Printing
LiberoDraft prints through the browser: the command Print Print opens the floating print dialog, and “🖨 Print” turns it into a vector graphic at paper size and opens it in a new browser window, which calls up the browser’s own print dialog half a second later. There you pick a printer or “Save as PDF”.
This page describes how things fit together. Step by step: print the model to scale, print a sheet, create a print profile, export SVG. Field by field: Print dialog.
Two ways: model or sheet
| Space | What is printed | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| Model | a print area at paper size that you place over the drawing | in the dialog: A:B, Ctrl + wheel |
| Sheet (paper space) | the sheet 1:1 with all viewports, frame and title block | per viewport |
On a sheet, paper, orientation, scale and margins are greyed out; the note line reads “Paper space: Layout 1 — A4 Landscape — Sheet prints 1:1, scale per viewport”. If you change space while the dialog is open, it sets itself up again.
The print area in the model
As soon as the dialog is open in the model, the print area — the paper edge and the inner frame of the margins — hangs from the pointer by the bottom right corner of the inner frame and snaps to snap points. A click fixes it (“Print area fixed — click the canvas = reposition, 🖨 = print”), another click releases it. The first time the dialog opens, the area sits centred over the drawing.
- The wheel zooms the view, Ctrl + wheel changes the scale in 10 % steps (always 1:B, B rounded to one decimal; the dialog shows the value).
- H and Q switch portrait and landscape.
- Ctrl+P prints when the dialog is open, otherwise it opens it.
Paper, orientation, scale, margins
Paper A4 to A0, Letter and Legal; orientation landscape or portrait; scale A:B in steps of 0.5 (1:2 half size, 2:1 double size); margins separately for top, bottom, left and right (0–80 mm, default 10). The printable area is the paper minus the margins; only what lies inside it reaches the paper — geometry is clipped at the edge, texts and dimension values are output whole or not at all. All settings are remembered with the program settings.
Switches
| Switch | Default | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| B/W | off | everything black on white, images in grayscale |
| Frame | on | thin rectangle (0.3 mm) on the inner frame of the margins |
| 🖼 Images | on | print inserted images, with their transparency |
| 💬 Remarks | off | print remarks (design review) — for review printouts |
Line widths and print colors
The “Line widths (mm)” section decides how thick each layer prints. The “Profile:” list controls everything:
- “From drawing” (default): every element prints with its own line width and color from the file; the layer rows below are disabled. An element’s print width comes from the “Printer line width (mm)” field of its layer (Edit layer), otherwise from the screen width at roughly 0.2 mm per pixel.
- “— choose profile —”: the layer rows become editable — a width in mm per layer and a print color on click. Plus the two collective values “◇ Dimensions:” (dimension and extension lines, equally thick per ISO/DIN, typically 0.25 mm) and “▤ Hatches:” (typically 0.1–0.25 mm). Arrow length and dimension text height come from the dimension settings and cannot be set here.
- A saved profile: sets all layer rows and collective values at once.
Print profiles
A print profile stores all line widths, print colors and the collective values under one name — “Draft”, “Workshop”, “Plotter A0”, say. 💾 asks for the name; an existing name is updated. 🗑 deletes the chosen profile after a confirmation. Matching runs via the layer name — so profiles work in other drawings with identically named layers as well; missing layers are reported in the status bar (“Print profile "Workshop" activated — no profile values for layers: Bohrungen”). Profiles belong to the program settings and travel with “Export settings” (Transferring settings).
Print calibration
Printers rarely output exactly 1:1. Print once at 1:1, measure a known length on the paper and enter “Measured on paper (mm)” and “Target length (mm)”: the factor target/measured scales the paper output only (centred), while the preview on screen and every mm value in the drawing stay unchanged. “Reset” restores 1.0000 (“Print calibration reset”). From 10 % deviation the factor is shown in orange.
What gets printed
Printed are visible elements on visible layers and Z levels, dimensions, feature control frames, datums, balloons, hatches, texts, leaders and blocks — in the stacking order of the Z levels. Not printed are guides, constraints, the grid and the gizmo. Using the “Groups” section you can exclude whole groups from printing (🖨 in the row, inherited by subgroups — Eye, lock and printing). Inside viewports on a sheet, their layer and object-type filters apply on top.
The print window
The new browser window shows the page centred on a grey background and calls up the browser print dialog; the page size is fixed to the paper (“Print preview opened”). If the browser suppresses the window, the status bar reports “Popup blocked — please allow popups” (Print window).
In the browser print dialog choose “Margins: None” and 100 % scaling — the margins already come from LiberoDraft. “Save as PDF” produces a true-to-scale PDF file.
Output as an SVG file
The command Export SVG in the file menu File writes a vector file: in the model the geometry only (lines, circles, arcs, ellipses, rectangles, polylines, splines, texts — no dimensions, hatches, blocks or images), optionally the selection only; on a sheet, after a prompt, either the complete sheet as a print SVG or the model content (Export prompts). Line widths appear in the SVG in millimetres as well: where a line follows its layer, that layer’s Width (printer mm) applies — the same value the printout uses (Lines in the file).