Text

The text command places a multi-line text label. After you click a position on the canvas, a popup editor opens where you can type content, apply bold/italic/strikethrough, change fonts and heights, and insert line breaks. Press Escape to commit and close the editor.

See the Text Editor page for the full editor reference.

Placing a text label

1. Type text in the terminal or click the Text toolbar button.
2. Click the anchor position on the canvas. Or type X,Y and press Enter for an exact coordinate.
3. The text editor popup opens above the new label. Type your content.
4. Press Escape to commit the label and close the editor.

The default height is 12 drawing units.

Editing an existing label

Double-click any text label on the canvas to reopen the editor for that label.

Coordinate entry for the anchor

Instead of clicking, type an exact position:

1. Type the X value.
2. Press , — the terminal shows [X], [Y{cursor}].
3. Type the Y value.
4. Press Enter to place the anchor and open the editor.

Keyboard reference

Anchor phase

Key	Action
0–9, ., -	Start X coordinate entry
,	Lock X and move to Y entry
Backspace	Delete last typed character
Enter	Confirm typed coordinate

Text editor phase (see Text Editor for the full reference)

Key	Action
Any printable character	Insert at cursor
Backspace / Delete	Delete adjacent character or selection
Enter	Insert a line break
← / →	Move caret
Home / End	Jump to start / end of hard line
Escape	Commit and close the editor

Grip editing — repositioning

A selected text label exposes one grip at the anchor point:

Grip	Position	What it does
Anchor	Bottom-left of the text	Drag to reposition the label

Selecting text

Method	Behaviour
Click	Selects if the click lands within the rotated bounding box of the text
Drag right (strict)	All four corners of the bounding box must lie inside the selection area
Drag left (crossing)	Any overlap between the text bounding box and the selection area selects it

Supported edit commands

Command	What happens to the text
Move	Moves the anchor point
Copy	Creates an identical label at a new position
Rotate	Rotates the anchor position and adds the angle to Rotation Degree
Mirror	Reflects the anchor point across the mirror axis (text string is not flipped)
Scale	Scales the anchor position and multiplies the height by the scale factor
Delete	Removes the label

Text does not support Offset, Trim, or Extend.

Properties

When a text label is selected the properties panel shows:

General

Property	Default	Meaning
Color	256 (ByLayer)	ACI color index
Layer	0	Layer assignment

Geometry

Property	Meaning
Position X / Position Y	Anchor point coordinates
Height	Base text height in drawing units (default: 12)
Rotation Degree	Counter-clockwise rotation in degrees

Properties

Property	Meaning
Content	The text string (MTEXT inline codes preserved)
Attachment Point	Alignment code (1 = top-left … 9 = bottom-right)

Text does not have Linetype, Linetype Scale, or Thickness properties.

DXF — MTEXT entity

Text labels are stored as MTEXT entities in the DXF file. Bold and italic are encoded using \L, \K, \O, and inline font switches (\f). Per-character height is encoded as \H. All formatting survives a full DXF round-trip and is readable by AutoCAD, LibreCAD, and other DXF-compatible applications.