To select an object, click on it with the arrow tool. Snap to Objects must be active so that the arrow tool can “see” the object you are clicking. 

Rectangular selection

Click on a blank part of the screen and move the pointer to define a rectangle: objects with control points within the rectangle will be selected. If you move top-to-down, the selection will include all partially or fully enclosed objects (inclusive selection); if you move down-to-top, the selection will include only fully enclosed objects (exclusive selection). You can invert the selection mode at any time by holding down the Alt (Option) key.

Inclusive and exclusive selection modes_

Polygonal selection

Use this method to select objects by defining a polygonal region. Click to add a vertex to the selection region, double-click to end

Adding and removing objects

Hold down the Shift key while clicking to add items to the selection or remove already selected items. Click on a blank part of the screen to deselect all. If the option “Arrow tool clicks extend selection” is active in Preferences, clicking an unselected object will automatically add it to the selection.

Selecting overlapping objects

When two or more items overlap it can be difficult to select the right object. To get a smart selection, activate the Arrow tool, hold the Control key and click or right-click on the intersection to open a contextual menu with a list of all the objects at that location, from top to bottom.

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Editing objects

The Arrow tool can also be used as an all-purpose editing tool: most of the tool-specific editing actions, such as resizing a line or editing a text, can also be performed with the Arrow tool.

  • Clicking a selected object on its outline, but not on a vertex, will activate the Move function.
  • Clicking a vertex of an object resizes the object.
  • Hovering the cursor on a vertex of a selected hatch, polyline or spline opens the menu with the options to edit the vertex.
  • Hold down the Command key to move any object, selected or unselected, by any of its vertices or by its outline.