4 - Text Styles

One of the simplest things to set up are text styles, and it's a good idea to get this done before you start copying details from one project to another, so there won't be any duplicate text styles.

We noticed people like to change styles to fit their current needs, not realizing that change gets carried through the whole project. To eliminate the need to create new styles, we decided to create all different styles we could need, for each font size. If there would be a need after all, the naming system that's in place ought to be followed.

We set up our styles' names based on a few characteristics:

- all styles start with our company's initials, so 'foreign' text styles stand out;
- font size: this is prefixed by the XP scaling value (048 = 1/4" since 48 * 1/4" = 12"); this sorts all styles correctly based on their size;
- leader type: arrow or dot;
- background: opaque (O) or transparent (T);
- border: if used, we add "border" to the end of the style's name;

for example: XYZ 096 - 1/8" (arrow) - T - Border

Note: even though Bold, Italic and Underline can be made part of a style, they can also be applied on an instance basis, and were therefore not considered in creating styles.

For each style created, we placed one instance in a designated 'Drafting Elements' legend, to be sure they cannot be purged from the project.

If you do end up finding duplicate text styles, these can be purged out, but only if they are no longer in use. One of our tricks to find them (eventually) is to change the style font size to 3" and its color to a nice hot pink. This way, it's sure to draw people's attention and demands to be replaced with the correct type. I'll also prefix the style's name with "purge" so it's clear it can be purged for good from the project.