We have introduced the point selection and window selection in How to select objects? Today, we are going to explore more selection tips for CAD beginners.

Select All (CTRL + A)

We can use the “Select All” functionality by pressing CTRL + A in many software programs and CAD is one of them. Sometimes using the CTRL + A and using window selection to select all the objects would give us different results, why? Because the CTRL + A can not only select all visible objects but also invisible ones or those on layers that are off.

Cancel selection and Invert Selection

1. Pressing Esc key would cancel our selections.
2. Long pressing the right mouse button, and we will have the “Cancel” option, as shown in the following picture, click Cancel will allow us to cancel our selections.

Press SHIFT and use point selection or window selection undo our selections.

Use CTRL + A to select all and press SHIFT to window select some invisible objects or unconventional objects.

Use CTRL + A and then window select while pressing the SHIFT key can help us select invisible objects or abnormal objects that are away from the graphic center, which is very useful when it comes to dealing with abnormal objects.

Previous selection

Imagine that we have selected some objects and are ready to edit them but cancel the selection by mistake. Can we get the selection back? Just execute the CHANGE command, and when we are prompted to select object, type P and then press Enter, we will get the canceled selection back, as shown in the following picture,