Let's back up a second.

You are drawing a floor plan.  OK.  Did you set your UNITS > Length > Type to "Architectural"?  Yes or no?

Also, make sure you draw everything FULL size.  It doesn't matter if you are drawing something as small as a paper clip or as large as the Freedom Tower; draw it FULL size.  Do not draw "to scale" as one might do on a drafting board.  If a room is 10 feet x 12 feet that's what you draw it.

Now to your question.

Right click in the area of the coordinate display (at the bottom of your screen) and choose from the list which includes Relative, Absolute, Geographic, and Specific.

Did you know that after you have picked the starting point of your line you can drag your mouse in the direction you want the line to go in (make sure to use Orthomode for perfectly straight lines) and just type in the distance (ex. - 4' or 4'6" without the dash in between)?

Make sure to also utilize OSnaps for accuracy too.

Last thing.  Create separate layers (with unique colors) for walls, windows, doors. dimensions, text, etc.  Do not draw everything on layer "0" in the color white.  That's just boring as hell and a pain to work with afterwards.

Anything else?  No?  Then good luck with your floor plan.  Post an image after you have completed it.


Edited by John Connor - 24.Jun.2015 at 12:02

Interesting graphic.  Kind of reminds me of the several feet of snow piled up outside my house two winters ago.  I had to tunnel out.

Re: Coordinate display.  Check your AutoCAD Help file by pressing the F1 key.  Search on the word phrase "To change the coordinate display".  Look in the right hand pane.  Three methods are listed.  Try one or all three.  Done.  Next question? 


Edited by John Connor - 25.Jun.2015 at 13:14

KegTed wrote: ... Let me try posting that screen shot again. ...

Most of the line detail got lost when the pic was down sized!

John Connor wrote: Well that image would have been best included in your very first post.  All the while I thought you were talking about the coordinates that are displayed in the lower left hand corner of the screen.  Seems you were referring to Dynamic Input which is what you see near your crosshairs.  Disable the feature.  There is an icon on the System Tray at the bottom of your screen to do so.

Hi John, I really appreciate the help that you've given me. I disabled the Dynamic input as you suggested but it still wanted me to input a line by distance and angle.

I just want to draw an object by starting in the lower-left corner.  The first segment is 5" long to the right, next segment is at an angle 2" to the right and 1" to the top - I do not know the angle in degrees.  It's hard (for me) to believe that there's not an easy way to toggle between polar and rectangular input.

When I discovered this AutoCAD LT 2013 on the PC my friend gave me I thought WOW, this is something I can use to kill time and maybe make a useful sketch every now and then.  But it's turning out to be more frustrating than relaxing.    I think I'll just put this AutoCAD LT thing back in the box and for get it.

Thanks again for trying to help.

John Connor wrote: You're making this more frustrating than it needs to be. How would you have drawn the same line if you were still doing it manually on a drafting board?  Come on...think. By the way, the line would be 2.2361 in length, drawn at an angle of 26.5651.

(Thinking......)
Doing it manually, I would have drawn a vertical construction line 2" to the right and a horizontal construction line 1" to the top.  The intersection would be the endpoint for the line.

I was hoping that I could do that with AutoCAD LT by dragging the cursor to the right and keying in 2' and then move the cursor to the top and key in 1" and then click to accept the point but that does not work.

Thanks.