Maximize the Power of Page Setups by Importing

Continuing the topic of using Named Page Setups (started with my last post titled “Name That Page Setup and Win (Save) Money”) to help you more efficiently manage plotting I wanted to take a look at how you might implement their use in the real world. The true versatility in Named Page Setups is found with the ability of importing them from one drawing to another. Here’s a look at how to import page setups from one drawing to another:

1. Open the Page Setup Manager. My last post demonstrated doing this by right-clicking on a layout tab; alternatively you can also right-click on the thumbnail of a layout if you’re using Quick View Layouts.

   

2. With the Page Setup Manager open, click the Import button from the right side of the dialog.
3. Browse to the DWG or DWT file containing the page setup you want to import and click Open. This opens the Import Page Setups dialog box.

   

4. The Import Page Setups dialog box will list each of the page setups stored within the selected DWG or DWT file. Select the page setups you would like to import, and click OK.
5. Each of the selected page setups will import into the current drawing, and display on the Page Setup Manager dialog box. As seen in my last post, any page setup listed in the Page Setup Manager dialog box can then be assigned to any layout in that drawing.

That’s all there is to importing page setups from one drawing to another. It’s worth nothing this is an import, not a dynamic link. Therefore changes made to a page setup in one drawing will not push to a second drawing. If these changes are needed in both drawings you could always re-import the page setup.

How can this be useful for me?

To truly see the benefit of named page setups, my personal recommendation is to create a single DWG or DWT that contains each of the standard page setups your firm uses. As an example your list of page setups may look like this:

By placing a page setup template (DWG/DWT) on the network, your users can access, import, and apply a consistent set of plotting configurations. This takes the guesswork assumed by the user when they want to do something as common as plot a black & white drawing in color. Just import the necessary page setup, apply to the layout, or temporarily override using the PUBLISH command, and your plot is done!