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It was a warm and sultry evening. Captain LearnCurve sat on the deck of his summer cabin, idly contemplating The Y Files. Suddenly a voice rang out (the Captain has a tendency to hear voices). Hold it! Don't you mean The X Files?
No, I mean The Y Files, as in Y does AutoCAD use SHP files, and Y do they need,to be compiled into SHX files, and Y do I need to know about them, and Y ...
At the end of your last column, you promised to tell us how to incorporate fancy shape symbols within a noncontinuous linetype.
I am. To include shapes in a linetype you need to create an SHP file and then compile it into an SHX file and then... That is the worst lead-in you have ever used.
Yeah, well.... Two columns ago you learned how to create custom noncontinuous linetype patterns based on a series of line segments and spaces. To do so, we used a simple text editor such as Notepad to edit the ACAD.LIN file or to create a new file with an LIN extension.
Last month, we covered how to include text within a noncontinuous linetype. This still uses the same LIN file and inserts the text definition as appropriate. Shapes-from the beginning
Starting with AutoCAD Release 13, you could create your own custom symbol shapes to insert into linetypes. In AutoCAD, a shape is sort of like an xref block definition. You create it once, then save it to disk to insert into any drawing. You can use only certain types of line elements and arcs, and you have no direct control over the color and linetype of individual elements.
Why not just use blocks?
There are two good reasons. Shapes are very fast and efficient, and they are the only way to get custom symbols into linetype definitions.
To create and use shapes:
Use a simple text editor such as Notepad to define the shape you want. Save it in a file that ends with the SHP extension.
You use the Compile command from within AutoCAD to translate it into a form that AutoCAD reads. This file uses the extension SHX.
You can now load them into your drawing and use...