LinceCAD PDFATTACH — Attach PDF
Attaches a page of a PDF file as an underlay.
- Command:
PDFATTACH· Global name:_PDFATTACH· Alias:PDFA - Ribbon: Insert › Import
Attaches a page of a PDF file as an underlay: a plan received as a PDF that serves as a background to draw on. The PDF is not copied into the drawing: its path is saved and the file is read again when the drawing is opened.
Usage
- Enter PDFATTACH (or PDFA), or click Attach PDF… in the XREF window.
- Enter the PDF path, or press Enter to choose it in a file dialog.
Enter path to PDF file to attach or [Browse] <Browse>:
- Enter the page number; Enter, the first one.
?lists the pages with their size in points.
Enter page number or [?] <1>:
- Specify the insertion point, which is the lower-left corner of the page (Enter: the origin).
Specify insertion point:
- Enter the scale, or specify a point: the distance to the insertion point is the width of the page.
Specify scale factor <1>:
- Enter the rotation angle, or specify a point in that direction.
Specify rotation <0>:
In the interface (not in scripts, SCRIPT or AutoLISP), after choosing the PDF the Attach PDF Underlay dialog box opens: the page (each one drawn with its proportions and its number) and the insertion point, scale and rotation; whatever you leave as Specify On-screen is specified afterwards, with the prompts of steps 4 to 6. The thumbnails do not show the page contents. The dialog box cannot be scripted in the AutoCAD console: it has a unit test; -PDFATTACH always asks on the command line.
Notes
- At scale 1, the page measures in the drawing the same as on paper, in the units of INSUNITS (without units, in millimeters): a landscape A3 measures 420 × 297 in a drawing in millimeters.
- The path is saved relative to the drawing's folder if REFPATHTYPE is 1 (and the drawing has been saved); otherwise, as a full path.
- The page is turned into an image inside LinceCAD, without external programs, at about 200 dots per inch: with a lot of zoom the pixels show. That is why object snaps do not work on what is drawn in the PDF.
- The underlay frame is controlled by PDFFRAME. It is adjusted with PDFADJUST, clipped with PDFCLIP, and its layers are shown or hidden with PDFLAYERS.
- It is saved as an AutoCAD PDF underlay (PDFUNDERLAY), which AutoCAD opens the same way.