Draw a run in plan and get the elevation drawn at the same time, directly below it and in line with it.
What SideView does
Each leg of the plan carries a bottom and a top level. As you pick your way along, the plan line goes down as usual and the side view gets the matching panel — bounded by those two levels and by the X positions of the leg’s two ends.
Ducting, ceiling bulkheads, retaining walls, pipe racks, roof upstands: anything where the plan is simple and the section is what takes the time.
How to use it
- Load the routine with
APPLOAD, or put it on your support file search path. - Type
SIDEVIEW. - Give the Y value in the side view that stands for a level of zero.
- Pick your way along the plan, giving each leg its bottom and top level.
- Press Enter to finish.
How it works
One number ties the two views together: the Y value in the side view that stands for a level of zero. Everything else follows from it — a level of 2400 lands 2400 above that line, whatever the plan is doing.
The X of each point is used unchanged, so the side view sits square under the plan and stays there. That is the whole trick, and it is why this beats drawing the section separately and trying to line it up afterwards.
It is one command, and the state stays inside it. Three separate commands that have to be run in the right order, with the state carried between them in global variables, come out wrong with no warning if anything else in the session happens to use a variable of the same name.
Geometry is built directly rather than by opening the LINE command, going away to ask for a point, and closing it in a later call. There is no half-finished command for an interruption to land in.
Notes and limits
- Set the datum first — every level is measured from it.
- The side view sits at the plan’s X. Move the plan afterwards and the two part company.
- Levels are per leg, so a step in the soffit is just the next leg with different numbers.
- One undo group covers the whole run.
Download and details
| Name | SideView — draw a run in plan and get the elevation at the same time |
| Download | SideView.lsp — 9.7 KB, plain AutoLISP source. Downloads directly; no zip to unpack. |
| Type | AutoCAD AutoLISP routine |
| Command | SIDEVIEW |
| Requires | nothing beyond a CAD platform with AutoLISP. |
| Source size | 9.7 KB, 214 lines |
| Error handling | Yes — a *error* handler restores every system variable it changed, on cancel as well as on error. |
| Undo | The whole operation is wrapped in a single undo group, so one U reverses all of it. |
| Compatibility | AutoCAD (any release with AutoLISP), BricsCAD, ZWCAD, GstarCAD, ProgeCAD and other IntelliCAD-based platforms. AutoCAD LT needs a LISP enabler. No .NET, no ObjectARX, no installer. |
| Author | YZ, August 2026 |
| Licence | Free to use, supplied “as is” with no warranty. |
References
- FLEXDUCT LISP — the duct itself in plan
- HIDESECTION LISP — hiding the concealed span in the elevation
- WALLSECTION LISP — sections through walls
- More free AutoLISP routines on this site
- Wisey’s Steel Shapes — free structural steel section drawing program