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"Sight" Survey (SS35)
Getting TrueType fonts from "Sight" Survey to AutoCAD 13+
Background: “Sight” Survey is a 16 bit program which can create AutoCAD 12 compatible drawing files. AutoCAD 12 only has the ability to use and display stroke fonts that are internal to the program, it does not have the capability to use Window’s TrueType fonts like “Sight” Survey. In light of this, the original “Sight” Survey program was written with a conversion program built into its CAD Control to substitute ACAD 12 stroke fonts for Windows TrueType fonts in order to be able to exchange drawing files between ACAD 10, 11, and 12 and “Sight” Survey.
With the release of AutoDesk’s 32 bit ACAD 13, 14, and 2000, these newer ACAD releases now have the ability to read and use Window TrueType fonts. However, “Sight” Survey is still in a 16 bit mode and still can only write drawing files up to the latest 16 bit version of ACAD 12. Hence, “Sight” Survey is still converting Windows TrueType fonts to stroke fonts even though ACAD 13, 14 and 2000 are able to read the drawing files that “Sight” Survey produces at the ACAD 12 level.
Simplicity Systems does have plans to bring “Sight” Survey up to the 32 bit mode and at that time it will provide greater font compatibility with the newer releases of AutoCAD. However, we do not yet have an announced release date for that product. This leaves us with a dilemma, how do we now get clean conversions of fonts from “Sight” Survey to ACAD and then back again?
Problem: Because of the conversion process taking place when writing ACAD files, unwanted results may occur. Two of the more common problems associated with this conversion is:
1. The text font you see on the “Sight” Survey screen may not be the text font an ACAD user will see on their screen from a drawing file created in “Sight” Survey. This is a result of the conversion process of converting Windows True Type fonts to an AutoCAD stroke font.
2. The text in “Sight” Survey may appear to perfectly aligned but when the drawing exchange file is loaded into ACAD the text appears to be mis-aligned and the spacing seems to have changed. This happens due to the differences in spacing of characters between the two different font types.
Tip: When placing text in “Sight” Survey that may have long stings of spaces, it would be better to break the text into individual sections and not have large areas of spaces between text. For example if you are creating several columns of text it would be better to build each column individually as a separate entity instead of using spaces between columns. Each column should be built separately and visually aligned on the drawing. This will eliminate the vast majority of spacing problems encountered between different font types.
Limitations: We have determined a way of getting the TrueType font into ACAD 13, 14 and 2000 but with certain limitations and restrictions.
1. “Sight” Survey can only do this when writing to DXF files, not DWG files.
2. You will need version 3.0 of “Sight” Survey.
3. Special formatting of characters such as bolding,
underlining,
4. If the TrueType font you are using in “Sight” Survey is not loaded into the other computer where the DXF file will be read, again AutoCAD will convert these fonts to the standard ACAD stroke font. Ensure the font you are using is a font that is installed on the other computer. Three safe fonts that can be used that should be installed on all Window computers are Arial, Times New Romans, and Verdana.
Solution: In order to get Windows TrueType fonts used in “Sight” Survey 3.0 to load in AutoCAD releases 13, 14, and 2000, you need to use the following steps:
1. Ensure you have the latest “Sight” Survey 3.0 update. Contact tech support at 606-564-5028, ext. 229 for a link to the site, or send an email to tech support. There are instructions on the website for downloading and installing the update. We recommend printing out the “Sight” Survey 3.0 Update Page so that you can have it as a reference when installing the update.
2. Don’t use any special formatting characteristics on any of your text.
3. Avoid using any long spaces to prevent any possible font conversion from mis-aligning your text.
4. Use only the DXF format when writing a file to ACAD releases 13 and higher.
Tip: When requesting drawing files from ACAD 13, 14, and 2000 users, ask for them in ACAD 12 DXF format. That way if they are using Windows fonts then you should be able to setup “Sight” Survey to read those TrueType fonts instead of the program converting them into a stroke font.
1) Make sure you have exited “Sight” Survey.
2) Open with Notepad the “cadcntrl.ini” file which is located in your Windows or WinNT folder.
a) Click the Windows Start button b) Select Run c) In the Open box type one of the following: ¨ For Windows 95 or 98 type c:\windows\cadcntrl.ini ¨ For WinNT, 2000, or XP, type c:\winnt\cadcntrl.ini (see note below) d) Click OK and the file will open in Windows Notepad
3) Save a copy of this file with a “.bak” extension instead of the “.ini” extension for backup purposes.
a) After Notepad opens then click on File b) Click on Save As c) After the Save As window opens then type one of the following in the Filename block: ¨ For Windows 95 or 98 type “c:\windows\cadcntrl.bak”. ¨ For WinNT, 2000, or XP, type “c:\winnt\cadcntrl.bak”. (see note below) e) Click on Save
4) Look for the block heading of [FromDXFFonts] in this file. Below this block heading will list all the fonts that “Sight” Survey looks for (left of the equal “=” sign) and the corresponding font (right of the equal “=” sign) that will be used when loading DXF files into the “Sight” Survey program.
5) Look on the left-side of the equal “=” sign for the fonts that are used in the DXF file.
a) If you find the font then set the right-side of that statement to read exactly what the left side of the statement reads (ex: ARIAL=ARIAL) and make sure there are no spaces immediately before and after the equal “=” sign. b) If you do not find the font then add another line right after the [FromDXFFonts] block heading and enter the font that is used, equal to itself (ex: TIMES NEW ROMAN=TIMES NEW ROMAN), and make sure there are no spaces immediately before and after the equal “=” sign. NOTE: make sure the spelling of the font is identical to the spelling (including any spaces) as it appears in the “Sight” Survey program.
6) Look for the block heading of [ToDXFFonts] in this file. Below this block heading will list all the fonts that “Sight” Survey looks for (left of the equal “=” sign) and the corresponding font (right of the equal “=” sign) that will be used when creating DXF files within the “Sight” Survey program.
7) Look on the left-side of the equal “=” sign for the fonts that you use in your “Sight” Survey drawing.
a) If you find the font then set the right-side of that statement to exactly what the left side of the statement reads (ex: ARIAL=ARIAL) and make sure there are no spaces immediately before and after the equal “=” sign.
b) If you do not find the font then add another line right after the [ToDXFFonts] block heading and enter the font that is used equal to itself (ex: TIMES NEW ROMAN=TIMES NEW ROMAN), and make sure there are no spaces immediately before and after the equal “=” sign. NOTE: make sure the spelling of the font is identical to the spelling (including any spaces) as it appears in the “Sight” Survey program.
8) Once all the appropriate changes have been made then save this file back out as cadcntrl.ini.
a) After Notepad opens then click on File b) Click on Save As c) After the Save As window opens then type one of the following in the Filename block: ¨ For Windows 95 or 98 type “c:\windows\cadcntrl.ini”. ¨ For WinNT, 2000, or XP, type “c:\winnt\cadcntrl.ini”. (see note below) e) Click on Save.
9) Exit Notepad.
You are now be ready to open “Sight” Survey and create readable files with TrueType fonts for ACAD 13, 14, and 2000+ users in a DXF format.
Note: If you have upgraded
operating systems from Windows 95 or 98, your path might be C:\windows
instead of C:\winnt. Use the path location that actually exists on
your computer.
© 2008 by Carlson Software, Inc. Last modified November 18, 2008
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