Create a General Label

1. Select Create > Label > General/Symbolic from the main menu to display the Labels form with the General Labels tab selected.

   

   This form allows you to enter the settings required for creating a label.

   Create New	Select to create a new label.
   Create Copy	Select to create a copy of an existing label.
   Attach to	Select an element type to be labelled from the dropdown list. The list has two parts: the top part displays a list of menus for different types of elements and the bottom part displays a list of Common Elements.
   Re-Attach	Select to re-attach a label.
   PPoint	Enter a P-Point or select the Cursor to pick a P-Point.
   Pline	Enter a P-line or select the Cursor to pick a P-line.
   Rotate	Enter a value for the rotation along the P-line Axis.
   Blanking	Select checkbox to activate blank margins.
   Blank Margin	Enter a value for the blank margin.
   Attributes	Select an attribute from the dropdown list.
   Offset	Set an offset from the dropdown list.
   Apply	Applies the form settings.
   Create Gaps	Displays the Gap Manager form.
   Dismiss	Closes the form.

   Draft automatically selects the Label layer in anticipation that you are going to create Labels. The Label layer, along with Drawing layers for dimensions, notes and tags are created automatically as members of a View.

   The Label layer can also be selected in the Layers toolbar and in the History toolbar.

   Layers toolbar
   History toolbar

   The Layers toolbar simply shows the Drawing Layer you are currently working on. The History toolbar displays a history of the current elements that have been selected (the left/right arrows are used to select recently accessed elements).

2. Select Create NEW to create a new Label from the Labels form. The Label layer is selected in Draft Explorer.

   A prompt (in the main window status area) identifies the Design elements to be labelled.

3. Select items of equipment to identify one or more within the Drawing display or the 3D View. As items of equipment are selected, a label containing the name of the equipment will be created at the origin of the equipment and will appear in the 2D View only.

4. Once each item of equipment has been labelled, press Esc to return to normal operation.

   The Labels appear in the Drawing Window for the origins of the equipment that have been selected.

   

The contents of the label are set by default to be the Name of the labelled element. The contents can be changed by selecting Text Contents from the Attributes dropdown list on the General Labels tab of the Labels form. The Modify Text form is then displayed.

The textbox on the form shows the content of the label. This can be normal text directly entered and which appears in the label, or Intelligent Text for which the information in the label is automatically taken from the Design database.

The default #NAME entry is an example of Intelligent Text. It is one of many different attributes, which are listed in the Intelligent Text form. This contains a selection of commonly used code words, and is displayed when Intelligent Texts is selected on the Modify Text form. The intelligent text can be selected and copied into the Modify Text form using the Insert and Append functions. The Insert function takes into account the current position in the text pane when inserting the text.