AlfaCAD Version 0.9
User's Guide

prepared by: Marek Ratajczak

November 2020

This publication or any part of it may not be copied by any method or for any purpose. In no event shall the author accept liability for damages, including incidental and possible side effects, related to or likely to arise from the purchase or use of these materials. The sole responsibility of the author, regardless of the form of action, will not exceed the purchase price of the materials described below.
The author reserves the right to make changes and constantly improve his programs. As a result, this publication reflects the state of the product at the time of the material publication and may not fully reflect the state of the program in the future.

Marek Ratajczak

email: author@alfacad.net

Introduction to AlfaCAD
1.1. Introduction
1.2. Required hardware
1.2.1. RAM
1.2.2. Monitor
1.2.3. Mouse
1.2.4. Printer
1.2.5. Plotter
1.3. Drawings in AlfaCAD
1.3.1. Create a drawing
1.3.2. Presentation of Figure
1.3.3. Editing Drawing Elements
1.4. Program operation
1.4.1. Entering commands and coordinates of points
1.4.2. Printout of drawing
1.4.3. Graphic editor configuration
1.4.4. Prototype drawing
1.4.5. Interchangeability of drawings
2. Getting started with AlfaCAD
2.1. Notational conventions. Terminology
2.1.1. Key markings
2.1.2. Notational conventions
2.1.3. File names
2.2. Getting started with AlfaCAD
2.2.1. Installation of the program
2.2.2. Launching the program
2.2.3. Starting the program AlfaCAD
2.3. Entering commands
2.3.1. Entering commands from the keyboard
2.3.2. Entering commands from the pull-down menu
2.3.3. Entering commands by means of function keys
2.4. Data input
2.4.1. Entering points
2.4.2. Numerical values
2.4.3. Calculator
2.4.4. Notepad
2.4.5. Dynamic mode
2.4.6. Geometric definition of distances and angles
2.4.7. File names
2.5. Dialog boxes
2.5.1. Editing line
2.5.2. Editing field
2.5.3. Drop-down menu
2.5.4. Switches
2.5.5. Switches
2.6. Selection of objects
2.7. Bug fixes
2.8. Canceling the command execution
3. Auxiliary commands
3.1. Service (auxiliary) menu
3.2. Help ("Help")
4. Commands for drawing objects
4.1. Line
4.1.1. Continuation
4.1.2. Closing polygonal chain
4.1.3. Deleting the last segment
4.1.4. Extension of the polygonal chain line
4.1.5. Geometric structures
4.2. Circle
4.2.1. Center and radius
4.2.2. Center and diameter
4.2.3. Two points on a circle
4.2.4. Three points on a circle
4.2.5. Tangential to two diagonal lines
4.2.6. Other geometric constructions
4.3. Arc
4.3.1. Three points on an arc
4.3.2. Start point, center and end point
4.3.3. Start point, center and angle of arc
4.3.4. Starting point, center and length of the chord
4.3.5. Start point, end point and radius
4.3.6. Start point, end point and arc angle
4.3.7. Start point, end point and the tangent direction at the start point
4.3.8. Continuation of a straight line, arc or a curve
4.4. Polyline
4.4.1. Start drawing polylines
4.4.2. Changing the parameters of a polyline
4.4.3. Arc segments of a polyline
4.4.4. Closing the polyline
4.4.5. Deleting the last segment of a polyline
4.4.6. Rectilinear segments of a polyline
4.5. Polygon
4.6. Disc (circular surface)
4.6.1. Center and radius
4.6.2. Center and diameter
4.6.3. Two points on the edge
4.6.4. Three points on the edge
4.6.5. Tangential to two diagonal lines
4.7. Ellipse
4.7.1. Approximation
4.7.2. Defining an ellipse by specifying the length of the axis and the semi-axis
4.7.3. Defining an ellipse by specifying the center and two semi-axes
4.8. Solid
4.9. Text
4.9.1. Inputting text
4.9.2. Angle
4.9.3. Text height
4.9.4. Width factor
4.9.5. Font as italic (skewed)
4.9.6. Text type
4.9.7. Hidden text
4.9.8. Bold font
4.9.9. Underlined text
4.9.10. Text alignment
4.9.11. Line spacing
4.9.12. Auto-interval
4.9.13. Interval
4.9.14. Fonts
4.9.15. Diacritical and special characters
4.9.16. Multiline text
4.9.17. Indices
4.10. Trace
4.10.1. Trace width
4.10.2. Axis offset
4.10.3. Trace as a polyline
4.10.4. Removing a trace
4.11. 2-line, 3-line
4.11.1. 2-line and 3-line width
4.11.2. Axis offset
4.11.3. 2-line and 3-line as polyline
4.11.4. Removing 2-lines and 3-lines
4.12. Rectangle
4.12.1. Two vertices
4.12.2. First vertex and side lengths
4.13. Sketch
4.13.1. Minimum segment length
4.13.2. Remove the last sketch line
4.14. Point
4.14.1. Point parameters
4.15. Chart
4.15.1. The accuracy of the approximation
4.15.2. Function graphs (“Charts”)
4.16. Bezier curves
4.17. Apps
4.18. Repeat the last drawing function
5. Editing functions
5.1. Removal of objects
5.1.1. Restoring deleted objects
5.2. Moving Objects
5.3. Copying Objects
5.3.1. Copying by division
5.4. Rotating Objects
5.5. Changing the scale of objects
5.6. Mirror reflection
5.6.1. X-axis mirror reflection of the block
5.6.2. Y-axis mirror reflection of the block
5.7. Stretching objects
5.8. Array multiple copy
5.8.1. Rectangular array
5.8.2. Circular (polar) array
5.8.3. Circular (polar) array with rotation
5.9. Changing the properties of objects
5.10. Editing text
5.11. Breaking (cutting) objects
5.12. Trimming (clipping) objects
5.13. Extending objects
5.14. Filleting objects
5.14.1. Filleting of two sections
5.14.2. Filleting a polyline and a polygon
5.14.3. Filleting lines to a circle
5.15. Chamfering
5.15.1. Chamfering two line sections
5.15.2. Chamfering the vertices of a polyline and a polygon
5.16. Parallel copy (offset)
5.17. Dividing object
5.18. Repeat the last edit function
5.19. Undo
6. Blocks and block functions
6.1. Basic information
6.2. Blocks and layers
6.3. Compound blocks
6.4. Grouping objects into a block
6.5. Saving the block in the "clipboard"
6.6. Inserting a block from the "clipboard"
6.7. Saving a block in a disk file (export)
6.8. Reading a block from a disk file (Import)
6.9. Block libraries
6.10. Breaking the block into elements (explosion)
6.11. Frozen blocks
6.12. Editing Blocks
6.12.1. Text editing
6.12.2. Breaking (cutting), trimming, extending, filleting and chamfering
6.12.3. Editing a dimensioning block
6.13. Block Attributes
6.14. Editing block attributes
6.15. Deleting DXF blocks
6.16. Importing DXF Blocks
6.17. Inserting a graphic image
6.18. Editing a graphic image
6.19. Graphic image export
6.20. Blocks correction
6.21. Fixed layers
6.22. Catalogs of typical elements
7. Controlling the drawing display
8. Properties of drawing elements
8.1. Basic concepts
8.1.1. Layers
8.1.2. Colors
8.1.3. Line thickness
8.1.4. Line type
8.2. Properties of layers
8.3. Current properties
8.4. Initial parameters
8.5. Editing layer parameters
8.5.1. New Layer
8.5.2. Current layer
8.5.3. Visibility of the layer
8.5.4. Editability of the layer
8.5.5. Localizabilty of the layer
8.6 Editing operations and layers
8.7. Information function
9. Drawing aids
9.1. Cursor step
9.2. Grid density
9.3. Grid points
9.4. Perpendicularity
9.4.1. Perpendicularity in the local coordinates system
9.5. Location of a point in relation to the object
9.5.1. Basic operations
9.5.2. Point snap modes relative to objects
9.5.3. Repeating point location mode
9.5.4. Location of points without the current repeating mode
9.5.5. Complex point location functions
9.6. Measure
10. Dimensioning
10.1. Basic information
10.2. Associative linear dimensioning
10.3. Circle dimensioning
10.4. Arc dimensioning
10.5. Angle dimensioning
10.6. Editing a dimension block
10.7. Deleting a dimension block
11. Hatching and filling with pattern
11.1. Hatch pattern information
11.2. Defining the boundaries of the enclosed area
11.3. Internal point of a closed area
11.4. Hatch function parameters. Defining Patterns
11.4.1. Hatch Pattern
11.4.2. Rotation angle
11.4.3. Scale
11.4.4. Base point editing and indicating
11.4.5. Distance
11.4.6. Creating hatch pattern sample block
11.5. Hatch function
12. File operations
12.1. Saving a drawing in filet
12.1.1. Updating a drawing
12.1.2. Saving a drawing as another file
12.1.3. Editing a nameplate (title block)
12.2. Reading a drawing from file
12.3. Entry and Return. Advanced functions for accessing drawings
12.4. Save a drawing in DXF format
12.5. Reading files in DXF format
12.5.1. DXF conversion setup
12.5.2. Drawing format. Prototype drawing
12.5.3. Converting line types
12.5.4. Converting font patterns
12.5.5. Diacritics
12.5.6. Colors conversion
12.5.7. Layers
12.5.8. Blocks and attributes
12.6. Memory usage
13. Searching and changing texts
13.1. /Find/ function
13.2. /Change Texts/ function
13.2.1. Change texts
13.2.2. Automatic numbering
14. Geometric characteristics of flat figures
15. Parameters and Options
16. Printing a drawing on a printer
17. Drawing a drawing on a plotter
18. AlfaCAD configuration parameters
19. “Help” “
20. Licensing
21. The punch line
APPENDIX A Font patterns
APPENDIX B Filling patterns
APPENDIX C AlfaCAD line types

AlfaCAD