Between the Lines

The Nozzle from 20 Years Ago

The AutoCAD sample nozzle drawing file created by Don Strimbu back in the 80s has come along ways in twenty years. There is now a 3D DWF file fo the updated nozzle that was done in Autodesk Inventor.

The nozzle from 20 year old AutoCAD 2.18.

The new Nozzle in a 3D DWF in the Free Autodesk DWF Viewer!

 

The animated GIF above just not do the actual free DWF viewer and file justice. You can download the DWF files from the URLs below.  Credit goes to Mike Geyer of Autodesk for the updated Nozzle.
http://betaprograms.autodesk.com/files/N-079-0.dwf
http://betaprograms.autodesk.com/files/N-079.dwf

To view the DWF files, you will need the small and free Autodesk DWF Viewer. http://www.autodesk.com/DWF

The 3D DWF is fast and beautiful as well as smart. You can navigate the parts of a object and change display representations. That means you can isolate or highlight parts of a mechanical assembly or sections and parts of a building right down to a wall on a certain floor. 3D DWF is much better than the late comer 3D PDF. The 3D PDF appears to only be a low qualty object texture drape and little to no object intelligence. Do you want a dumb box with a low quality texture or a real building with textured rooms and objects with intelligence and data? The below image is from a 3D DWF where you can navigate right down to the nice textured room of a larger building and even hide or isolate each object.

And yes, I still run AutoCAD 2.18 from time to time for fun to see how far AutoCAD has progressed. More unofficial AutoCAD history can be found Here.

Cheers,
Shaan

Austin and San Antonio Texas AutoCAD Presentations

I have been asked to present on AutoCAD Futures in Austin and San Antonio Texas. This is essentially the same presentation I will be doing at the Houston Texas and Lansing Michigan AUGI CAD Camps.

• February 23, 2005 San Antonio, Texas
• February 24, 2005 Austin, Texas

For more information on this free event see the San Antonio AutoCAD User Groups web site: http://www.saaug.org/ in the Upcoming Events section. If you are located in the area, try to attend this event and say "hello". Make sure to bring your AutoCAD questions and wish list items.

I have been told that I will not have to wear a Texas cowboy hat for the event. ;-)

Cheers,
Shaan

Shipped a bunch of donations today

The AutoCAD Team came through once again this year and provided more "not for resale" Full version AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT products. This made it possible so that I could fulfill most all requests for product donations for my fourth annual starving students and those in need donations. This year I had received more requests than I had products available from my shelves.

I have began notifying those by email that nominated someone or had asked to be considered for a product donation. I just started shipping the packages today by FedEx ground.

I hope the product donations make a difference and go to good use. I will do this again next year for the fifth year.

Sincerely,
Shaan Hurley

I will be presenting at two AUGI CAD Camps

I was just informed by my boss to prepare AutoCAD Futures presentations for two of the AUGI CAD Camps specifically Houston Texas and Lansing Michigan. Too bad Houston was not after Lansing as I am sure I will need to defrost after being in Lansing Michigan.

I attended the first AUGI CAD Camp in Jacksonville Florida in November 2004. and had a great time. It is a real compressed schedule to fit in one day but the benefits for those attending make it well worth it. It is also affordable at $99 for the early bird registrations and $129 thereafter.

The locations and dates that I will be presenting at AUGI CAD Camp.

• 
  Houston, Texas USA Feb 8th, 2005

• 
  Lansing, Michigan USA Feb 10th, 2005

Some of my fellow  team members will be presenting at the rest of the AUGI CAD Camps.

For more information on the AUGI CAD Camps go to http://www.cadcamp.com

Perhaps I can organize some customer site visits or CAD Geek dinner or lunches as I love those. I will also try and rustle up some freebies to give away to those that do not fall asleep during my presentations.  If you are interested in getting together or visiting, drop me an email at shaan@autodesk.com.

I hope to see you there!
Shaan

Met with the AUGI Board this Afternoon

I had a great meeting with the AUGI Board today.  The AUGI membership is comprised of over 45,000 Autodesk product users as a community to share, educate, and network with fellow Autodesk product users. It is always great getting the AUGI Board together with Autodesk. I have known many of the board members for a long time.  I have been a huge AUGI supporter for many years back to when it was known as NAAUG. We discussed the upcoming 5 AUGI CAD Camps at which my team will be at showing some cool "stuff" as well as a variety of other meeting topics. I also took the opportunity to sneak a few of their cookies when they were distracted by my boss.

I had to hurry and blog this meeting as there were other CAD bloggers at the meeting like Richard Binning.
Hey Richard, I beat you to the blog post!

A few photos of the AUGI gang.
Yoshi Honda the current 2005 AUGI President, Mark Kiker, Chris Lindner, Rick McNeil, Michael Perry, Robert Bell, Donnia Tabor-Hanson, Jill King, and Richard Binning.

Cheers,
Shaan

Participate in Shaping Future AutoCAD and Viz

Internally we call them test fests, usability sessions, focus groups, customer research, or gunslingers. No matter what the term used to describe them, Autodesk is always looking for customers to provide feedback on our products. It is extremely important that we observe and listen to the feedback of customers trying new features in our upcoming products or possible design concepts. I can say for the AutoCAD and Viz teams, that no changes or features are implemented without customer input and feedback at many stages before a release. If we don't listen to what the users want or expect from a feature, then we will not keep our customers satisfied and selecting our products.

Autodesk is always looking for product Usability Participants; both for in the Bay Area and in other regions. We hold many sessions via LiveMeeting for users not located in the SF Bay Area as well as hold customer visits and focus groups all year long in all regions of the world.

If you are interested in participating for AutoCAD, AutoCAD LT, or Autodesk Viz sessions, please contact: traci.garzelli@autodesk.com Please include your Name, Contact details, and the products that you use.

Another critical part of the customer feedback equation is beta testing of future products. Beta testing is not only to find software bugs before the software is released but also is a perfect opportunity to listen to the customer feedback. The beta testing feedback is so very important so we can change or tune things or perhaps as in many cases add new items based on the customer feedback and requests. Of course beta testing is not without some amount of risk as unreleased software can have some downsides that must be considered as well. Ideally you want to have another machine separate from your production and daily use machine so that there are no conflicts to your existing versions of products. But if you want to be on the cutting edge and speak direct with the developers and designers of the products, have some time to test, want to provide your feedback, and help shape the future of products, then this is for you. You can sign up at htttp://myfeedback.autodesk.com. You will be invited to feedback or betas based on your profile you create when you sign up. I was a customer and beta site before coming to work for Autodesk and even was in the AutoCAD R14 satellite broadcast and demo CD ROM. I loved living on the edge but also participating the design feedback with the teams that developed the products I used daily. I got to participate and make the products more user friendly and productive for my use.

We also send out many surveys to users signed up on the http://myfeedback.autodesk.com looking for your feedback on potential features, design concepts, trends, and your usage of the products.

You can also submit feedback to the product teams. Many of us reply as I am on the AutoCAD product feedback alias that gets these user feedback items. We do try and answer all that we can. Most are fairly simple questions or requests. You can submit feedback direct to the team on the Autodesk web page by selecting the "contact us" located at the bottom of each web page. Now select "Feedback", and finally select the product from the pull-down menu. Or you can direct to the AutoCAD feedback form page. Now enter your feedback and be as specific as possible. Maybe mention you heard about this feedback method from Shaan's blog.

So if you want to provide feedback and be involved in shaping the future product releases, just let us know.  Autodesk customer Lee Ambrosius's take on participating in the feedback process link to article.

Cheers,
Shaan

Cool Autodesk University 2004 Video

The video was created in its entirety by a German AU 2004 attendee Helge Brettschneider.  He used a few of my AU 2004 photos from my AU 2004 Image Gallery.

Make sure to have your speakers turned up for the music!

Check it out
http://myfeedback.autodesk.com/files/AU2004_usa.wmv

Thanks Helge!
Shaan

Made it into Victorian Homes Magazine

I could not figure out why I was sent the nice glossy Victorian Homes Magazine February 2005 issue last week. Then after paging through it on page 4 I saw one of my photos had been used and gave me full credit. The photo was one of the haunted (rumored) Haystack Landing house that burned down last year.

Cheers,
Shaan

5 Million Downloads of DWF Viewer!

On the afternoon of December 15th, 2004 we reached 5 Million downloads of the DWF viewer in almost exactly 2 years since the launch of DWF 6. The monthly download rate has increased to 330,000 and continues to grow due to the popularity and benefits of the DWF format over other electronic formats for CAD documents.

To put this in perspective, each of the following is roughly 5 million:

• The total population of Maryland or Minnesota or Finland
• If you had a US $1 bill for each download, the bills would weigh 10,000 lbs and would require 321,500 cubic inches of space
• The number of years ago that the two main islands of New Zealand began to form
• About 5% of the US population that uses a computer
• The number of miles light can travel in a vacuum in about 30 seconds

Thank you to all of the DWF users out there!

More of my DWF related blog posts:

• Use the Best Tool for the Intended Purpose or Output
• Autodesk DWF Viewer 5 - Adding More Performance and 3D DWF Files!
• More DWF Benefits
• “Is DWF an ‘open’ file format?”
• More DWF vs. PDF
• Quick Article on Design Document Communication with DWF
• DWF Precision Follow Up
• DWF Precision Article by Brian Mathews of the DWF Team
• The Free Autodesk DWF Writer 2
• New Exciting DWF Usage for Facilities
  

If you were planning on downloading and updating Adobe Acrobat 7 for your text documents, you might also consider using the time to also install the free Autodesk DWF Viewer for your CAD documents in the DWF format. Adobe Acrobat 7 still is not up to the measuring stick marks set by the DWF format on file size, visual fidelity, and performance when it comes to CAD drawings.

Looking For a Few Good Video Tutorials

Thanks to Betsy Weber and Techsmith I am holding a quick fun giveaway. I have been using Techsmith's products SnagIt and Camtasia for many years on a daily basis. I create almost all of my video tutorials and screen captures using their products and they are indispensable for me personally. Betsy graciously offered up 5 Camtasia and 10 SnagIt licenses for a quick and fun giveaway.

So here are the details on how you can share your AutoCAD 2005 and Autodesk Viz 2005 knowledge in a video tutorial to fellow product users.

Email a Zip archived video tutorial for AutoCAD 2005 or Autodesk Viz 2005 to me at shaan@autodesk.com. The best tutorials will be posted and also win a free copy of Techsmith Camtasia or SnagIt. Those who win will be notified by email.

• You must base the tutorial on AutoCAD 2005 or Autodesk Viz 2005 and show the products and features.
• The tutorial video should be 640 x 480 or  800 x 600 resolution.
• The tutorial video should be under 2 minutes in the Windows Media (WMV) streaming media file format and use the Techsmith codec for compression as a .WMV file.
• File size of the zipped file should be under 4MB.
• You can add audio to narrate the tutorial or use text box callouts.
• Be creative and try to teach someone who will see the video something about AutoCAD 2005 or Autodesk Viz 2005 such as a new feature or tip or trick.
• You must agree to release of rights on the video so that I can post the tutorial.
• Tutorials should be in English
• All submitted tutorials should contain a description of the tutorial and who created it.

You can create your video entry by downloading the free 30 day trial of Techsmith's Camtasia.
Link to Camtasia 30 Day Trial

Helpful link about recording videos with Camtasia and using CPU intensive applications like AutoCAD and Viz. http://www.techsmith.com/products/studio/tutorials/1014.1.asp

Entries must be received by February 15th 2005 at 12AM PST. The videos will be judged by Autodesk product managers and myself. Winners will be announced and notified by mid February. This is not official Autodesk sanctioned offer or product endorsement.

Cheers,
Shaan

AutoCAD 2005 Tip - Paragraph Break in Table

I have ran into this question myself and thought I might share the tip that was given to me from AutoCAD developer Kurt Chase. When you have Mtext you can use the Enter key to break the paragraph or add a space. But when the Mtext is in a AutoCAD 2005 Table Enter moves you to the next cell. What you do is just like in Microsoft Excel and use ALT+Enter.

Link to my blog post on using the AutoCAD Tables and Mtext to achieve multiple columns of text. Link Here

Cheers,
Shaan

Desktop Search Tools - I love MSN Desktop Search!

A few weeks back I mentioned in a post in this blog I had tried the Google Desktop and then un-installed it because I did not like it for multiple reasons. Then I decided to try the new beta of the MSN Desktop Search. Well after a few weeks I am not sure I could do without the MSN Desktop Search. It allows me to search for documents, contacts, files, emails, photos, music, appointments, Outlook Express posts, and instant messenger  text logs on my machine fast and easy. It has been a huge benefit for me to find stuff fast based on keyword searches. For example when I am looking for emails for a specific person, I can simply enter their name and see all emails, instant messages, files, discussion group posts, web pages, and appointments related to this person.

For some cool tips on the MSN Desktop Search read the article by Wei-Meng Lee
Inside Secrets of MSN Desktop Search
by http://www.windowsdevcenter.com/

To use the MSN Desktop Search, you need to download the MSN Toolbar Suite.

The MSN Search teams blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/msnsearch/archive/2004/12/13/282000.aspx

Cheers,
Shaan

Free AutoCAD Video Tutorials

http://www.dgcad.com/ by DG CAD Consulting has posted a series of free video tutorials on AutoCAD, ADT, and Revit.  What they have done is used the New Features Workshop which is in AutoCAD 2005 and then added their own commentary to further explain the concepts of new features. You can also order the video tutorials on CD. I have added this web site to this blogs left side menu of Helpful Resources. Sometimes the most absorbed and memorable training comes from seeing and following along.

An example is the 7 part series of lessons for AutoCAD 2005 New Features
Lesson 1: Sheet Set Overview
Lesson 2: Sheet Set Wizard
Lesson 3: Sheet Sets - Resource Files and Views
Lesson 4: View Ports, Callout Bubbles, and View Adjustments
Lesson 5: Sheet Sets - Select Selections, Archive, eTransmit, and Publish
Lesson 6: Sheet Sets - Lists and General Summary 
Lesson 7: Tool Palettes

Thanks to Mark Browning for giving me the heads up on this great resource. If anyone else has a tip, trick, or site to mention please let me know at shaan@autodesk.com.

For those wanting to know where the AutoCAD 2005 New Features Workshop is in AutoCAD, it is in the Help menu pulldown.

Dilbert's Ultimate House "DUH"

Robin Capper has posted an article and a link to the Dilbert's Ultimate House "DUH". http://rcd.typepad.com/rcd/2005/01/dilberts_ultima.html
http://www.dilbert.com/ Press Release link

The "Virtual Construction" was by Heartwood Studios located here in the San Francisco Bay Area and also Boston. Where are their DWF floor plans? ;-)

This is a really interesting tongue in cheek residential design project with some interesting design specs and also some good laughs from the funniest suggestions list. I do hope Robin finds out the design and visualization software used in the project and I too will email them. They do list discreet 3ds Max, Autodesk Viz, Autodesk Architectural Desktop, and Autodesk AutoCAD on their website.

<Update Jan. 2, 2005> The "DUH" project did in fact use Autodesk AutoCAD and discreet 3ds Max. This is great news and another perfect example of using AutoCAD and 3ds Max to design and visualize a great project.

Modified Dilbert quote from http://www.allgreatquotes.com/dilbert_quotes5.shtml
We're a planet of nearly six billion ninnies living in a civilization that was designed by a few million amazingly smart deviants using AutoCAD.
Dilbertdesk

Cheers,
Shaan