Desperate Measure

Question

(Maybe nobody will mind the double-post in the Mac & Windows AI forums.)
Well, it's a poor excuse for the dimension tools that are still missing in Adobe apps, but it's a lot less tedium than building dimension labels object by object.
Just draw a line with the Line Tool and then run the script. The script turns your line into a group containing three objects: the arrow/text, and the two witness lines.
The witness lines are created at an arbitrary 12 pt. length. You can directSelect their endpoints to elongate them if you need to.
The dimension is automatically picked up from the length of the line, and its value conforms to the Ruler Units you have active when you run the script. For best use, turn on SmartGuides to make snapping to points and path edges easy, (and to be able to align to object edges at a distance using SmartGuides construction guides).
The script expects two specifically-named Graphic Styles and one Paragraph Style to be present. Otherwise, you'll get an error. An .ai file is included from which you can copy/paste those in one whack. The reason for the Styles is, it lets the text/arrow be a single object: a pathType object. The paragraph's style has a baseline shift to offset it from the arrow; and being a pathType object, you can use the pathType handle to flip the text to the other side of the arrow when you need to. The arrow's style uses the #3 arrrowhead Effect at its default 100% size. This is important because the script automatically downscales the arrow path so that its out-hanging arrowhead points are inboard the witness lines.
Using Styles, of course, also means you can change the style attributes and appearances any time after you've created the dimensions and all the dimensions in the document will update accordingly. For example, you could redefine the Dimensions_Witness Graphic Style as a dash or dotted line; or you could change the size/baseline shift/font of the labels for all the dimensions used in the document at once.
To install the script:
1. Quit Illustrator.
2. Copy the .jsx script file in Illustrator's Presets/Scripts folder.
3. Launch Illustrator.
To easily get the styles set up:
4. Open the accompanying .ai file named JET_DimensionStyles.ai. Copy the group in the middle of the Artboard. Close the file. Paste into your document. (If you find the script useful, you can paste the Group into your templates and/or startup files, so they will already be there when you create new documents.)
Both the script and DimensionStyles.ai file are in
this .zip archive.
Draw and Canvas users, of course, will justifiably snicker. ;-)
JET

Answer 1

JETalmage I can no longer download the zip file to this script, I would love to get access to it again or if you want, email me it here:
mike @ somethinginteractive . com