Many users are faced with the task of measuring areas when editing various drawings in the process of working in
AutoCAD. There are several ways to measure the area in
AutoCAD. Let's take a closer look at these methods and analyze their strengths and weaknesses.
Getting the area value from the properties of an object.If such a enclosed shape is formed by one object, for example, a circle, enclosed polyline or region, then its area value can be getted from the properties of this object. The property palette can be opened pressing
Ctrl + 1.
The
_LIST command also allows you to get the area value from the properties of the enclosed object.
It should be noted that the manipulations associated with getting the values of the areas of a large number of such objects can be quite time-consuming. If there is a need to measure the area of the enclosed shape formed by the connection or intersection of various types of objects, the complexity of calculating the area such a shape usually increases. The fact is that the user has to use some
AutoCAD tool to create an additional enclosed object in place of this shape, for example using the
_BOUNDARY,
_PLINE commands or create a hatch object using the
_HATCH command. It should be remembered that such a redundant object is likely to require subsequent removal at the end of all the manipulations necessary to measure the area in
AutoCAD. The drawbacks of this method include all the drawbacks characteristic of these commands (
_BOUNDARY,
_HATCH) associated with inaccuracy, and sometimes the impossibility of constructing some boundaries.
Measuring the area of an enclosed shape using the _AREA command.There is another way to get the area of eclosed shape in the standard set of AutoCAD tools - this is the
_AREA command. This command is specifically intended to quickly measure the area of such a shape without additional creating of an enclosed object.
The obvious advantages of the
_AREA command include the ability to get the area value of a shape that have gaps along the outline. But basically this method is more suitable for calculating the areas of simple polygons. When working with large and complex enclosed shapes, this method demonstrates very mediocre performance, because in fact, the user has to manually (point by point) re-draw boundary of this shape. If the boundary elements include various kinds of splines, then the exact calculation of the area in this case is a big question due to the limited capabilities of the
_AREA command when working with similar objects.
Measuring the area of any enclosed shape in AutoCAD using AreaTester free plugin.Currently, one of the most effective methods for calculating the area of any enclosed shape in
AutoCAD is the method using the AreaTester free plugin. In this case (if plugin is installed into
AutoCAD environment), it becomes possible to measure not only the areas of enclosed objects, such as a polylines or circles, but also any other shapes formed by the intersection and connection of various types of objects, which include lines, arcs, splines and many other
AutoCAD basic objects. At the same time, to measure the area of any enclosed shape, you only need to point the crosshair of the cursor on it and the area value will be instantly displayed in the context window above the cursor. In addition, the user can create the necessary list of the areas in the main application window for the further work. All these areas are summed automatically in the created list. The total result of the summation is displayed at the bottom of the main window of the app.
One of the key features of
AreaTester, compared to the standard
AutoCAD tools described above, is the ability to determine the area value of any enclosed shape excluding the areas formed by objects that have got inside such an shape (the so-called "islands"). This option significantly simplifies the user’s work on calculating areas in
AutoCAD, eliminating the need for additional mathematical operations.
Additional features of the AreaTester for AutoCAD free plugin:- Automatic measuring of the all areas in a drawing.
- Annotating the areas directly in a drawing.
- Exporting the generated list of areas to the clipboard or some convenient data format (* .txt, * .csv).
- Adding the table of the area list to a drawing.
Visit the official website
AreaTester for AutoCAD free plugin:
http://areatester.com
