TXTEXP moves text slightly when exploding.

[Anonymous]

I'm trying to convert some text into polylines. TXTEXP seems to work almost perfectly, however, the text moves slightly. When I say slightly, I mean like a point originally at (0,0) moves to (0.010,0.003). This is enough to move it off the grid that I need.

Here's some observations:

1. The amount of displacement seems to depend on the view. If I run TXTEXP, then look at the displacement, then undo it, then run TXTEXP again, I will get the same result only if I haven't moved the view (zoomed or panned). If the view has changed, I'll get different numbers, although they'll be pretty close to each other (like 0.0029 becomes 0.0036).

2. It doesn't displace all points by the same amount. 

3. I've tried several different fonts and they all do this.

4. I've tried changing INSUNITS, INSUNITSDEFTARGET, INSUNITSDEFSOURCE, -DWGUNITS to make them all the same. (I've tried both unitless and mm.) I'm not an expert, so I don't fully understand what these do, but there are several forum posts about problems with TXTEXP that recommend to check these.

I'm using version R.118.0.0 AutoCAD 2021.1 on Windows 10.

Any recommendations for how to get text into polylines without moving it?

Thanks!

[qnologi]

this seemed helpful...

Exploded Text moves - Autodesk Community - AutoCAD

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the reply. I tried to change the WMFBKGND variable manually before running TXTEXP. Unfortunately, I still get the same result. I also tried to modify the TXTEXP.lsp as the post suggested and still have the text offset. 

Am I doing something wrong?

(defun c:txtexp (/ grplst getgname blknm FLTR GLST GDICT SS VIEW UPLFT TMPFIL TBX
                   TMPFIL CNT PT1 PT2 ENT TXT TXTYP PTLST ZM LOCKED GNAM vpna vplocked)
  (acet-error-init
        (list
         (list   "cmdecho" 0
                 "highlight" 1
                 "osmode" 0
                 "Mirrtext" 1
                 "limcheck" 0
                 "wmfbkgnd" 1 ; "wmfbkgnd" 1  was added 05FEB2021
         )
         T
        )
  )

[qnologi]

i found this...

Autocad txtxexp problem. Change Scale and position of the text. Solution? and All about txtexp | GIS...

[Anonymous]

@qnologi, thanks for the response. That post has me try two things, one of which I've already done (INSUNITS=0) and the other I don't really understand:

"Another problem of txtexp is its resolution and precision when exploding text. if you select single text it woks perfect but if you select text in a large area, text will be jagged and not so good. solution that i find is to write a lisp to select each text individually, then zoom to it and do explosion. it works good but takes a long long time."

I'm trying TXTEXP with a single character and zoomed at various places. Every time the text gets moved by a tiny amount. I attempted to use two text boxes that are far apart, and yes, when I run TXTEXP on both at the same time, the offset is larger. However, I need the offset to be exactly zero.

I'm beginning to think this can't be done. Is there another method to change text to polylines?

[pendean]

You will need to fix the movement/displacement/size manually in each case AFAIK with AutoCAD: you will need to find another software to do it like Adobe Illustrator (I am assuming you need this for CNC work?).

[Anonymous]

Yes. The CNC software needs the points on a grid.

I'll keep looking for a solution. Thanks for the response!

[Patchy]

Which fonts did you use for this drawing? Can you attach it here?

[Anonymous]

It happens with every font I've tried.

Here are some examples that I've just tried.

txt.shx

Times New Roman

Stencil

[Patchy]

I tried all the tricks but can't find one that work.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for trying!

[DentonYoder]

I have an old one that we used... We called it stroking a drawing.  In control panel -> Autodesk plotter manager -> add printer to a file; DXB format.  Print anything you want to this format.... start a new drawing and do the command dxbin to import the file you created.  It is a "line" stroked drawing now.  Everything, even circles are now lines.

[Anonymous]

This seems promising, however, I'm having a lot of trouble trying to get the scaling correct.

If I make the text height = 1, after I print to the dbx and import it, the text isn't 1 anymore. it's around 0.9989. Interestingly, the width seems to be correct.