By Martin Phelps
This command can be easily overlooked, or not even noticed. It’s located in the expansion area of the “Modify” panel of the ribbon menu, as shown in Figure 1.
Alternatively, type-in “Set” and from the displayed list select “SETBYLAYER”, as shown in Figure 2.
The function of this command is to change AutoCAD objects that have not been set “Bylayer” to “Bylayer”.
Through the “life” of a drawing or design, the file may be “Opened” and “Edited” by a number of users, and therefore it can’t be guaranteed that all drawn objects will be drawn “Bylayer”.
This may be down to a lack of understanding of company CAD standards, pressure to get the drawing completed, an accidental oversight by the user, or it may be a quick solution to complete the drawing by placing the object on any “Layer” and changing its “Properties” to suit the drawing requirements. And yes this does happen. Particularly if the drawing does not go through any CAD standards checking.
As with all AutoCAD commands, when the command is activated, it appears at the command line as shown in Figure 3.
The only sub “Option” is “Settings”, selecting this option will allow the user to change which “Properties” of “Bylayer” are matched. By default, the properties “Color”, “Material”, “Linetype”, “Lineweight” and “Transparency” are checked, as shown in Figure 4.
As previously mentioned, generally drawings are created “Bylayer”. Figure 5 below shows three lines, all have been drawn on the “Layer”, “Outline”.
The green “Line” at the bottom of the sequence has both the “Linetype” and the “Colour” set “Bylayer”.
The middle Line has both the “Color” and “Linetype” “Bylayer” properties overridden, and the top line has just the “Linetype” “Bylayer” property overridden.
Using the “Set to Bylayer” command and selecting the objects that have not been drawn “Bylayer” will set them to “Bylayer”.
Once the “Objects” have been selected, as with many AutoCAD commands the number of selected objects is totalised in the command line, pressing “Enter” confirms the object selection.
The user now has the option of confirming to change the selected objects from “Byblock” to “Bylayer”.
The user has the option to include “Blocks” by responding “Yes” or “No”.
Finally, the command then confirms how many items have been modified and their “Properties” changed to “Bylayer”. The result is shown in Figure 6.