Hatch patterns can contain dashed-lines by appending dash-length items to the end of a line definition item.
Each dash-length item specifies the length of a segment making up a line. If a length is positive, a pen-down segment is drawn. If a length is negative, the segment is pen-up, and it is not drawn. The pattern starts at the origin point with the first segment and cycles through the segments in circular fashion. A dash length of 0 draws a dot. You can specify up to six dash lengths per pattern line.
The standard hatch pattern ANSI33 looks like:
and is defined as follows:
*ANSI33, ANSI Bronze, Brass, Copper 45, .176776695,0, 0,.25, .125,-.0625
For example, to create a pattern that draws dashed lines at 45-degrees with a dash length of 0.5 units and a space between dashes of 0.5 units, the line definition would look similar to
*DASH45, Dashed lines at 45 degrees 45, 0,0, 0,.5, .5,-.5
If you wanted to draw a 0.5-unit dash, a 0.25-unit space, a dot, and a 0.25-unit space before the next dash, the definition would look similar to
*DDOT45,Dash-dot-dash pattern: 45 degrees 45, 0,0, 0,.5, .5,-.25, 0,-.25
The following example shows the effect of delta-x specifications on dashed-line families. First, consider the following definition:
*GOSTAK 0, 0,0, 0,.5, .5,-.5
This draws a family of lines separated by a gap of 0.5, with each line broken equally into dashes and spaces. Because delta-x is zero, the dashes in each family member line up. An area hatched with this pattern would look like this:
The following shows the previous hatch pattern with an offset along the X axis
*SKEWED 0, 0,0, .5,.5, .5,-.5
The hatch pattern definition is similar, except the delta-x is set to 0.5. This offsets each successive family member by 0.5 in the direction of the line (in this case, parallel to the X axis). Because the lines are infinite, the dash pattern slides down the specified amount. An area hatched with this pattern would look like this:
