SolidWorks 2011 Parts Bible - Matt Lombard [226]
The Style panel contains the following buttons:
• Apply Defaults/No Styles. Removes style settings from the current interface, setting all values back to the defaults.
• Add or Update Styles. Either adds a new style to the database or changes the name or other settings for an existing style.
• Delete Style. Removes a style from the database.
• Save Style. Saves a style to an external file (*.sldhwfvt), which can be loaded by other users and added to their databases.
• Load Style. Loads a saved style file.
Styles can be loaded into document templates so that for every document created from the template, those Styles will be available.
Linking notes to custom properties
You can link notes to custom properties. The custom properties can be from the drawing or from the model that is referenced by the drawing. I mention this kind of link briefly in Chapter 20, but discuss it more thoroughly here.
Figure 16.12 shows a note on a drawing with custom property links pulling data from the model shown on the drawing. To add these links, driven by the syntax $PRPSHEET:”material”, click the icon indicated in the image to the right in Figure 16.12.
FIGURE 16.12
Linking notes to custom properties
In this case, text has been combined with custom properties, but custom properties can also appear alone. To access the Custom Properties interface, choose Tools⇒Properties.
When you activate the note, you may want to see the syntax, or you may want to see the actual text value of the custom property. You can find the setting that controls which one is displayed by choosing View⇒Annotation Link Variable.
Hyperlinking text
Hyperlinking text is sometimes useful on drawings to provide a link to reference documentation, specification, test results, and so on. The first button in the third row of the Text Format panel of the Note PropertyManager enables you to add a hyperlink to text in the note. Figure 16.12 shows this panel. Either copy the URL to the hyperlink dialog box that appears or browse to it from the dialog box.
Note that there is a bug in SW (which has been around for years!), including SW2011 SP0 where you cannot un-hyperlink a box. Once you type “http://” into a note, it automatically turns the entire note into a hyperlink. According to the Knowledge Base you are supposed to right-click on the note, and then select the hyperlink button in the FeatureManager, where you can then delete the link and click OK to remove the link. Unfortunately, this just produces an error. If you want to put a Web address into your drawing note without it turning into a hyperlink, you have to trick Solidworks into not recognizing it as a Web link. I suggest putting a space between the : and the // of the link, which will not be obvious on a printed drawing.
Adding notes and symbols
Notes and symbols are regularly combined in SolidWorks. Symbols are discussed more fully later in this chapter, but are mentioned here because of the frequency with which they are used with notes. In reference to Figure 16.12, the image to the right shows the Text Format panel, which contains a button to the interface where you can add symbols.
Using Blocks in Drawings
Blocks in SolidWorks can contain sketch elements and notes. When used in drawings, blocks have several common uses, including the following:
• You can use standard note blocks for tolerances, disclaimers, or default requirements.
• You can put together a mechanism in 2D where each block represents a part.
• You can use flow direction for fluid systems.
• You can use drawing stamps such as “Not For Release,” “Preliminary,” “Obsolete,” and so on.
• You can use symbols for schematics that can be snapped together.
• You can save drawing formats as blocks to make them easier to place as a single entity.
Like styles, blocks reside in the document in which they are created, but you can save them out to a *.sldblk file, load them into other documents, and save them as a part of a document template.
Inserting blocks
You can apply blocks in several