Applies To:

Caddie 12 upwards

Question:

I have opened a drawing from another DWG user and there are lots of Reference Symbols in the drawing. I want to embed these references in the drawing so they become part of the drawing. How can this be done retaining the original grouping?

Answer:

The easy answer is to explode the references. What this does is to replace the Reference symbol with real objects which the reference was displaying. The problem doing this is, if the symbol hadn't used patterns (DWG groups) there would not be any relationship between the objects and it would therefore be difficult to select all the objects now created.

What would be better in cases like this would be to replace the Referenced Syymbol with a Block. A Block Reference works in a similar way to a Reference Symbol, in that it shows a representation of the original objects. Where it differes is where the referenced objects are stored. In the case of a Reference Symbol the object are in another file, in a specified computer location. This means the Referenced Symbol has to be aslso sent to a new location (on other computer for instance). 

Block however reference object already in the drawing