Recently in an AutoCAD training an age old question came up - how do I change the path of XRef from Full Path to Relative Path? The answer has always been to open XRef Manager and type in some combination of “..\” in the text string under Saved Path. This pathing concept has become easily digestible in recent times, but still remains a challenge overall.
In the screen shots below the file Wall Base.dwg is shown as XRefed with Full Path as is evident from the Saved Path. Under the historical method I would have to type “.\Res\Wall Base.dwg” in the Saved path.
This was the case until now. Not anymore!
AutoCAD 2013 makes it really easy by introducing the graphical way of achieving the same result - right click on the XRef and chose Make Relative from Path cascade. Refer to the following screen shot:
Isn’t that simple! Now go ahead and change your existing XRefs from Full Path to Relative Path. And use Relative Path from now on.
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Gaurav Bagga
Senior Application Specialist Infrastructure
Gaurav is a Senior Application Specialist for Infrastructure Solutions at Ideate based out of San Francisco. He has over 18 years of experience in construction and related software industry. With this extensive design technology background he helps engineering and surveying companies, federal and state government agencies, and ENR 500 firms critically analyze and improve their construction drawing production process. He implements Civil infrastructure design technology led by InfraWorks and Civil 3D and has helped Ideate grow Civil Infrastructure Services. Being an industry recognized speaker he has presented cutting edge design technology at several industry conferences such as Autodesk University. Find Gaurav on Twitter.