So you want to take you multi-colored drawing and plot it in just black and white, but how? This post is a direct result of a question I received from an attendee on the See the Difference with AutoCAD 2010 Tour in October.
In AutoCAD when you go to the Plot command and enter the Plot dialog expand the Plot dialog.
Select the Monochrome plot style (ctb or stb). Now select Apply to the Layout and preview or Plot and you should should be good to go.
Cheers,
Shaan
Have you ever double clicked on the Application Menu icon in the upper left expecting the menu to rollout, only to see the application close?
This is more common now that the application menu icon is a little bigger “Big Red A” in AutoCAD 2009 and AutoCAD 2010 as well as other Autodesk products. I did this once while on the See the Difference with AutoCAD 2010 Tour.
Make sure to take your time when selecting the application menu icon and not get impatient and click it again causing a double click event and close the application. Patience is a virtue.
Cheers,
Shaan
I just set out the reminder email to people that have signed up to attend and receive information on this inaugural Autodesk User Meetup this week.
Date and Time September 23rd at 5PM - 8PM
Location
BetaLoft http://betaloftslc.com/
357 West 200 South Suite 201 Upstairs
Salt Lake City, UT, 84101
Located next to the Gateway Mall and the UTA Trax and Frontrunner transportation
Purpose
Agenda
5:00 - 6:00 Meet & Greet Networking and Root Beer Bust (pizza and root beer soda)
6:00 - 6:15 Welcome and Introductions
6:15 - 6:20 Overview of the Meetup and idea behind it.
This group is for all Autodesk product users to exchange ideas, presentations, and fun. We have a very rich and diverse design community using Autodesk products and can benefit from networking.
6:20 - 7:15 Open Discussion of Meetup and User group organization.
6:30 - 6:55 Next Steps
6:55 - 7:00 Thank You and Meeting Wrap Up
I will remain until 8:00PM for those wishing to stay and talk with people or eat the left over pizza.
Please spread the word and invite others to attend. This is not just a Salt Lake City or Utah event but one for anyone wishing to attend. Sign up to be notified of the Salt City Autodesk User Meetup
Hope to see you at the Meetup!
Shaan
For those of the mechanical engineering persuasion and using AutoCAD Mechanical or thinking about it there is some great new resources. The AutoCAD Mechanical View on the AutoCAD Exchange is now live and some nice videos have been posted to both the AutoCAD Exchange and YouTube.
You can select the discipline view for the AutoCAD Exchange in the upper right by selecting View > Mechanical View. It is essentially a discipline filter so you could see all or just your specific flavor of AutoCAD.
AutoCAD Exchange Mechanical View
AutoCAD Mechanical 2010 Video series on the AutoCAD Exchange Mechanical View as well as on YouTube. The video series is by AutoCAD Mechanical Product Manager Adam Perry. Adam did a great job on the videos!
Now I need to get back to some late Sunday night last minute packing for a very early flight tomorrow morning to San Francisco. I wonder if Lynn Allen has any left over ribs that won her 1st place in a competition this weekend. mmmm
Cheers,
Shaan
I wanted to have some fun on a vacation day and mention a staple of AutoCAD use which is the FILLET command. I also wanted an excuse to draw a salmon in AutoCAD.
I have heard people actually pronounce FILLET the same as FILET but they are differently pronounced and different meanings. The AutoCAD FILLET command is immensely helpful for adding a user defined radius between two lines.
Command FILLET “Select first object or [Undo/Polyline/Radius/Trim/Multiple]”.
You can also set the radius to 0 (default) and join two lines and trim them quickly. In AutoCAD you can fillet arcs, circles, elipses, elliptical arcs, lines, polylines, rays, splines, and xlines. You can also fillet 3D solids and surfaces.
Remember it is the FILLET (fill’it) Not the Salmon Filet (fill’ay).
Yes I did draw the northwestern Native American styled salmon carved art in AutoCAD. It was a bunch of fun to come up with in only a few minutes. Below is a link to a DWF file of the drawing.
Download Salmon fillet DWF File
Cheers,
Shaan
I just wanted to mention if you have an Internet connection while installing your AutoCAD 2010, you will be alerted that there is an Update 1 available and can install it during the initial AutoCAD 2010 installation.
The installer can also point to a local network location for the Update if you have an internal location of the Update. This is nice that you don't have to install a new version and immediately afterwards install the updates separately.
Talk about a sweet loaded one, two punch!
I use Camtasia and Snagit on the Windows PC every single day as a picture or video crosses language barriers and is ideal for recording presentations, tutorials, and documenting steps or process.. Now I can use them on my Apple MacBook as well.
Download a fully functional, 30 day copy of Camtasia for Mac here!
You can also use Techsmith’s free Jing for screen captures recordings on both Windows PC and Mac.
After I get Snagit, Camtasia and more Autodesk Mac applications then all I need is Windows Live Writer blog tool as I cannot find anything similar for the Mac. I am now juggling 4 operating systems as there is no one size fits all yet.
Cheers,
Shaan
For those that use AutoCAD Mechanical which is the mechanical design specific flavor of AutoCAD are you aware there is Finite Element Analysis FEA? I have been using AutoCAD Mechanical since it was acquired from GENIIUS by Autodesk back when I was a customer in Oregon. The 2D FEA feature has been in AutoCAD Mechanical since I can remember but you hear very little about it or people are shocked when they realize this powerful feature is in there. It is not the complex 3D modeling and simulation you get with Autodesk Inventor but a great AutoCAD based 2D FEA to give you valuable design feedback on your 2D sections including Von Mises, defection mesh and more,
Below is a solved 2D FEA of a section fixed at both ends and a load in the middle just like me sitting on a park bench <Jethro Tull flashback>.
FEA in AutoCAD Mechanical is one of those hidden gems.
Cheers,
Shaan.
There is a virus being reported by a couple AutoCADbased product customers. The original virus first popped up in 2005 and was very limited but has been changed slightly. Some antivirus software does detect this virus and remove it. Many great people worked behind the scenes over the past week to research and publish a solution.
The virus spreads simply by someone placing the malicious acad.vlx in a directory with the DWG files or a support path location being opened and then spreads from there into open DWG files and by replicating itself.
The below LISP code detects and deletes any acad.vlxfile before AutoCAD attempts to load it, preventing the spread of the virus. The possible random strings written to the DWGfile by the acad.vlx appears to be harmless. The malicious file acad.vlx is not an Autodesk file.
Update: Check with your CAD Manager or fellow employees to make sure you have not named your own customization as "logo.gif "or "acad.vlx" as the below LISP will not check the version but remove any file named logo.gif or acad.vlx. There is a file checksum published here AutoCAD malware: ACAD.VLX:
The Autodesk Technical Solution IS being published.to the AutoCAD Support Page and also being mentioned on the Support Blog - Without A Netby Tom Stoeckel:
ID: TS13717811
Published date: 2009-Aug-07
http://usa.autodesk.com/getdoc/id=TS13717811
Issue
Users of AutoCAD-based products have reported a malicious acad.vlx file that causes drawing corruption.
Solution
This is not an actual AutoCAD file provided by Autodesk. When the malicious acad.vlx file is loaded in AutoCAD, it corrupts the drawing, which may result in a Missing Language Pack dialog box displaying when you save and reopen the drawing.
The acad.vlx file creates a copy of itself in the Help folder (for example, C:\Program Files\AutoCAD 2010\Help\logo.gif). Several other files are also modified and the ACADLSPASDOC system variable is set to 1, allowing the acad.vlx file to be loaded into other opened drawings, thereby corrupting them.
The cleanup process outlined below detects and deletes any acad.vlxfile before AutoCAD attempts to load it, preventing the spread of the virus.
To prevent additional file corruptions
(defun cleanvirus( / lspfiles lspfile x) (setq lspfiles '("acad.vlx" "logo.gif")) (foreachlspfile lspfiles (while(setq x (findfile lspfile)) (progn (vl-file-delete x) (princ "\nDeleted file ") (princ x) );progn );while );foreach) (cleanvirus)
End of Solution Document.
<hurley_warped_humor_alert> Many times some precautions can prevent most risks of malware or virus by maintaining vigilance on what files are allowed into your environment as well as running up to date antivirus software. This is common sense and like knowing what direction the dog is pointing before you pet it in a dark room or not golfing downwind of Tiger Woods or the golf announcer. hurley_warped_humor_alert>
For more tips on preventing virus in AutoCAD see AutoCAD and Viruses
Shaan
Every week there is a new AutoCAD Expert to pose your long burning questions for FREE. Last week Guillermo Melantoni (What a Mesh) and myself were the AutoCAD Experts in residence on the AutoCAD Exchange in the Ask The Expert feature.
This week August 01, 2009 until August 07, 2009 the AutoCAD Expert taking questions on the AutoCAD Exchange is none other than the former AUGI president and Hawaiian AutoCAD master Yoshi Honda. Yoshi i also the the Director of Operations for US CAD in Hawaii. Yoshi has used and taught AutoCAD for many years including at Autodesk University .
How sweet would it be to work in Hawaii…Ahhh one can dream of the beach, a nice gentle tradewind breeze, the perpetual sunny days, a golf course and wet bar every 100 feet, and of course a command line. :-)…
Have you wanted to become the AutoCAD Expert of the week, think you have what it takes? Be the AutoCAD Exchange Ask the AutoCAD Expert
Mahalo,
Shaan
I am currently on vacation but wanted to share a great AutoCAD Tip from my friend the AutoCAD Trainer Guy Michael Beal. Michael always has great tips and clear instructions in his monthly “Michael’s Corner” available on the web as well as a monthly newsletter.
Prerequisite: The X and Y values need to be in a single cell in the format of X,Y for this to work. If X and Y have their own column, you will need to make the necessary adjustments to get them to X,Y format.
Do you have an AutoCAD, AutoCAD Architecture,AutoCAD Mechanical, or AutoCAD MEP tips, tricks, or resources you would .like to share with the thousands of readers of this Between the Lines blog? Send me your favorite tips, tricks and resources
How can you update and re-path AutoCAD drawing reference files such as other drawing files, fonts, or plot configuration files after a path has changed?
Reference Manager is the answer. In AutoCAD 2004 the Reference Manager was added and it is included with other AutoCAD based products like AutoCAD Architecture, and AutoCAD Mechanical. The tool is easy to add drawings and see where reference files were found or not..You can search, select all, invert selections, edit selected paths and even use find and replace paths in batch. The Reference Manager can run outside of AutoCAD and without AutoCAD running.
You can locate the Reference Manager from the Windows Start Menu > Programs > Autodesk > AutoCAD 200x > Reference Manager
Cheers,
Shaan
In AutoCAD 2010 products there is now a new ribbon option we call sticky panels. You can now tear off a ribbon panel to the drawing area. It will remain on your drawing area modeless much like a toolbar would.
In this quick bite size example I want to take the Action Recorder off the ribbon to my drawing area for easier access as I want to record and test some macros.
I simply select the panel on the lower panel description name and then hold the left mouse button and drag it off the ribbon. You could do this for other panels you frequently use perhaps the new Mesh panel or the Modify panel.
There is are option available on the sticky panel such as the ability to change the orientation of the panel from vertical to horizontal. I can also drag the sticky panel back onto the ribbon in a location I would prefer or select the option to return it to the ribbon which places it back where it came from.
Cheers,
Shaan
In June I will begin to focus on my Autodesk Platform Technology Evangelist position and less on managing all Autodesk product betas. I will be the mouth and ears for customers, the design and development, and product management teams.
I am adding 3 more great products to my hat for my position as Autodesk Technology Evangelist. In addition to AutoCAD, I am now involved with AutoCAD Architecture, AutoCAD MEP, and AutoCAD Mechanical and what I call the AutoCAD Fantastic Four. I am truly excited for having the cross discipline focus. These products are used by millions and relied upon and Autodesk is continuing to improve them based on customer feedback. They are not going anywhere or being retired they are being focused together with the same AutoCAD DNA they share which will result in a much more consistent and powerful features using more coordinated team resources.
I will continue same as always on this blog Between the Lines the same as I have the past 6 years but will have more time to dedicate to writing more tips and tricks and cover more products, user groups, and great customers as well as traveling for events and speaking engagements.
Before coming to Autodesk, I was a mechanical designer involved in a wide variety of large projects from process equipment, pressure vessels, shell & tube heat exchangers, large bridges, hydroelectric and navigational locks, nuclear steam generators,and military watercraft. Having been involved in a wide variety of projects gives me a diverse background of project experience and disciplines to draw upon in my jobs at Autodesk.
Please let me know how I am doing or what you would like to see in the blog. If you want a very large audience for AutoCAD tips, I would be happy to publish your tips and give you a very visible credit and potentially get you fame and fortune, ok maybe not fortune but thousands read this blog daily.
Sincerely,
Shaan Hurley MoMH (Man of Many Hats)
Autodesk Platform Technology Evangelist
Find out how to turn "What if" into reality & Why Design Matters
The Autodesk Imagine Virtual Event is an online live event with interactive chat sessions included.
Tuesday May 19, 2009
10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. EDT
7:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. PDT
Agenda
The Autodesk Imagine Virtual Event Agenda May 19, 2009
10:00am–5:00pm EDT / 7:00am–2:00pm PDT
11:30–12:00pm EDT / 8:30–9:00am PDT
12:00–12:30pm EDT / 9:00–9:30am PDT
12:30–1:00pm EDT / 9:30–10:00am PDT
1:00–1:30pm EDT / 10:00–10:30am PDT
Scheduled Chat Sessions:
1:30–2:00pm EDT / 10:30–11:00am PDT
2:30–3:00pm EDT / 11:30–12:00pm PDT
3:00–3:30pm EDT / 12:00–12:30pm PDT
Scheduled Chat Sessions:
4:00–4:30pm EDT / 1:00–1:30pm PDT
Scheduled Chat Session:
I hope to see you there as I will be participating in the chat sessions such as “Straight Talk about AutoCAD 2010 Benefits“.
Cheers,
Shaan
AutoCAD customers have been asking for the option to rotate the view with their associated viewport. This was a top item in the AUGI AutoCAD Wish List June 2007 submitted by Bill N. (link).
With the AutoCAD 2010 based products we have added the ability to rotate objects in a viewport with the viewport easily without having to become a UCS ninja master.
You can select the viewport and when you rotate it the view rotates with the Viewport. There is a new AutoCAD System Variable VPROTATEASSOC which is set to a value of 1 by default and will rotate the view with the viewport. You can set VPROTATEASSOC=0 to have the Viewport rotate with the Viewport.
Viewport before rotating. You can use the command ROTATE and select the viewport boundary, or select the viewport boundary and then use the grips to rotate.
When you rotated the viewport in past releases of AutoCAD it resulted in the following result.
The default in AutoCAD 2010 rotates the view with the viewport.
Keep the wish List items coming!
AutoCAD Wish List Submission Form
Cheers,
Shaan
I was doing some planning work for a new pond in my backyard and thought I would share a cool AutoCAD tip.
When drawing a 2D layout drawing of my yard’s landscaping I was presented with the problem of duplicating the flowerbeds border with the grass regions. Instead of copying and drawing outlines which could cause problems with the splines I used for the curved shapes, I used the trick of creating a new boundary polyline with a Hatch. Below is a tutorial on how you can do the same trick and as a bonus showed my design styled in Autodesk Impression.
So in this image you see the 6 regions I want defined for a polyline on a separate layer, but the boundaries of these objects is not drawn yet.
What I did was hatched the 6 regions I wanted to create a boundary for using the AutoCAD command BHATCH.
I then double-clicked on the new Hatch which brings up the Hatch Edit dialog. I then selected the option to “Recreate Boundary” then accepted the default option to create a Polyline and boundary not Reassociate the Hatch to the new boundary.
Now delete the Hatch object and you are left with a polyline boundary of the regions you hatched. This is much faster than other methods to create the new boundary layer. I could also just keep the Hatch objects on a separate layer and even use AutoCAD Fields to display the square footage of my grass covered areas. In a past popular blog post “StarBacks BBQ Floor Space Planning with AutoCAD FIELDS” I showed how to show a hatch objects area and even use that area value for an AutoCAD or Excel table and calculations. As Matt Murphy would say “ That’s Wicked Cool”.
To make the design nice and visually pleasing instead of just a collection of lines, I styled my design using Autodesk Impression. Below are the hand rendering styled images created with Autodesk Impression 3 in less than five minutes.
The best part is the rendering is vector based drawing and if I update the DWG file I can simply update the rendering in Impression instead of starting back from scratch in a raster editing program or using traditional pens, markers or watercolor. In less than five minutes I imported the DWG and styled it in a colored pencil then changed my mind and in less than one minute changed to an overlapping marker style.
Autodesk Impression is a free download for many Autodesk Subscription customers.
Update 5/11/09
Tom Kelly pointed out another excellent method to create the outline of a region in the comments to this post. Use the Boundary command “BO”. So many commands, so little time. Thanks Tom.
Cheers,
Shaan
In past releases of AutoCAD you could develop a nice Dynamic Block but had to save it to see if it worked and then re-enter the Block Editor (BEDIT command) to tweak and tune it, and repeat.
Now with AutoCAD 2010 and AutoCAD LT 2010 in the Block Editor there is the ability to test your block speeding up the creation of powerful Dynamic Blocks.
You can access this new Test Block option from the Block Edit ribbon or using the AutoCAD command BTESTBLOCK when in the Block Editor.
Cheers,
Shaan
This book, AutoCAD 2010 Transitioning from AutoCAD 2009 covering all of the big AutoCAD 2010 topics and workflows. This volume contains 17 in-depth lessons, with detailed conceptual coverage, discipline-specific workflows, examples and advanced study exercises on:
Table of Contents Sample Chapter
Partners or customers can purchase the printed guide at the Autodesk estore:
I had the pleasure to present to the Seattle based PSAUG Puget Sound Autodesk Users Group last week. I called this my Shaan's Digital Design Rodeo Roundup Seattle 2009 as a fun theme name as I am a digital design rodeo clown with my warped humor and presentation style and loving the live Q&A even the tough questions with horns. I promised I would provide my resource links to all that attended and am sharing below.
Resources
Shaan’s blog http://autodesk.blogs.com/between_the_lines/
Shaan’s on Twitter http://twitter.com/mrcadman
AutoCAD 2010 Help Documentation and Resources now available online
AutoCAD 2010 Website http://www.autodesk.com/autocad
Autodesk Assistance Program Offers Help to Displaced Workers
If you would like me to present to your group in person or over the web please contact me for a fun time covering most of the AutoCAD based products.
Cheers,
Shaan
Platform Technology Evangelist
Direct 415 507-8432
Mobile 415 328-6747
Email: shaan.hurley@autodesk.com
Twitter http://twitter.com/mrcadman
There have been a flurry of enhancements (AutoCAD 2010 Other Enhancements aka The Frosting) in AutoCAD 2010 as well as the excellent new features like the new 3D mesh modeling, geometric constraints and parametrics, 3D Printing, PDF and more. I wanted to focus on two enhancements that are nice gems and in response to requests from our customers.
The first enhancement is that you can now change the color property of a layer from the Layer dropdown itself. So many have asked for this as they can change other layer properties from the layer properties dropdown but not the color since at least AutoCAD R14. Now in AutoCAD 2010 you can!
Another enhancement is making the selection of colors in the “Select Color” dialog more distinguishable.
Below in AutoCAD 2009 can you tell what color is selected easily?
In AutoCAD 2010 there is a distinct black border to indicate the color highlighted.
In many cases it is the small changes that affect an AutoCAD users productivity.
Happy Earth Day, now go plant a tree. This blog past was created using post-consumer bits and bytes. :-)
Cheers,
Shaan
Juan Maschio from beautiful Argentina has started a new blog dedicated to using both Revit and 3ds Max in the design process. Juan will also be blogging some tips and tricks for other programs such as: AutoCAD , Autodesk Impression, Revit MEP, Revit Structure.
Please join me in welcoming Juan to the CAD Blogosphere and to your bookmarks and RSS feeds.
Welcome, Bienvenidos, Benvenuti Juan!
Revit Unleashed! (English and Spanish)
http://www.unleashrevit.blogspot.com/
Revit Unleashed Italia! (Italian)
http://www.revititalia.blogspot.com/
RSS Feed
Cheers,
Shaan
Recent Comments