AutoCAD: Beyond the Basics

Tips and Tricks

• Improve drawing revisions with rev clouds and wipeouts
• Create polylines boundaries to simplify area extraction
• Use regions for complex area calculations
• Create selection sets based on object properties
• Reduce file size and maintain good CAD management practices by purging unreferenced objects
• Use points to identify coordinate locations in your drawing
• Place objects at evenly spaced intervals
• Use QuickCalc to perform calculations or convert units.

Advanced Text

• Understand the single interface for all text commands
• Create text with tabs, indents, paragraph/line spacing
• Create static and dynamic text columns
• Make the most of AutoCAD’s spell checker
• Create attributes with multiple lines of text

Working with Tables

• Use AutoCAD’s table function to make your data easy to understand and share
• Control table appearance and make global changes
• Use formulas, auto text and blocks in your tables to automate annotation and perform calculations
• Extract block attribute data to your table Save time and reduce errors by dynamically linking data in an Excel spreadsheet to your AutoCAD table

Blocks and Attributes

• Create a block so it can be used in multiple drawings
• Create an annotative blocks that are scaled by the annotative scale in a viewport
• Attach numeric and txt information to block definitions to make it easy to track drawing data

Reusable Content

• Reuse data from another drawing using Design Centre
• Increase productivity by making your most frequently used tools and commands available on tool palettes – one if the most dramatic enhancements to AutoCAD in recent years
• Easily manage large, multi-disciplinary projects using external references
• Effectively manage your xrefs for better viewing and smaller files

Layer Management and Best Practices

• Use Layer filters to quickly find objects you need inside of complex drawings
• Use layer states to return to a saved configuration of layers
• Ensure uniformity across drawings using layer standards

Working with DWF Files

Dynamic Blocks

• Create single block to represent multiples object configurations Assign actions to specific parameters of you dynamic block, such as scale, stretch, move, rotate, flip and array