Autodesk India User Community - (AU 2010)

40 AutoCAD Tips in 40 Minutes

Lynn Allen - Autodesk, Inc.

AC120-1R
If you want a plethora of power user tips, then be sure to join Cadalyst columnist and author Lynn Allen as she takes
you through a whirlwind of productivity techniques that are certain to improve your everyday drawing life. At a tip a
minute, you are certain to discover some AutoCAD features that will remove some of the tedium and boost your ability
to meet project deadlines.

About the Speaker:

Lynn Allen, Cadalyst columnist and Autodesk Technical Evangelist, speaks to more than 30,000 users
worldwide each year. For the past 16 years, she has written a monthly column in Cadalyst magazine
called "Circles and Lines" and is the voice behind the popular Cadalyst videos -Tips and Tricks Tuesday
with Lynn Allen. Lynn started using AutoCAD software with Release 1.4 over 20 years ago, and taught
at the corporate and collegiate level for 13 years before joining Autodesk. A sought-after public speaker
with a unique comedic style, Lynn is always one of the highest rated speakers and host of Autodesk
University. The author of three AutoCAD books, her latest is entitled AutoCAD Professional Tips and
Techniques.

Email: lynn.allen@autodesk.com
Twitter: Lynn_Allen
Blog: www.autodesk.com/lynnallen
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Introduction
With so much going on in our everyday drawing life we have a tendency to get in an AutoCAD
rut. The goal behind this course is to show you a variety of tips that will spark a new
awareness and lead you down the road to increased productivity!

User Interface Tips:

1) AutoComplete (Tab to cycle)

After keying in a one or more characters - use the tab key at the command line to cycle
through all of the command and system variable combinations

2) Arrow to move up and down command list.

Up and down arrows can take you through previously executed commands. Great for
Lispers.

3) Control+9 to toggle command line on/off.

4) Right Click on the command line to retrieve previous commands from the
shortcut menu.

5) Move Model space/Layout tabs to the Status bar for more screen real estate.
Move to and from the status bar via the right click Hide Layout/Model tabs option.

6) Dynamic editing of Layout Tabs

Double Click to rename the tab. Use Control key to copy layout tabs, simply drag to move
them.

7) Drag and Drop layout tabs to Sheet Set

After saving your drawing you can easily drag and drop your layout tabs to the active sheet
set.

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8) Maximizing Viewports
Double click on a viewport to open and edit the contents as though you were in model
space. No need to worry about accidentally modifying the scale factor and yet zoom and
pan all you want. Click outside of the red area to quickly get back to your paperspace
layout.

9) Taskbar to 1
Display all open files at the taskbar by setting the system variable TASKBAR to 1.

10) Customize the Quick Access Toolbar for maximum productivity!

(Layer drop-down, SAVEAS)

11) Search for commands in the Application Menu

Cant find a command in the Ribbon? The Application Menu will show you where it is!

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Tool Palette Tips:

12) Quickly create a Tool Palette of your blocks in Design Center

Tip: Be sure to PURGE the drawing with the blocks first!

13) Drag and Drop blocks to your Tool Palette

Highlight a block and use a right click to drag a block to an open tool palette. Your new tool
with also remember the layer, rotation angle, scale, etc.

14) Set up tools to automatically scale to your drawing

Set the Auxiliary scale factor to Plot Scale or Dimscale

15) Drag and Drop Hatch patterns to your Tool Palette

Highlight a hatch pattern and use a right click to drag the
hatch pattern to the tool palette. The pattern, layer, scale
factor, and rotation angle are also saved with the hatch pattern.

16) Drag and Drop a Dimension to save all the settings and the layer for speedy additions of
new dimensions with the same settings.

17) Easily customize your icon with an existing image file.

18) Bonus tip: Use ADD Selected in AutoCAD 2011 to achieve much
of the same results

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Layer Tips:

19) Customize your Layer Columns

For maximum productivity be sure to turn off any columns
you arent using.

20) Layer States for maximum productivity

AutoCAD gurus use Layers States so they can avoid constantly changing the layer settings.

21) Applying Layer States per Viewport

After setting up your layer states you can apply them to individual viewports

22) SETBYLAYER
This is a fantastic command to set any object (including those within nested blocks) back to
BYLAYER!

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Misc. Layer Tips:

23) Layer Translater (LAYTRANS)

Great for mapping layers from one naming convention to another

24) LAYWALK (View layers individually)

Use the LAYWALK command to quickly view individual layers

25) LAYDEL (Delete even the most stubborn layers!)

Use this fantastic Express Tool to delete any layer (except for 0 and defpoints)

26) LAYISO Isolates layer(s) for easy editing. AutoCAD 2008 and above allows you
to fade the other layers so you can see the objects on the other layers but not
accidentally modify them.

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27) COPYTOLAYER
Allows you to make a copy of an object to another layer. You can even create a
new layer if needed!

28) Autodesk Seek

Use the DC Online tab in Design Center to easily get to the content on Autodesk
Seek (or just select the Autodesk Seek button in AutoCAD 2010+)
Autodesk Seek
www.autodesk.com/seek

9 2005 Autodesk

TIMESAVERS:

29) JOIN command (Glue)

Use the Join command to glue together polylines, lines, arcs, elliptical arcs and
splines. Join two lines together that are collinear, even if there are gaps between
them. Join different types of objects together if there are no gaps. Join more than
one arc, even with gaps, as long as they lie in the same imaginary circle.
You can even use the JOIN command to turn an arc into a circle.

30) OVERKILL
This Express tool is a great way to delete duplicate objects and clean up your
drawing. OVERKILL removes unneeded objects by deleting duplicates and
combining line and arc segments that overlap. There are multiple settings to ensure
you get just the results you want.

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31) CHANGE command to shorten/lengthen

Use the age-old CHANGE command to quickly lengthen/shorten line segments to a specific
point (Ortho on)

32) Highlight objects and use a right click to Move and Copy

33) Speedy Array (Control key)

Select objects, select a grip, C for Copy and hold the Control key down to do a quickie
array!

34) Shift for more than one hot grip

35) Speedy Trims/Extends

Hit an extra enter to turn the entire drawing into a cutting edge (objects dont highlight
though!).

36) More Trim/Extend:

Shift key to switch between Trim and Extend and Edgemode

37) Fast Corners using Shift in FILLET command

Use the Shift option in the FILLET command to quickly square off corners (no need to set
the radius to 0)

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38) FILTERS command

Go directly to the undocumented FILTERS command to quickly delete excess layer filters.

System Variables:

39) PEDITACCEPT
Set PEDITACCEPT to 1 to avoid the irritating Do you want to turn it into a polyline
question.

40) OSNAPZ to replace Z Value with Current Elevation

When snapping to objects with different elevations, you may want the current elevation to
be used for the Z value. Set OSNAPZ to 1.

41) PLINEGEN - Sets how linetype patterns generate around the vertices of a 2D polyline.

42) WHIPARC to 1 for smooth arcs and circles (forget dealing with VIEWRES!)

43) SELECTIONANNODISPLAY
Set to 0 to turn off ghosting with annotative objects

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OPTIONS Tips:

44) Default Template File for QNEW

Use the Files tab to set a default template file for starting new drawings. This will eliminate
you needing to select a template file each time (use the NEW command if you want to
select a different template file).

45) Right Click Customization

Configure your right mouse button to do BOTH a shortcut menu and an enter in OPTIONS
(user preferences tab)

46) Speed up drawings with Annotative Scaling

Turn off Maintain Visual Fidelity while you are drawing. Turn it back on right before
saving to a lower release number.

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Display Order:

47) TEXTTOFRONT command

Bring all of the text to the top of the draworder with the TEXTTOFRONT command.

48) HATCHTOBACK command

Sends all hatch patterns to the bottom of the draworder
.

Table Tips:
49) AutoFill AutoCAD Tables
Use AutoFill to do automatic numbering in Tables.

50) Tables wrap automatically over multiple columns (as long as Table Breaks are
enabled)

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Misc. Tips:
51) Control the Text Sample string with MTJIGSTRING

52) Fade External References (by default they are faded by 70% in 2011)
XDWGFADECTL

53) Use OSNAP Tracking to quickly find the center of a box

(in fact use Object Snap Tracking to make your life much better period!)

54) BURST to explode blocks with Attributes and maintain their attribute value (not definition)

55) Reverse Search for Xrefs

In Design Center, Use the Search tool to do a reverse search for drawing files that are
xrefd into other files.

56) The Magical QDIM command

Use for speedy dimensioning!

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Zooming Tips
57) Zoomwheel
Controls the direction of the Scroll Wheel for zooming in and out

58) Zoomfactor
Controls the speed of the mouse wheel (3 to 100) undo doesnt work on ZOOMFACTOR

59) VTOPTIONS
top secret command that controls the transition speed of zooms (or whether or not there is
a transition)

60) Turn your mouse into a Joy Stick with Ctrl+Wheel

61) Double Click for Zoom Extents

Keys, Keys, Keys

62) Control+R to cycle through all of your viewports

63) Control+A to select all the objects in your drawing

64) Tab to cycle through object snaps

65) Hold down right mouse button to clear grips

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66) Visit my blog: www.autodesk.com/lynnallen

67) Go to Autodesk University 2011!

Visit Autodesk University Online to view my other 30 tips!

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