Datasheet

WinDoWs on the MoDel
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Master and Active Drawing Views
If you can’t see the Projects or Drawing Templates branch in Figure 1.1, look at the top of the
Prospector pane. There is a drop-down menu for operating in Active Drawing View or Master View
mode. Selecting Active Drawing View displays only the active drawing and Data Shortcuts. Master
View mode, however, displays the Projects, the Drawing Templates, and the Data Shortcuts, as well
as the branches of all drawings that are currently open.
In addition to the branches, Prospector has a series of icons across the top that toggle various
settings on and off. Some of the Civil 3D icons from previous versions have been removed, and
their functionality has been universally enabled for Civil 3D 2011. Those icons are noted here.
Item Preview Toggle Turns on and off the display of the Toolspace item preview within
Prospector. These previews can be helpful when you’re navigating drawings in projects (you
can select one to check out) or when you’re attempting to locate a parcel on the basis of its
visual shape. In general, however, you can turn off this toggle—it’s purely a user preference.
Preview Area Display Toggle When Toolspace is undocked, this button moves the Preview
Area from the right of the tree view to beneath the tree view area.
Panorama Display Toggle Turns on and off the display of the Panorama window (which is
discussed in a bit). To be honest, there doesn’t seem to be a point to this button, but it’s here
nonetheless.
Help This should be obvious, but it’s amazing how many people overlook it.
Have You Looked in the Help File Lately?
The AutoCAD Civil 3D development team in Manchester, New Hampshire, has worked hard to
make the Help files in Civil 3D top notch and user friendly. The Help files should be your first line
of support!
Open Drawings
This branch of Prospector contains the drawings currently open in Civil 3D. Each drawing is
subdivided into groups by major object type, such as points, point groups, surfaces, and so forth.
These object groups then allow you to view all the objects in the collection. Some of these groups
are empty until objects are created. You can learn details about an individual object by expand-
ing the tree and selecting an object.
Within each drawing, the breakdown is similar. If a collection isn’t empty, a plus sign appears
next to it, as in a typical Windows Explorer interface. Selecting any of these top-level collection
names displays a list of members in the preview area. Right-clicking the collection name allows
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