please help me with this project dwg

Hi guys.

can you please tell me the best way to divide a DWG file into sections?

I`m trying to help a friend by building a data base for construction work.

to build houses on a city, and the database call for a map that came from a gps device, that is on DWG format. now this image is full of squares that represent the new house locations, the problem is that is one whole image representing the whole city, I was wondering if there is a way to divide this image into sectors to represent the houses location when i do a printout.

could you please help me?

any sugestion will be appreciated.

thank you.

Use paperspqace layouts, one for each "section". The viewport in each layout can be zoomed, panned and scaled for anything you want to show on one page. Depending on your ploting scale and paper size, it may be expedient to use more than one viewport per page.

Thank you

I will try

one more time thanks

Thank you

I will try

one more time thanks

Good luck with it. Make good use of the F1 key. just remember that a viewport is a window back into modelspace. You can make the window show any part or all of what is in modelspace.

If all you want is the one section look at the EXTRIM command in the Express Tools.

Thank you very much, I will try that too.

I`m while lost with this project, I need to break these drawing into individual sections so that I can store each section by it self into my database.

so that when a house is built on a location of this map i can call up individual section up and not the whole map.

thank you angain for your help.

you guys are very nice and helpfull.

this is a nice forum.

thanks again guys.

Are you by chance using AutoCAD MAP3D? That has the tools in it to create a database with each section it's own record real easy. If not then what you will need to use to create a seperate dwg file from each section is the Wblock command. This will allow you to select each section and create a new dwg from the selected objects.

Thank you very much, I will try that too.

I`m while lost with this project, I need to break these drawing into individual sections so that I can store each section by it self into my database.

so that when a house is built on a location of this map i can call up individual section up and not the whole map.

thank you angain for your help.

you guys are very nice and helpfull.

this is a nice forum.

thanks again guys.

I think I misinterpreted what you were asking about. I thought you just wanted to print out the drawing in individual sections. Separate layouts/viewports will not give you anything but separate printed pages. There will be no separation whatsoever of the original image. So there will be no database items other than your hard copy plots.

Murph_map mentioned xtrim. As said, this works best if you only need one or a small number of images or sections out of the original. Xtrim may not give you objects that can be referenced by a database. Xtrim is very easy to do. It is a command function you perform on a defined block. It is pretty much a cross reference to a particular portion of a block. If the original drawing is not already a block, you can make it a block. The way xtrim works > It will prompt you to select a portion of a block with a selection window. When the command is completed this selected area will remain visible while the portions outside the selection area will not be visible. this xtrim'ed image becomes a new insertable object and can then be inserted where you please. You have to repeat xtrim for each section or even to duplicate one already made. They are not re-insertable entities as are blocks, but you can xtrim off the same block for new images, duplicates or otherwise, until your fingers bleed and your head hurts.

Xtrim can cause some minor problems. Each xtrim'ed image will still exist nearly as big, data wise, as the original block, and indeed it is actually the entire original block, just mostly invisible. Each one counts as a block reference back to the original one. This can inflate your drawing file size and minimally degrade working response time if a large number of xtrim'ed images taken from a very large block is inserted in the same drawing. You can xtrim a block that exists in one drawing into another drawing BUT the entire block comes with it.

One more thing, a modification in overall size to the original block (defined in the same drawing) can change or shift your xtrim image even if the change is not wihin the visible portion of your xtrim image.

A more labor intense method to build your database > select the sections you want and copy the selected items into an empty area of model space. Then you can erase and/or trim off the parts you don't need, and copy the remainder to a new dwg. repeat until you get them all separated. You could turn each newly copied section into a block (or wblock) and put all these blocks into a single new drawing file. From that drawing file they can be inserted into any other drawing at any time and can serve as a database or catalog of blocks.

If you filled a "Master Database.dwg" with a bunch of xtrims from a block that is a map of an entire town, your drawing file size would be very GINORMOUS to say the least, since each xtrim is the whole town, just not visible.

Murp_Map and Dana.W.

First of all thank you so much you guys are the best, thank for taking the time for help me; I do appreciate.

Murp_Map, Hi.

The Auto cad that I have is version 2011, I just intalled it to open this image, to see ho it looks. my friend gave me his copy.

I don`t wile use Auto cad, I`m just tring now for this projet. many years ago. when I was in school living in the US. I gave Auto cad a try;

And the Experience wasn`t good . the school principal gave me the possition of school clerck, and asked to make a report of the computers that was purchesed with federal grant to sent to the school superintendr once a year.Well At the time I just watched this movie where their had a nice 3d map of a location where you just click on it and it and the image rotates, zoon and everithing. So the idiot here tought it would look cool on my school project.

So I got my self a copy of Auto cad LT and installed it, (I tink was 1999, when i was at this school).

once the programm finished installing, i was all excited to open up and start my project; Man, as soon I tried to draw my first line...

this windows poped up asking me to expecify line lenght, dimenssion, and angle. so I looked around there was nobody, I looked at the screen one more timethen I ran crying like a litle girl. and vowed to my self never to look at Auto cad again.

Now many years have past, and my heart still breeds when Hear the word Auto cad.

Now Serious, Thank you Murp_map, for your sugestion to AutoCAD MAP3D.

I`m downloading AutoCAD MAP3D, it big, 5 gigs, it will take me 3 days to download;

If works for me, then I will orde me a copy, that way I will be prepaired for next time something like this comes up.

I just hope that it will let me import this dwg file into it to work, i`m not loking foward to redo or edit this drawing by hand block by block.

if it don`t work then I will use your second sugestion WBLOCK. right now this image that thei gave me is 9 mega Bytes, and i tink it is very big full image of houses.

thank again Murph_map .

Dana W.

thank you, you are a angel.

I did apreciate what you did for me.

thanks for the time and detail of your explanations , it was while nice of you.

you not only told what to do, but also the steps to avoid. thank you Dana.

And you got the right idea, about make individual blocks to refference by the database.

that was my original thought, when my friend first came and asked to make him a database that show a picuture of the land where the house would be built.

I tought that his was gone bring me separeted photos of the land for the database, so I went ahead and built him a server runing red Hat Linux and MySql for the database.

the database is very simple, it fuction is only to display a single form with name and addresses, and a image/picture of the house being bulit.

I thought that my friend was gona bring me simple fotos of the place, so tha i could just add them to a directory on the server, and have the database call them when needed, But then he goes and bring me this this image, that is whole map of the city that complicated the whole project.

the way I see it either I discard this AutoCad map and use the simple photos that i tought tha he was going to bring me, or I discard the database, and try to build a new one around this Autocad map.

He told me that a gps was used to draw this image, and on the field the gps can locate this sections on this map by xy coordinates, So that got me tinking maybe I cold get my program to read and referrence this objects by coordinates instead of dividing this image into blocks. (just a tought..).

I going to try Murp_Map sugestion and give AutoMap3d a try. If it works I even maight comercialize this software, hope my C++ BUILDER 6 can handle this:D

Well, Dana thank you for everything, yor explanation did save me a lot of time and head ache.

god bless you all.

And Dana if you and Murp_Map ever decide tha you guys need a vacation,

come dow here to brasil.

it will be a pleasure to show you guys around.

one more time thank you all.

hey Dana, my post is bigger than yous.

just notice that.

Brasil? Even winter in Brasil is better than summer here in central Maryland USA. Lock up all your girlfriends and daughters, I'm on my way.