DWG to DOC

[Daftlad]

I am currently trying to produce some generic drawings on behalf of my company and need to make the drawings "job specific".

 

The problem I have is that I need to issue the drawings so that the title box can be edited to add a location on site.

 

Is it possible to do the drawing in AutoCAD and import it into a Word Document so so that I can put a field in place so that the field is the only editable part? if so whats the best step by spet way of doing this.

 

This may be a really noobie question but its got me stumped.

[Tiger]

I think what you need to look into is Dynamic Blocks.

 

What you do in is, in a new DWG, draw your title block (at 1:1 scale)and instead of the text, you put Attributes (command ATTDEF) in place.

 

Then when you do a drawing, you insert the Dynamic Block and can then enter text in the Attribute based on the project in hand.

 

There are lots of threads on here about Dynamic Blocks, and plenty of people that know more about it than I do.

 

Good Luck.

[Daftlad]

I know alot about Dynamic Blocks myself but you have the wrong idea, I already have attributes set up in my drawing boarder. I am trying to produce Generic Drawings to issue to our sites, Im a Scaffold designer and we use Generic drawings to advise our site base labours. The problem I am faced with is these Generic Drawings need to be issued as a drawing everytime they are used. So, instead of people contacting the design department for us to change the title box ect, I want the lads on site to be able to do this without the need of AutoCAD.

 

Im looking ot create say a form in MS word, so that the only part that can be edited is the title box as all computers in our company have word on them. I have tried inserting a PDF into Word but i lose the quality.

[DANIEL]

you might be able to get your desired result by embedding the cad file into a word doc, but your field probably won't be linkable to the CAD file itself. There really isnt a good way to do what your trying to do but this concept might get you close.

[Daftlad]

do you think that maybe adding a text box through Abobe world be better? but does that mean to edit the text box all computers need pdf editing software?

[Tiger]

ok, now I get it.

 

Since I have no idea how you would do that, I going to say issue the drawing sans locationdata and send a pen with the drawing

[DANIEL]

do you think that maybe adding a text box through Abobe world be better? but does that mean to edit the text box all computers need pdf editing software?

 

 

I don't know, I'm not good with Adobe at all.

[tzframpton]

Use WMFOUT and import that into Word. See if that helps.

 

On second thought, are you trying to link the Doc file so that when a person makes changes, it updates in CAD? I don't know how you're going to get that to work, honestly.

[Daftlad]

no i dont want anybody to be able to edit the drawing itself, just the title box.

 

Using WMFOUT may work, i will have a look now

[Daftlad]

tried inserting a metfile into word and the same thing happens when you insert a PDF, once you increase the size you lose the quality....

 

Does anybody know if I can use Adobe to insert a text box and what version i would need?

 

this is starting to become a problem

[DANIEL]

maybe you could do a printscreen and imbed a jpg or something?

[tzframpton]

tried inserting a metfile into word and the same thing happens when you insert a PDF, once you increase the size you lose the quality....

No it doesn't. It may look like it does, but a Metafile is a vector file, not a raster. It doesn't matter how much you increase the size, when you print the document it will be clean and crisp. And I don't think there's any possible way you can link fields to a word document in the manner you're wanting, without heavy customization.

[qball]

It seems if you insert a WMF or JPG into Word that you can't write text over the image, correct? So maybe it does have to be on a PDF. I have Adobe Reader and you can't mark it up.

[eldon]

If you use a text box in Word, then you can place the box anywhere over the image.

[JD Mather]

How about a dwf and have them use mark up in free Design Review for the additional information?

 

Don't loose drawing fidelity and they can't edit the drawing itself.

[tzframpton]

Or even a free CAD program to let them edit the DWG itself. Plenty of them out there.

[irneb]

Firstly the "trick" is to use a paperspace viewport and set that tab's Page Setup to a "special type". You need to turn on the "Display Plot Styles" check in the "Page Setup" dialog.

 

After that turn on LineWeights (if your CTB/STB has differing pen widths) (the LWeight system variable). Finally go inside the viewport, select the linework and press Ctrl+C to copy it to clipboard.

 

Next open Word (or in my case LibreOffice Writer) and paste there.

 

You can paste special to have it linked to the DWG file (as if it's an xref to that DWG) or you can simply paste normally as an embedded OLE object. Or you can have it converted to EMF metafile as I've done in the example.

 

However, you've got one problem: Scaling! Word / Writer is not meant for accuracy, these images tend to have a mind of their own when you paste them. Though that you'd probably have as an issue no matter what you do - it's a "feature" of these word-processing programs.

 

AFAIK this method is the closest to making a decent job of it - without requiring lots of extra programs.

[Organic]

I would just leave the one field they have to fill in on site blank and tell them to hand write in whatever they have to in that field.

[irneb]

I would just leave the one field they have to fill in on site blank and tell them to hand write in whatever they have to in that field.

+1 Old school rules!

 

Just hope their penmanship isn't comparable to a daddy-long-legs!