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If you want to change the sample line numbers into the letters in your sample line style
description you can do it by creating your own sample line style that enables that operation.
Using this method you can easily create a letter description instead of a numerical/digital description.
This method is useful in every alphabetical system so you don’t need any additional software to create:
- Letters in your native language alphabet,
- Letters without certain and specific letters (if you want).
If they are not used by design for any particular reason (e.g. some national alphabet letters),
- Your own letter system e.g. A, A’, A’’ or any other combination of an alphabetic system.
You will get all the needed information about this method to use it in the English alphabet.
You can also easily use it in any other alphabet system because it describes the universal rules which you can easily adopt to your unique situation.
In spite of the differences in the alphabets like:
- Additional national letters,
- Changes in the letter sequences in the national alphabets,
- Amount of letters (e.g. the English alphabet consists of 26 letters).
For most cases the sample lines can be described by the English alphabet letters without the national letters.
But even if you want to use them in your language you can do it anyway.
THE BASICS OF THE METHOD
You can make the sample line labels of the letter description for your sample lines.
You can assign a number to each letter and an extra number 0 equals null (empty).
When you use the English alphabet you have 26 letters so you can describe it as:
- Using only one digit you have 26x260=26 so you can describe 26 sample lines,
- Using only two digits you have 26x261+26x260= 702 so you can describe 702 sample lines,
- Using only three digits you have 26x262+26x261+26x260 = 18 278 so you can describe 18278 sample lines, this should be sufficient enough for most cases.
Note that you will get the sequence of the letters among others:
A,B,C,…,Z,AA,AB,AC,…AZ,BA,BB,BC,…,BZ,…,…,ZZ,AAA,AAB,AAC,…AAZ,BAA,…,…,…,ZZZ
Generally you can convert any numerical/digital value into a letter marking.
You can use for this a simple method based on dividing and using the modulo operations.
This mechanism works as shown below:
Using these simple calculations you can create your expressions for your sample lines.
However in some cases you should also make some extra logic operations to get the correct
letter notation e.g. from the value = 680 you get the letters: _, Z, D not: A, _, D.
It is a consequence of using the 0 value to represent an empty space.
Therefore you should use an extra mechanism that will control the correct values of the letters, remembering that the letters have their own values from the range: 1 - 26.
In other words you cannot use the 0 value after a non-0 value.
You should change that 0 value into the preceding value which will be the value = 26
in your sample lines description.
So you should build some logic auxiliary expressions that will control the move mechanism
when it is necessary and calculate the proper values. You can use basic math and logic
operations and build such expressions in your sample lines.
1.Choose the Sample Line node from Settings in your Toolspace,
2. First of all, choose Label Styles and then add a new expression and give it a meaningful name e.g. NumChr which is equal to the amount of the letters in the English alphabet NumChr = 26
3. Next create new truncated expressions for every digit which you should numbering
somehow but in the same manner e.g. the first digit = 1, the second digit = 2, the third digit = 3
4. You can choose some math functions by selecting the button with the f(x)+ icon.
5. Give your expressions some meaningful names e.g. Trunc1, Trunc2, Trunc3
and choose also Format result as Double,
Trunc1:
TRUNC((({Sample Line Number}/NumChr)/NumChr))
Trunc2:
TRUNC((FMOD(({Sample Line Number}/NumChr),NumChr)))
Trunc3:
TRUNC((FMOD({Sample Line Number},NumChr)))
6. Create the auxiliary value expressions and give them some meaningful names e.g.
AuxVal1, AuxVal2, AuxVal3 and choose also Format result as Double,
AuxVal1:
IF((Trunc1+NumChr)<=NumChr,Trunc1+NumChr,Trunc1)
AuxVal2:
IF((Trunc2+NumChr)<=NumChr,Trunc2+NumChr,Trunc2)
AuxVal3:
IF((Trunc3+NumChr)<=NumChr,Trunc3+NumChr,Trunc3)
7. Create the digit value expressions which will calculate the final values of the letters and give them some meaningful names e.g. DigitVal1, DigitVal2, DigitVal3 and choose also Format result as Double,
DigitVal1:
IF((LOG10({Sample Line Number})/LOG10(NumChr))<=2,0,
IF(((Trunc2<=1)&((Trunc3!=AuxVal3)|(Trunc2!=AuxVal2))),
AuxVal1-1,AuxVal1))
DigitVal2:
IF((LOG10({Sample Line Number})/LOG10(NumChr))<=1,0,
IF((Trunc3!=AuxVal3),IF((AuxVal2-1=0),NumChr,AuxVal2-1),AuxVal2))
DigitVal3:
AuxVal3
You have the mechanism which calculates the proper values for each sample line.
Now you can build your expressions which will control the visibility by changing the height of every digit.
When the calculated letter corresponding to its position should be visible then the height of this letter changes into the height which is visible now and
if the letter shouldn’t be visible then the height of the letter changes into the invisible height equals almost zero. Thus you will see only the correct letters.
8. Create the expressions which will control globally the height of the letters:
MajusculeHeight = 0.005
MinusculeHeight = 0.0000000001
9. Create the expressions which will control the height of every letter,
The letter A expressions for 1, 2, 3 digit:
viA1 where A=1→IF(DigitVal1=1,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
viA2→IF(DigitVal2=1,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
viA3→IF(DigitVal3=1,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
The letter B expressions for 1, 2, 3 digit:
viB1 where B=2→IF(DigitVal1=2,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
viB2→IF(DigitVal2=2,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
viB3→IF(DigitVal3=2,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
Getting the values from the letter table, create the expression for each letter until the letter Z:
The letter expressions Z for 1, 2, 3 digit:
viZ1 where Z=26→IF(DigitVal1=26,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
viZ2→IF(DigitVal2=26,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
viZ3→IF(DigitVal3=26,MajusculeHeight,MinusculeHeight)
10.Create the offset expressions which will control globally the distance between the letters,
For the first digit:
IF((LOG10({Sample Line Number})/LOG10(NumChr))<=2,0,0.015)
For the second digit:
IF((LOG10({Sample Line Number})/LOG10(NumChr))<=1,0,0.01)
For the third digit:
0.005
11. Create your own letter sample line style and name it e.g. myLetterSection,
12. Build the text elements for the sample line label letters,
13. Add a new text element for the first A digit and name it A1:
- Set Name = A1
- Anchor Point = End
- Contents = A
- Text Height = viA1
- X Offset = OffsetChr1
14. Add a new text element for the second A digit and name it A2:
- Set Name = A2
- Anchor Point = End
- Contents = A
- Text Height = viA2
- X Offset = OffsetChr2
15. Add a new text label for the third A digit and name it A3:
- Set Name= A3
- Anchor Point = End
- Contents = A
- Text Height = viA3
- X Offset = OffsetChr3
16.Add the text elements for each successive letter in the same manner,
17. Select the sample lines and choose the created sample line style description
and click the Add button,
18. Next click the OK button and finally you will see the result.
UNICODE IMPROVEMENT
If you know how the standard method works for the sample line letter style you can note how to improve it to get a much faster and a more effective method.
The standard 26-elements method uses 26 letters for every three positions that gives 26x3=78 elements.
You can reduce this number of elements and get a better method for a large amount of
sample lines because the more elements the greater losses.
If you want to know how to expand this method by the Unicode improvement you can read the full story here http://goo.gl/rPvjD
The previous link is disabled
If you want to know how to expand this method by the Unicode improvement you can read the full story here http://goo.gl/rPvjD
to read "Alphabetical instead of numerical Sample Line Labels" article
follow this link http://civilfastforward.com
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