Initially RealCADD will open with a new Plan – "Untitled 1" – which will be displayed at the bottom of the Window menu. As more drawings are opened, they will add to the list. To move from one to another, simply click the one you want. The current drawing will be ticked.
The Carbon version of RealCADD Command Line pallet is shown to the right. The Cocoa version Command line is similar, but it is fixed to the bottom left of the window instead of being a floating pallet.
The principle behind the command line is that you can enter data for objects (line, oval, rectangle etc.) as you draw, rather than editing the data after the object is drawn. Clicking the arrows will display the menu of objects that can be drawn with the command line.
To see details of how the tools work in the command line, click the appropriate menu item in the image to the right and scroll down. The descriptions are based on the standard Mac Click & Drag drawing mode. If you have selected Click & Click in Preferences, then there will be minor differences.
The basic operation of the command line (having selected it in the Window menu) is to start drawing with whatever cmd you wish to use and, while holding the mouse button down, enter the specific data in the command line window, tabbing from one box to the next. When you are done entering data, hit the ⏎ (Enter/Return) key and let go the mouse. The object will be draw according to the data you have entered. You can use some Snap attractions (End, Center and Intersection) to select a start point for drawing the object. Currently you can't use Perpendicular or Tangent (if drawing a line).
ArcWith the command line active, selecting the Arc tool (or hitting the D-key) will automatically change the command line pallet to arc mode.
Click on the drawing where you want to start your arc, keep the mouse button held down and start to drag. The pallet will automatically register x1 and y1 (the centre position of the arc), where you clicked.
The next three boxes must have data entered in them:
r enter the radius of the arc. Tab to the next box
ad enter the start angle of the arc. Tab to the next box
aa enter the subtended angle through which the arc will be drawn.
Click ⏎ (Enter/Return) and let go the mouse.
The final three boxes are optional. WL = line width: enter this as a number in pixels. CL = line colour: enter 0 = black, 1 = red, 2 = yellow … 7 = white. CB = background (fill) colour: enter 0 = black, 1 = red, 2 = yellow … 7 = white. If you want to use these, after entering r, ad and aa, hit the ⇥ (tab) key to move to the WL box and enter the data. Then tab again to the CL box if you want to enter the colour data and again to the CB box if you want to enter background colour data. Then hit ⏎ (Enter/Return) and let go the mouse.
Tip: If your zero position is the top left corner of the screen (the default), then your start data will be positive numbers. If you have moved your zero point elsewhere, then both x-data and y-data can be positive or negative. Drawing from left to right will be x-positive; right to left will be x-negative. Similarly drawing from top to bottom will be y-positive and from bottom to top y-negative. If you have selected in Preferences for "Positive y upwards", then y-positive and y-negative will be reversed
Tip: You can move forwards and backwards along the boxes by using ⇥ (tab) and ⇧⇥ (shift-tab)
Note: The final CB box is not active – tabbing to that will simply take you back to the first box. Ignore it.