May 10, 2012

AutoCAD Layer Walk

Have you ever get confused which AutoCAD objects are on which layer? When you work with layer standard, you may have dozens or even hundreds of layers in your drawing. Finding which one sets to wrong layer can be a tedious work.
Here is a little tool that will be useful: layer walk.
AutoCAD layer walk

AutoCAD layer walk

Type LAYWALK then [enter] to activate this tool. Alternatively, you can access it from menu: Format> Layer Tools> Layer Walk. Or access it from your ribbon: home tab>layers panel> layer walk. You may need to expand the panel to see the tool.

With this tool, you can quickly check if your objects are placed correctly in their layer. You can turn off restore on exit if you find the one placed in wrong layer and move it.

Hold a layer

You can show multiple layers by pressing ctrl key then make the selection. Or, If you don’t like pressing ctrl, you can right click then select hold selection from context menu.

Create layer states

Another interesting thing it can make is layer state. Creating layer state may be a bit tedious, but it is easy using layer walk! Simply select all layers you want to turn on. It should be easy because it’s fast and you can quickly see the changes on your screen.

Now right click, then select save layer state from context menu. Type the layer state name, then you’re done! Very easy, right?

See how you can use layer walk in this video

Further reading:

If your layers overwhelm your layer list, you can also consider to use layer filter.

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You might also interested to

  1. 10 AutoCAD Layer Tools (You Might) Forgotten
  2. Using multiple layer states in multiple layouts
  3. Creating Different Drawing Representation
  4. Simplify AutoCAD Layer Manager List with Layer Filter
  5. Layer 0, ByLayer and ByBlock

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About Edwin Prakoso

Edwin works as an Application Engineer in Jakarta, Indonesia. He has 4 years experience in building industry, then start to work for Autodesk reseller.
He is certified as Revit Architecture 2010 certified professional and CATIA V5 part design specialist. Currently he is involved as team leader for implementing SmarTeam as PDM in several companies.
You can reach him on twitter @cad_notes. You can also connect with him on LinkedIn. If you prefer email, reach him at edwin.prakoso@cad-notes.com.