About Editing a Reference In-Place (AutoCAD Mechanical Toolset)

You can modify external references and redefine block definitions from within the current drawing by using in-place reference editing.

The program considers both blocks and xrefs as references.

While editing a reference in place, you can copy objects from other blocks of the host drawing to the xref, or to the block drawing, using AMREFCOPY.

When you finish editing a block reference, use AMREFCLOSE to save changes to the edited block, assign a new base point, and save the edited block under a new name. Also use AMREFCLOSE to save changes and assign a new base point to the edited xref.

Note: With AMREFCLOSE, you cannot change the name of the xref. If you change the base point of an edited xref, the AutoCAD INSBASE variable changes as well. This change affects all drawings that reference the edited xref. The program shows a warning dialog box enabling you to choose between having the INSBASE variable changed or discarding the changes made to the base point.