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Hatch

Dimension

Draft

Description

To create a text element with an arrow use the Draft Label command instead.

Usage

See also: Draft Tray and Draft Snap.

Options

The single character keyboard shortcuts available in the task panel can be changed. See Draft Preferences. The shortcuts mentioned here are the default shortcuts.

• To manually enter coordinates enter the X, Y and Z component, and press Enter after each. Or you can press the Enter Point button when you have the desired values. It is advisable to move the pointer out of the 3D View before entering coordinates.
• Press G or click the Global checkbox to toggle global mode. If global mode is on, coordinates are relative to the global coordinate system, else they are relative to the working plane coordinate system.
• Press N or click the Continue checkbox to toggle continue mode. If continue mode is on, the command will restart after finishing, allowing you to continue creating texts. The shortcut does not work in the second task panel. This option is not available in the first task panel in FreeCAD version 0.19 and earlier.
• Press S to switch Draft snapping on or off.
• Press Esc or the Close button to abort the command.

Notes

• A Draft Text can be edited by double-clicking it in the Tree View.
• Draft Texts created or saved with FreeCAD version 0.21 are not backward compatible.

Properties

See also: Property View.

A Draft Text object is derived from an App FeaturePython object and inherits all its properties. The following properties are additional unless otherwise stated.

Data

Base

• DataPlacement (Placement): specifies the position of the text in the 3D View. See Placement.
• DataText (StringList): specifies the contents of the text. Each item in the list represents a new text line.

View

Annotation

• VyAnnotation Style (Enumeration): specifies the annotation style applied to the text. See Draft AnnotationStyleEditor.
• VyScale Multiplier (Float): specifies the general scaling factor applied to the text.

Display Options

• VyDisplay Mode (Enumeration): specifies how the text is displayed. If it is World the text will be displayed on a plane defined by its DataPlacement. If it is Screen the text will always face the screen. This is an inherited property. The mentioned options are the renamed options (introduced in 0.21).

Text

• VyFont Name (Font): specifies the font used to draw the text. It can be a font name, such as Arial, a default style such as sans, serif or mono, a family such as Arial,Helvetica,sans, or a name with a style such as Arial:Bold. If the given font is not found on the system, a default font is used instead.
• VyFont Size (Length): specifies the size of the letters. The text can be invisible in the 3D View if this value is very small.
• VyJustification (Enumeration): specifies if the alignment of the text: Left, Center or Right.
• VyLine Spacing (Float): specifies the factor applied to the default line height of the text.
• VyText Color (Color): specifies the color of the text.

Scripting

See also: Autogenerated API documentation and FreeCAD Scripting Basics.

To create a Draft Text use the make_text method (introduced in 0.19) of the Draft module. This method replaces the deprecated makeText method.

text = make_text(string, placement=None, screen=False)

• Creates a text object, at placement, which can be a FreeCAD.Placement, but also a FreeCAD.Rotation or a FreeCAD.Vector.
• string is a string or a list of strings. If it is a list, each element is displayed on its own line.
• If screen is True, the text always faces the camera, otherwise it is displayed in a plane defined by its DataPlacement.

The view properties of text can be changed by overwriting its attributes; for example, overwrite ViewObject.FontSize with the new size in millimeters.

Example:

import FreeCAD as App
import Draft

doc = App.newDocument()

t1 = "This is a sample text"
p1 = App.Vector(0, 0, 0)

t2 = ["First line", "second line"]
p2 = App.Vector(1000, 1000, 0)

text1 = Draft.make_text(t1, p1)
text2 = Draft.make_text(t2, p2)
text1.ViewObject.FontSize = 200
text2.ViewObject.FontSize = 200

zaxis = App.Vector(0, 0, 1)

t3 = ["Upside", "down"]
p3 = App.Vector(-1000, -500, 0)
place3 = App.Placement(p3, App.Rotation(zaxis, 180))
text3 = Draft.make_text(t3, place3)
text3.ViewObject.FontSize = 200

doc.recompute()

Hatch

Dimension

Draft