Distance Tracking

Distance Tracking lets you place a point by typing an exact length instead of clicking. It is controlled by the Dist toggle in the control bar, next to Pins and ANGL, and it is on by default with the setting persisting across sessions.

What it adds is narrow but useful: it lets the most recent vector pin act as the anchor that angle tracking measures from. Without it, a command can only measure from a point it has already collected itself — which means the first point of a shape has nothing to measure from at all.

The three toggles work together

Distance Tracking is not self-contained. Two other toggles have to be in the right state before you can type a length:

If you have Pins and Dist on but ANGL set to Off, nothing will happen: there is no locked direction to measure a length along.

How Pins and Dist are coupled

Distance tracking is meaningless with pins switched off, so the two toggles are kept in step:

• Turning Pins on turns Dist on as well.
• Turning Pins off turns Dist off as well.
• Turning Dist on turns Pins on if it wasn’t already.
• Turning Dist off leaves Pins on.

So Dist can never be active while Pins is inactive, but you can keep pin tracking for alignment while switching off distance tracking — useful if you want reference lines without the cursor locking to a pin when you meant to lock to your own last point.

Placing a point at an exact distance

1. Turn on Pins, Dist, and set ANGL to an angle step.
2. Start a command that asks for a point — Line, Circle, Rectangle, and so on.
3. Pin a reference point: hover an existing snap point until the marker turns into a filled square.
4. Move the cursor away from the pin at roughly the angle you want. When it comes close to one of the ANGL steps, the direction locks — a tracking indicator appears from the pin.
5. Type the length and press Enter or Space. The point is placed exactly that far from the pin, along the locked angle.

The terminal prompt tells you when you can type. While locked it reads:

pick start point or enter length: [ ]

and the value you type appears in the brackets.

Why the first point matters

This is the case that would be impossible otherwise. Consider starting a line exactly 250 units to the right of an existing corner:

1. Start Line.
2. Pin the existing corner.
3. Move right until the direction locks at 0°.
4. Type 250, press Enter.

The line now starts at a point 250 units from the corner, with no construction geometry and no arithmetic. Without Dist, the Line command has collected no points yet, so there is nothing for a typed length to be measured from — you could only click approximately, or draw a construction line and delete it afterwards.

For the second and later points the command already has its own anchor (the previous point), and that is used first. The pin is consulted as an alternative only when your own anchor is not locked, so pinning something does not hijack a lock you already have.

Typing freezes the lock

Once you start typing digits, the anchor stops changing. Whichever point was locked when the first digit landed stays the anchor until you commit or clear the field — moving the mouse mid-entry will not silently swap the measurement to a different pin or to the command’s own point.

Keyboard reference

Typing a length is optional. With the direction locked you can still click, and the point is projected onto the locked angle.

Where it works

Distance tracking is available in every command that asks you to pick points:

Line, Polyline, Arc, Circle, Ellipse, Rectangle, Spline Cv, Spline Fit, Leader, Area, Move, Copy and ViewportCopy.

See also

• Vector Pins — pinning points and tracking along their reference lines
• Grid & Snap — the other precision aids in the control bar
• Distance — measuring an existing distance rather than typing a new one