How do I make a 2D rectangle

[Anonymous]

Please excuse me I am new and an idiot...I cannot find the beginners section. I cannot find anything....

I am trying to watch tutorials to tech myself. But I am have trouble with the very basics....

I found this instruction:

How do you make a rectangular selection in AutoCAD?

Select objects by clicking them or by using a window or crossing method.

1. To specify a rectangular selection area, click and release the mouse button, move the cursor, and click again.

This is not working for me…..

I am using the mouse in my right hand. I left click release and drag the mouse making the rectangle.

Then I click again….but it disappears. If I right click I get a lot of options, but still the rectangle disappears.

I am sure it is second nature to an expert like you, but I am stuck. There is no point in going any further unless I can at least make a rectangle.

Can you help and idiot with this very basic. Question.

Many apologies for put this request somewhere that I know it is not supposed to be....but I am lost and confused.

[tbrammer]

This is a developer forum, not a user forum. But anyway - try this:

Open the options dialog (by right click menu or command _OPTIONS).

Click to the tab "Selection" (in German it is "Auswahl") and change the selection method ("Fensterauswahlmethode") to "both" or "click & click".

[dgorsman]

Just to be clear: are you trying to select something?  Or are you trying to draw something? 

[Anonymous]

Sir/Madam

Thank you.

I am learning and just trying to draw rectangle, etc from scratch.



Thank you



Regards

Dan

[Anonymous]

Sir



My apologies. I was unaware.

I cannot find the OPTIONS button/tab..?

Just by the way, how do I change the programme wide preference to metric.



Thank you



Dan

[tbrammer · Accepted solution]

I thought you were asking how to make a rectangular SELECTION.

Now I understand that you misunderstood the meaning of "How do you make a rectangular selection in AutoCAD?".

So to draw a rectangle you can either type the command "_RECTANG" (without quotes) or click on the command button (sorry, german screenshot):

---

@Anonymous wrote:
I cannot find the OPTIONS button/tab..?

---

To bring up the options dialog you can either type "_OPTIONS" and hit <RETURN> or right click anywhere and select the last item of the context menu.

---

@Anonymous wrote:
how do I change the programme wide preference to metric.

The units are stored in the drawing. Usually you use a template drawing like acad.dwt or acadiso.dwt that defines the drawing units.