Select Similar in AutoCAD and Civil 3D

May 12, 2019

For the past several weeks I have been placed on projects using AutoCAD and Civil 3D. I found myself working through drawings making edits and incorporating changes along the way. About a week ago I realized that my favorite command MATCHPROP (match properties) just may not be my favorite anymore. I found myself using SELECT SIMILAR frequently throughout my checking and editing process. Let’s explore how this command works.

The Select Similar command will select objects with shared properties and works like this:

Select an object that represents the category of objects you want to select (we selected the text).
Right-click, and choose Select Similar.

You will notice that the objects that are similar become part of your current selection set (shown with the blue grips). You can now use the Properties palette (CTRL+1; shown below in the red box) and change the properties of all these objects at once – a big time saver.

In this case the fonts are not all consistent with our standard and all we have to do is change the style in the window.

What if I want to change what the command searches for?

With no objects selected, enter SELECTSIMILAR.

Enter se (settings) or you can just select at the command prompt.

In the Select Similar Settings dialog box, select the properties that must match for objects to be selected. These settings can be setup within the template file you are using for your company standard.

If no properties are selected, objects of the same type (for example, all lines) are selected.

Note: If you want to select different types of objects that share properties like color or line type, use Quick Select. Type Qselet at the command prompt and you have the option to filter through object settings as shown in the dialog box.