Align to Lines

Use the Line tool to project nodes or points to a line along a user-defined direction or the normal to the line selected, then remap or offset over selected reference entities.

  1. From the secondary ribbon, click the Lines tool.
    Figure 1.


  2. Select ordered nodes, FE edges, or points as source geometry to align/project to onto target entities.
  3. Check Use end nodes to auto-detect end nodes based on your source selection and align between them. Otherwise, select target entities to align to.
  4. Click Along Vector to define a single direction using the Vector tool.
    All of the entities are projected along this direction.
  5. Use the icons in the microdialog further refine the alignment:
    • - Remap projected nodes to they are dispersed evenly over the length of the line.
    • - If two nodes or targets are selected, toggle to make the connecting line finite/infinite.
    • - Offset the target line by the specified value
  6. Click .
The following examples show several different alignment use cases.
  • Project source nodes on to a target line
    Figure 2.


  • Project nodes on to a smooth line (smooth lines can be defined using the location entity)
    Figure 3.


  • Align nodes between start and end nodes
    Figure 4.


  • Align nodes with respect to reference nodes
    Figure 5.


  • Align + Remap
    Figure 6.


  • Align + Offset
    Figure 7.