Darn it. I came here looking for an answer but this isn't the one I was looking for. I've gotten so used to my drawings looking great it's a shame I'm going to have to eye-ball it now.
Example; start a pline from a given point. Draw orthoginally (horizontal or vertical) at least half way across your screen, then line up a new end point to be exactly 45 degrees from a third end point. Continue the pline to the third point and fillet the pline. Now do that in a drawing that is crammed with other lines, circles, points, etc. You can do it in 2008 because ortho works with zooming away from the first point and closer to the third point to then use polar while avoiding other lines (and accidentally grabing polar points from lines you don't want). In 2010, that doesn't work with just polar tracking only because polar points reset when you zoom in closer to the thrid point (and away from your first point).
Autodesk, please fix this. It worked great before, why did you have to go though the extra work of disabling it? Do you expect me to go back to R-14 days of using construction lines? Do you want me to produce less accurate drawings? Then what is the purpose of not allowing polar and ortho?
One option is to use F8 for Ortho and F10 for Polar. I switch back and forth woth ease.
Once you have this as a habit, it's fast & easy. I use the above as well as F3 Osnap all the time.
I know it's not the answer you want, but it's the best I can come up with.
Good Luck!
Thanks, yeah I use the F keys a lot to switch a bunch of functions still. But as I described above; switching between the two doesn't help, I need to have both on at the same time. I just don't understand what the point of disabling it was for. Why spend the time and resources to eliminate a feature of Autocad that worked good, wasn't causing any conflicts, and actually benefited users in helping to create cleaner drawings; especially when it had all ready been implimented for years?
Polar and Ortho have always been mutually exclusive - activating one deactivates the other. As previously posted, you can include 0, 90, 180 and 270 in your Polar angles, to be able to lock in on those angles when you are close to them. Unlike having Ortho on, once you stray too far from one of those angles, you will lose the "lock". That is as close as you can get to having both on at the same time. I can not remember the last time I had Ortho on. I have been using Polar almost exclusively since that feature was added.
David,
You are miss informed. The last version my office was comming from is 2008 and both worked at the same time in that version. Prior to that it was 2004, then 2000 where and both worked in them too. I'm not sure when this actually was changed but we only really started migrating to 2010 after update 2 was released because the numerous errors (and slowness) had prevented us from fully upgrading. It's also the reason why we never bothered with 2009 and all those other versions too, that or there wasn't enough of an imporvement or reason too.
I used 2000, 2004 and 2008, and I can assure you that you never had both Polar Tracking and Ortho on at the same time. Ortho always goes either 0/180 or 90/270, depending upon which way is farther from your initial point. With that active, no other angles are possible, so Polar Tracking could not work.
From the ADT 2004 Help:
"Note Ortho mode restricts the cursor to horizontal or vertical (orthogonal) axes. Because you cannot have Ortho mode and polar tracking turned on at the same time, AutoCAD turns polar tracking off when you turn on Ortho mode. If you turn polar tracking back on, AutoCAD turns Ortho mode off. Similarly, if you turn PolarSnap on, grid snap is turned off automatically."
David,
I found the problem and officailly stand corrected, though I was still very close in my thinking. I went back to an older 2008 pc in my work and looked back at the actual settings we used to use. The correct settings were object snap tracking and ortho. Polar tacking is turned off but when I looked back at the polar tracking dialog box I noticed the same function of polar tracking was being achieved with object snap tracking instead. I've attached a simple image to show what I was talking about. Notice my first point is off the screen but ortho is still allowing me to draw the line straight up. The os tracking is then allowing me to finish the line at a set 45 degree angle.
Sorry about the confusion everyone.
Cool. It has been so long since I have used ORTHO that if I ever knew you could combine ORTHO and OTRACK, I have long since forgotten it. You can get the same effect with POLAR and OTRACK on, but you would have to have your cursor be closer to "straight up" from the start point, which could be a challenge with the point off screen.
I also has Same Problem,
When I use Ortho on Then the Line tool ( or Any) doesnt Catch any respective Intersection Points while for This to be Worked I need to Turn OFF Ortho And Then Turn on Polar Snap in Autocad 2014 64bit.
Before I was using Autocad 2010 it was fine working.
Can you help me how to work for 2014 too...
I am not seeing much difference using Object Snap Tracking with Ortho Mode between ACA 2010 and ACA 2014. With Ortho Mode on, you can only extend up/down and left/right from a previously entered point - other angles are only available from the tracked points. If you need other angles from a previously entered point, then you will need to turn on Polar Tracking.
I'm using Acad MEP 2015 and this is thankfully still working for me as I still use it quite often.
My normal settings are to have Object Snap turned on, as well as ortho. I also have Polar Trackging turned on, with 30 degree incriments as well as additional angels for every 45 degrees. My tracking settings use all polar angle settings and are relative to last segment.
After starting a line zoom/pan closer to your ending point. Hover over it for a second then move your curser off of it. Although your line will originally start off only extending in the up/down or left/right direction, your line will turn at some point and you will see a dashed line tracking the angle at which your line will be coming from (at which ever angle you choose). Simply left click to confirm it and you line will automatically be drawn in.
I even go so far as to use a lisp routing that will automatically change my layer to a circuiting, start the polyline command, wait for me to draw and finish the line, then go back and add a fillet to the line (radius based on my dimscale), it then changes my layter back to what ever I was on previously. It's a real time saver for adding in circuit lines that are parallel to the building lines.
ps. I'd upload my lisp routing but my boss is a bit... protective of that. sorry.
I'm also tossing and turning my polar, ortho, osnap settings, but I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed this pic of those nostalgic toolbars and icons. I must remember to take more screen shots and keep them in an autocad scrap book lol
Thanks, yeah I found out a long time ago that the pick icons are easier to use and especially faster than navigating the ribbon. Notice my custom icons on the right, that screen shot is cut off but I have a bunch more than that for inserting our most common blocks. I hardly ever use our custom pull down menu, but even that is faster than the ribbon too. I never could understand why anybody thinks using the ribbon is better. To each their own though & at least it works.