How to invert current selection in CAD?

Invert selection is usually used in Photoshop and other graphic editing software. Sometimes we need to select a few options and to invert other options. The following methods can help invert your selections.

1.Quick Select (QSELECT)

Using QSELECT can realize the invert selection function if we wish to remove a certain type of objects when selecting graphics objects.

We can run the Quick Select if we want to remove a certain type of objects from all the selected objects. Just choose your option and check the Exclude from the new selection set. If we need to remove certain objects from the selected objects, we can window select all the objects and then use Quick Select. The following is a simple example: we need to select all the objects except the circle.

(1). Select the quick select button in the Command panel or Properties panel to execute the command, or you can enter QSELECT command.

(2). Set circle as the Object Type in the Quick Select dialogue box and select Select All in the drop-down box of Operator, then check the Exclude from the new selection set option.

If there are other graphics objects in the drawing file, we can window select them before executing Quick Selection, and then check the Append to current selection set at the bottom of the Quick Select dialogue box.

(3). Click OK button to confirm your action and all objects will be selected except circle, as shown in the following picture.

2. Remove objects from selection sets

If the objects that we’re going to remove are of different types or there are only a few of them, then we cannot use Quick Select to get what we need at a time. Take the above picture as an example: we only want to remove the three circles, so we can window select all the objects and point select the three circle to remove them.

There are two options: one is to point select and window select the objects that we want to remove after pressing SHIFT; another way is when the command line prompts to select objects and all the objects have been selected, you can enter R and press Enter, and then point select and window select the objects to be removed.

In CAD we can select objects before executing commands, or we can select objects after executing commands, either will do. When we have window selected objects without executing any commands, we can only use the SHIFT. If the MOVE or COPY command has been executed and the prompts in the command line indicate us to select objects and at this time some objects have been window selected, we can either use SHIFT or R parameter.

3. Hide objects that are to be removed from the selection sets

If we need to remove objects from the selection sets, and want to repeat this operation, we’ll need to hide those objects to facilitate our window selection.

Assume that we are going to remove the two circles at the bottom, we can point select the two circles, and click the right-hand button to select Hide Object option, as shown in the following picture.

After the two circles are hidden, we can directly window select other objects, as shown in the following picture.

If we only do this operation for once, then there is no need to hide them in case you forget to terminate the object isolation.

The above are methods that I can think of. There are other operations in actual practice, for example, we can turn off the layer or isolate layer and then select. Using which method depends on which method is more convenient in the specific case, you can try as many as you want and select the most suitable one in your drafting.