Element settings

What every command that adds an element (LINE, ARC, POLYLINE, TEXT, DIMHORIZONTAL …) has in common: its id, its layer, and the settings that can follow it.

Syntax

KEYWORD @id,points…,layer,settings…

A list of points is written in square brackets: [P1,P4,P5] takes those points in that order, and [P1..P5] takes P1, P2, P3, P4 and P5, just as if they were written out (and the drawing saves them written out: [P1,P2,P3,P4,P5]), so moving, copying or mirroring the element takes every one of them.

Settings after the element

Any of these can follow an element, each after a comma, in any order:

TOOL settings

An element needs only the settings that differ from its layer's: each layer can have TOOL settings of its own (LAYER …,TOOL KEY=value,…, see LAYER), set for all the layers at once in Production › Tool Options. What an element is cut with is, for each setting, the first of:

1. the element's own TOOL setting;
2. its layer's;
3. the export options' (the pocket layer and default tool of the G-code export).

So LINE P1,P3,0,TOOL FEED=600 on a layer with TOOL DIA=6,FEED=1200,DEPTH=-3 is cut with a 6 mm tool, 3 deep, at 600 a minute. DRILL=TRUE on a layer drills every element on it (a point, or a circle's centre). The Properties panel's Tool Options… edits an element's own settings, and Use Layer Settings clears them, so its layer's apply.

RULE settings

FOLD is how far a crease folds when the drawing is folded in 3D, in degrees from 0 to 180: RULE FOLD=60 for each crease of a hexagonal carton, RULE FOLD=180 for a gusset folded flat. The line's layer still says which way it folds (Crease one way, Reverse crease the other). A crease without it folds 90°. It can be worked out from the drawing's sizes, and then follows them: RULE FOLD=180-RTOD(ATAN2(D,W/2)) for the base of a triangular tube.

STEP is when a crease folds as the design folds up: the creases with step 1 fold first, then step 2, and so on, so a box's walls can stand up before its flaps close over them: RULE STEP=1 on the walls' creases, RULE STEP=2 on the bottom flaps', RULE STEP=3 on the top's. Creases without a step take the one the 3D page's fold order gives them (see Pages), numbered the same way, so a step of 1.5 comes between the order's first and second. Creases with the same step fold together. It can be worked out too (RULE FOLD=90,STEP=S+1). On the 3D page, picking a crease and choosing Set fold step writes it for you; so do dragging a panel to fold it (FOLD) and dragging creases and steps on the fold-order timeline (STEP): see Live editing in 3D.

PUNCH and DIE name the press-brake punch and die a sheet-metal bend line is bent with (tools of the tooling library: RULE PUNCH="Gooseneck punch 88°",DIE="V-die 16 mm 88°"); without them they are chosen. See Press-Brake Simulation.

The others are kept from die-making files so they can be written back; you rarely type them. AUX and POINTAGE (CF2), TABLE, QUALIFIER, CORNER, SEGMENT, SEGSTART, SEGEND (DDES3), FILELAYER and ARROWHEAD.

A part's 3D settings

A part is made 3D by its layer's LAYER3D settings: one thickness, height and material for every closed outline on the layer. A part that differs has its own, on its closed outline (or on a part or block whose outlines they are), over its layer's:

For each one, the part's own setting wins; without it, its layer's; without that, the drawing's (the material's thickness T, the 3D page's material). Each can be worked out from the drawing's variables, and then follows them: RULE THICK=BT,LOOK="birch-plywood" makes a part BT thick, and changing BT changes it. In a function, the function's own arguments can be used (RULE THICK=TK); a thickness of 0 is not set, so a function can give its parts their own thickness or leave them their layer's.

RULE AS="WRAP" on one element of a closed outline wraps that piece alone (Wrapping and sweeping):

These settings only make the 3D model: no 2D export writes them, and the drawing cuts the same. Everything that uses a part's thickness follows them: its body and the cuts in it (a pocket deeper than the part goes only through it), its mates (a face's height is in the part's own thickness), fittings and banding, the 3D exports, measuring, and the panel cut list's thickness (see Reports). The Properties panel's 3D Part sets them for the selected parts.

Bridging settings

A rule's own bridges, which Make Die, CF2 and DDES3 files and the drawing API use (the Bridge Tool writes them for you):

BRIDGEWIDTH, BRIDGESPACING, BRIDGEENDS and BRIDGEPAIR can be worked out from the drawing's variables (RULE BRIDGEWIDTH=BRW1), and then follow them.

Examples

P4=[250,200]
LINE @1,P0,P4,1
LINE P4,P2,0,BRIDGES 2,3,LINEWIDTH 0.5
POINT P4,0,TOOL DRILL=TRUE,HOLE=5,DEPTH=-12
LINE P1,P3,0,HIDDEN,NOPLOT
LINE @5,P0,P1,1,RULE FOLD=60
LINE @6,P1,P2,1,RULE STEP=2
BRW=5,"Bridge width"
LINE @7,P0,P4,0,RULE PLACED="C0.25:5 L0.75:5",BRIDGEWIDTH=BRW
LINE @8,P4,P2,0,BRIDGES 3,4,RULE BRIDGEENDS=10,BRIDGEPAIR=2
LINE @9,P2,P0,0,RULE BRIDGESPACING=60,BRIDGEWIDTH=BRW
POLYLINE @10,[P0,P1,P4],TRUE,0,RULE THICK=6,Z=12,LOOK="birch-plywood"

The first line is on layer 1 (Crease); the second is a cut with two 3 mm bridges, drawn 0.5 wide; the point is a 5 mm hole drilled 12 deep; the next line is neither drawn nor plotted; the next is a crease that folds 60° (one side of a hexagon); the next folds in the second step. The last three are cuts with bridges of their own: two at a quarter and three quarters of the way along (the second a tack), as wide as BRW; three pairs, the first and last 10 from the ends; and as many as keep them no more than 60 apart. The triangle is a part 6 thick in birch plywood, 12 off the floor in 3D, whatever its layer says.

Notes

Everything an element is made from is a point or an expression, so the element follows its points when they move. Its settings are written after it in the drawing file exactly as typed here, and the Properties panel shows and changes them.

An element made in a block (a loop, an IF, a function) keeps its layer, LINEWIDTH, BRIDGES, TOOL and RULE settings in what the block makes. A fold angle, step or part's 3D setting worked out from the block's variables is worked out as each element is made, so creases made in a loop (RULE FOLD=A for each A) each fold as far as their own turn says. A HIDDEN element in a block isn't drawn.

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