AutoCAD® 2012 FOR DUMMIES®

Looking Around in Layout Land

All the zoom, pan, and view operations I describe in this chapter work in paper space layouts as well as in model space. (Chapters 4 and 5 describe the differences between model space and paper space and how to navigate between the two.) One little complication exists, though: In a paper space layout — that is, any drawing area tab except for the Model tab — it's possible for the crosshairs to be in either paper space or in model space inside a viewport. Zooming and panning produce different effects depending on which space your crosshairs are in at the moment. You switch between the two spaces using the MSPACE (MS) and PSPACE (PS) commands.

Experiment with the different effects by following these steps:

1. Open a drawing that contains at least one paper space layout with a title block and one or more viewports.

   If you don't have any such drawings handy, try using one of the AutoCAD sample drawings that you can download from http://www.autodesk.com/autocad-samples. For example, have a look at architectural_-_annotation_scaling_and_multileaders.dwg.

2. Click Quick View Layouts on the status bar and then click one of the layout preview images — that is, any image other than the Model preview image.

   AutoCAD displays the paper space layout, including any title block and viewports. Click somewhere away from an image to dismiss the Quick View image bar.

3. Type PSPACE (or PS) and press Enter.

   AutoCAD will either switch to paper space or tell you that you're already ...