Having worked in a design office in the past I know how there can be office pranks to liven up an office and blow off some steam. Sometimes projects can cause pressure, time crunch stress, and conflicts causing some to go to prank mode to relieve stress. Lynn Allen used to offer a few great pranks to do in AutoCAD including the one where each ZOOM would perform two UNDO commands and a SAVE, but that one could be a little dangerous and lose some work and design data if you had no backups of the DWG.
Pranks should always be in fun and not cause damage or negative impacts as those can be career limiting moves as well as be just downright mean and destructive. I will not officially admit to what I may have done myself, but mention a few pranks I know of:
- Creating hidden messages in a linetype by using micro size text in a linetype that appears like a normal line, but zoom in and you get a text message.
- Capture an AutoCAD screen image and place it as a raster image on the desktop then unplug the mouse. Sit back and prepare to watch the coworker click maniacally in frustration.
Create some annoying alert dialogs in a LISP or macro for most common commands like (alert "Do you really want to do this, really?")
Change some system variables like crosshair angle or grip size and color, you can even accomplish this in a profile. Background color to lime green, VIEWRES to 10, APERTURE to 50, others GRIPCOLOR and GRIPSIZE.
Post your fun (and safe) AutoCAD pranks in the comments to this blog post. Let the fun begin.
Shaan
