Logical Operations in a Range Phrase

A range phrase targets a set of objects by specifying one or more range elements (the keywords that follow the range keyword in the command). If multiple range elements are specified, the final set of objects returned by the range phrase will be, by default, the intersection of the separate range elements.

union

The union keyword may be specified anywhere within a range phrase to return a range that is a union of the present range elements.

not

The not keyword may be used at the end of a particular range element to return the inverse of the objects specified by the element. The not keyword must appear at the end of the range element specification (e.g., range position-x 0 100 not position-y 0 100 not).

extent

When the extent keyword is used in a range phrase, the extent of the object (rather than the object centroid) is used to verify whether the object is within the range. This keyword is only applied to geometric range elements (e.g., sphere).

or sub-keyword

Range elements constructed with the group keyword and the surface keywords have an or sub-keyword to facilitate joining together multiple groups or surfaces in one range element.

Logical Operations & Named Ranges

Using the named-range keyword, an existing named range may be inserted into a range phrase and be treated as a range element within that range phrase. The logical operations described above are all applicable (e.g., ... range named-range 'fred' not would return all objects not in the named range 'fred'). See the next topic, Named Ranges, for further information.