P-line Representation

P-lines may be displayed in Paragon in one of two ways. The form of display is controlled by the REPRESENTATION PLINES command as illustrated in the Specifying P-lines On or Off image.

Specifying P-lines On or Off

The P-line identifier keys may be omitted or displayed. This is also controlled by the REPRESENTATION PLINES command, as illustrated in the Specifying P-line Identifier Key Representation image.

Specifying P-line Identifier Key Representation

P-line length (default 50mm) and size (default 5mm) can also be controlled. Refer to Reference Section at the end of this chapter for the full syntax of the REPRESENTATION PLINES command.

Unlike P-points, P-lines can be omitted from the display completely. Whether a P-line is drawn or not depends on the settings of three of its attributes:

• LEVEL - the drawing level range

• CLFLA - the centerline drawing flag attribute

• TUFLA - the tube drawing flag attribute

LEVEL is a pair of integers. CLFLA and TUFLA are logical attributes which are set to TRUE or FALSE (corresponding to ‘ON’ or ‘OFF’ respectively). When you first create a P-line, CLFLA and TUFLA are both FALSE.

Control is initially on the setting of LEVEL. If the PARAGON LEVEL setting is within the LEVEL range specified for the P-line (as its LEVEL attribute) then the P-line will be considered for drawing, otherwise it will not be. If the level condition is satisfied, then whether a P-line is displayed or not in PARAGON depends upon the settings of its CLFLA and TUFLA attributes and upon the settings of the drawing options specified by the REPRESENTATION command.

The REPRESENTATION command provides a means of effectively overriding the settings of the P-line’s drawing attributes without changing them. An example REPRESENTATION command is

REPRESENTATION TUBE ON CL OFF

(The word CENTRELINE may be used instead of CL.)

The drawing option settings interact with the drawing attributes of the P-lines thus: if an ‘ON’ REPRESENTATION setting matches a corresponding ‘TRUE’ attribute setting (for example, REPRESENTATION CL ON and CLFL TRUE) then the P-line will be drawn, otherwise it will not be drawn.

The drawing of Geomset primitives is controlled in a similar way. The next section gives examples of how the LEVEL, CLFLA and TUFLA attributes interact with the REPRESENTATION settings.