Descriptions

Descriptions are free-form notes that you attach to entities on the P&ID — to a specific valve, to every centrifugal pump, to all dynamic blocks of a certain shape, or to a whole group of similar classes. They show up where you read about the entity (in hover popups, in the descriptions overview window, in the Excel equipment export) and stay completely out of the way where you don't need them.

Descriptions never modify the underlying drawing — they live alongside it as part of the AseptSoft project, so you can annotate freely without worrying about polluting the AutoCAD file or breaking your block library.

🪜 Four scopes, most-specific wins

Every description belongs to one of four scopes. When several scopes have a description for the same entity, the most specific one wins — but you can always see what would apply at the broader scope and override it locally.

Resolution order: Instance → Plant3D Class → Block Definition → Class Group. If the entity has nothing at any scope, the description simply isn't shown.

🖱️ Editing a description from a hover popup

The fastest way to add or edit a description is from the entity's hover popup. The Valve, Instrument, and Off-Page Connector popups all carry a description row directly under the tag.

1. Hover any valve, instrument, or OPC.

2. Look at the description line under the tag:

   • If a description exists at the Instance scope, you'll see it as italic text ready to edit.

   • If only a fallback applies (Class / Block / Group), you'll see that fallback rendered with a small chip telling you the scope it came from — clicking it lets you create an Instance-scope override.

   • If nothing is set anywhere, you'll see a faint + Add description placeholder.

3. Click the line to enter edit mode, type your text, then:

   • Press Enter to save.

   • Press Esc to cancel without saving.

   • Click anywhere outside the popup — your edit saves automatically (no half-typed descriptions get lost just because the popup closed).

💡 Right-click the description line at any time to jump to the Descriptions Overview window with this entity already selected.

Hover popups only show Instance descriptions for editing — class/block/group fallbacks are read-only there. This keeps the popup edit promise honest: clicking Edit means you're editing this entity, not silently overriding a class-wide fact.

🚶 Walking the drawing in Edit Descriptions mode

When you have a lot of descriptions to author, the Edit Descriptions command is the right tool. It dims the rest of the drawing, highlights everything that already has a description at the active scope, and lets you click any entity to edit it directly.

Access: Module Ribbon → Live Edit panel → Descriptions dropdown → Edit Descriptions.

Picking the scope

You're always in exactly one scope at a time. The prompt always tells you which one. Switch by typing one of the inline keywords:

Switching scope flips the highlight colour everywhere — so a glance tells you "this is what I'm authoring against right now."

What you see

Every entity that already has a description at the active scope gets a coloured outline around its bounding box and a one-line label at the top-left corner with the description's first words. Entities outside the current view are skipped automatically; layout-tab use stays restricted to the active viewport so badges don't double across paperspace viewports.

Editing one

1. Click any entity. A small input window opens, anchored next to the entity. Its title tells you exactly what you're about to save:

   • Edit INSTANCE description for 2A4B7 — only this entity.

   • Edit CLASS description for 'PumpCentrifugal' (applies to every instance of this class) — every centrifugal pump.

   • Edit BLOCK description for 'V-401 :: OPEN' — every reference of this block in this visibility state.

   • Edit GROUP description for 'Flow meters' — every class inside the group.

2. Type the description and press Enter.

3. The window closes; the outline updates immediately to reflect the new state.

Press Esc or type Quit at any prompt to exit cleanly.

📋 The Descriptions Overview window

For bulk authoring, search, and discovery, open the Descriptions Overview window from the Live Edit panel or by right-clicking any popup description.

The window has four tabs — one per scope — plus a single filter box that searches across columns.

The subtitle line tells you the documentation completeness at a glance — 42 class (12 unannotated) · 18 block (3 unannotated).

Live with selection

The Overview window listens to your AutoCAD selection while it's open. Pick a single entity in the drawing and the window:

• On the Instances tab — scrolls to the matching row and opens its Description cell for editing. If no row exists yet, a transient empty row is appended at the bottom with the cursor placed in the Description column. The transient row is auto-removed on the next selection if you didn't type anything, so cycling through entities never leaves abandoned empties behind.

• On the Plant3D Classes tab — finds the entity's class in either the documented table or the candidates list (creating a candidate on the fly if needed) and focuses the Description cell.

• On the Block Definitions tab — same logic, against the block-definition composite key.

• On the Class Groups tab — resolves the entity's class to its containing group and reveals the matching row.

Promoting a candidate to documented

Inside each class-level tab, the bottom table shows what hasn't been described yet. Type a description into any candidate row and press Enter or Tab — the row migrates to the top table automatically. No save button to hunt for.

Jumping back to the drawing

The Instances tab has a Jump to entity button on every row — it sets the AutoCAD selection to that handle and zooms the viewport so the entity is centred. Useful when working from the documented list back into the drawing.

🗒️ Descriptions in classes and groups

When you browse class definitions in the Class Grouping window, every class shows a small italic caption under its name with the class-level description. Group headers and regex subgroups show their own description as a subtitle. The descriptions are read-only there — clicking Edit description... in the row's context menu opens the standard input window so you can author or change them without leaving the grouping view.

🤝 Hand-off to Excel

Every entity in the AseptSoft Excel equipment export now carries two extra columns:

Downstream BOMs, equipment registers, and audit reports can therefore join on description without any extra round-trip.

🏭 Pharma example: documenting a CIP skid before review

Maria is preparing a CIP skid P&ID for engineering review. She wants every meaningful entity to have a brief description so reviewers don't have to ask "what does this valve do?" out loud.

1. She opens the project, opens the AseptSoft module, and clicks Descriptions → Edit Descriptions on the ribbon. The drawing dims; all the centrifugal pumps that already have a class-level description show with sky-blue outlines.

2. She types Classes to switch to class scope. A few class-level placeholders appear; she clicks each one and writes the description.

3. She switches to Instances (white outlines). She clicks the bottom-tank valve, types Bottom-tank drain — opens to empty the tank into the drain manifold, presses Enter. The white outline appears around the valve.

4. After a few minutes she has 30 instance descriptions in. She presses Esc, opens the Descriptions Overview window, and types tank in the filter box — every description mentioning tanks appears so she can do a coherence pass.

5. She runs the Module Excel export. Reviewers receive a workbook where every Equipment row has a Description column populated automatically — no separate Word document needed.

🔗 Related Pages

• PID Components Classification — class definitions and groupings that descriptions piggy-back on.

• Valve Hover Inspector — surfaces the description line under the tag.

• Instrument Hover Inspector — same.

• Excel Tabular Exports — equipment export with the Description column.