This year we have teamed up with Packt Publishing to organize a contest of its newly published book on AutoCAD.

5 lucky winners stand a chance to win digital copies of the book (e-book). Keep reading to find out how you can be one of the Lucky Winners.

Book Overview

What you will learn in this book:

1. Learn how to create basic 3D shapes and models
2. View and navigate 3D models
3. Apply user coordinate systems to define workplanes
4. Create 3D models from 2D drawings
5. Apply 3D basic shapes and modify 3D models
6. Master AutoCAD Lighting and materials effects
7. Obtain information from 3D models, like volumes and inertias
8. Create photorealistic images of your 3D models

How to Enter?

All you need to do is click this link to head over to the book page here and look through the product description. Read about the book description and contents.

Write in the comment below this post to let us know what interests you the most about this book. It’s that simple!

The winners will be chosen randomly.

Deadline

The contest will close on 23 June 2013 at 24:00 Central Time. And the winners will be announced on 24 June 2013. Time is limited, so hurry up if you want to join the giveaway!

Winners will be contacted by email, so be sure to use your real email address* when you comment! Hurry up as you could be one of the few lucky ones to get yourself a free e-book of the latest released title.

*Comment only using name and email, don’t login using facebook/twitter or other network.

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Someone asked me if it’s possible to have the offset result is chamfered or filleted at the corners. The answer is yes. It’s not in the command’s option at command line. There is no option dialog box where you can change it. You need to change it in system variable.

The system variable that is responsible for this is OFFSETGAPTYPE.

The default value is 0. Offset will fill the result’s gap by extending lines.

If you change the value to 1, then the gap is completed by adding fillet.

The value 2 will complete the gap with chamfer.

See the image below to see how it works.

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Autodesk is currently working with Project M3D. They will release the beta version soon. If you are interested to try involve, you can sign up now.

Project M3D allows you to open and edit 3D models, create 3D views, markup and share the markup.

Autodesk 360 mobile apps allows you to view 3D models in Autodesk 360. But you can only view the model. This mobile app can do further.

Just like you, I haven’t tried it yet because the beta isn’t released yet. If you sign up now, you will be notified when you can use the beta.

You can read more about the beta project here.

Don’t forget to provide feedback. That’s the purpose of beta project: they want to know what you think!

Go sign up here.

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© giadophoto – Fotolia.com

Autodesk has changed download method for 2014 product trial. Some products only have ‘install now’ option. You can’t download the installer media and install it on several machines. If you need to install it on 5 machines, then you need to download it 5 times. This actually make sense. If you want to try a software, then you will install it on one machine or two. Not on a dozen of computers. Install now will only download necessary files, not the whole installation media.

For example, you want to install AutoCAD 2014 64Bit. Using install now method will only download 64Bit files, with necessary prerequisites and components. Let’s say you already have necessary prerequisites installed. You already have materials library installed. This option will not download those files during installation.

It sounds ideal, isn’t it? Probably in a perfect world. However, many have problem using this method.

Another issue that you should aware in media delivery: some suites physical media doesn’t have 32Bit inside. Check the product list here.

32Bit is supported (not all products – see your software system requirement), but the physical media only have 64Bit inside it. You need to download the 32Bit media. If you need to install it on several machines, install now obviously not a good option.

Let’s explore all download options so you can choose what’s best you.

Download methods explained

Is there any other method we can use, if the install now option doesn’t work?

Certainly. Autodesk has 3 methods: download now, browser download and install now. You can choose which method you want to use in subscription center.

My favorite option is browser download, the traditional method. It is so far the most reliable for me. I use download manager software, so I can continue the download anytime. It allows me to control the bandwidth usage as well.

See the differences between those download methods here.

Unfortunately, if you are not on subscription your option is limited. As I mentioned before, free trial page only have install now option.

Download using virtual agent

There is one more place you can download your media: you can use virtual agent.

Go to Autodesk customer service page here. Find the virtual agent link as shown below. Click the ask button.

You will see a pop-up window. If you don’t see it, check your internet browser pop-up blocker.

If you want to download new product, click ‘Downloading New/Updated products’.

The only method offered by virtual agent is browser download.

Downloading older version in virtual agent

Subscription customer don’t have to worry about this. They can download it from subscription center. But what if you are not on subscription? If you lost your installation media, can you download the older version?

You can also download older media from virtual agent. Click ‘Downloading and Installation’ to find your media. However, it only offer 3 versions older than current. Now we have 2014 products, so you can only download 2013, 2012 and 2011.

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That question is obviously come from AutoCAD users. Revit doesn’t have plot styles. But certainly, we can control how the objects to appear when we plot.

Object styles

Objects in Revit is controlled by object styles. You can access object styles in Manage tab, Settings panel.

As you can see below, in object styles dialog box you can control the line properties.

For example, railing is drawn with black line and solid line pattern. It will be shown with line weight 1 in projection. And 2 when cut.

Visibility/Graphics Overrides

We can override object styles for specific views. We can do this with visibility/graphic overrides.

You can access this tool in view tab, graphic panel. Or default shortcut for this tool is VG.

If you set any value here, then your view will use it instead of object styles.

Filters

Filter is another way how you can override object appearance. It has higher priority than object styles and visibility/graphics override.

It means, doesn’t matter how you set object styles and visibility graphic overrides. If you override settings in filter, then your view will use it instead.

About filters

You can set a common property for filter. By using filter, you are not limited to a specific object. For example, you can set properties for interior walls, doors, and stairs at once. As long as they have common property, you can set it in filter.

In this example, you can see common property for those objects is function.

It means only interior wall and stairs will be included. Exterior walls and stairs are not. You can create filters from view tab, graphic panel.

In this sample, the filter rule is set for function: interior. You can set 2 more conditions if necessary.

Overriding filters visibility

After you define your filters, you can override the visibility. It’s also in Visibility/Graphics Overrides, in filters tab.

Click add to add filter to the list, and change the properties as necessary.

View templates

View templates is the highest priority, since Revit 2013. View templates can store visibility settings for your view. Once you have it set, you can apply it to views you want to. By having templates, you can set the visibility only once. You don’t need to change properties for each view.

If you apply view template to a view, all filters override will be removed. And visibility/graphics override is greyed out. You are no longer able to change it.

Read more about view templates here.

Changing line weight

Now we know how we can set object visibility in Revit, including the line weight. But how do we set the line weight for plotting? Revit only has integer number, not real plot thickness.

You can see and change the plot thickness in ribbon> Manage tab> Settings panel> Additional Settings> Line Weights.

As you can see above, line weight 1 will be plotted 0.18 mm or 0.10 mm. Depends on the view scale.

It’s not difficult, isn’t it?

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This is a floor plan. The exhaust block has specification information. They all are stored in attributes.

By having the information stored in block, we can extract the data later. Using data extraction, you can create schedule very quickly.

Now if you already have many blocks in AutoCAD drawing, editing the attributes can be tedious and prone to error. It would be easier to edit the attributes in table, isn’t it?

Export the attributes data

You can edit the attributes in Microsoft Excel. To do that, first you need to export the data from AutoCAD. You can use ATTOUT command.

Or you can access it in express tools tab, blocks panel.

ATTOUT and ATTIN are part of express tools command. If you don’t have it installed on your computer, then you can’t use it.

export attributes will ask you to define a file name (in .txt format) and select objects to export.

Editing the attributes

You can edit the file using notepad. But it may not be convenient. It would be more convenient to edit it in Microsoft Excel. And further more, you can use formula if the attribute should be calculated value.

You can open txt file in Excel and edit there.

Open Microsoft Excel, then open file. You can’t double click from Windows Explorer.

Change the file type to Text Files or All Files to see your exported file.

Click open. You will see import wizard. You can click Next to review the import settings. Or just click finish to accept default settings.

Usually default settings would be fine. Now you can edit the values.

DO NOT edit the handle column. It’s the block ID. If you change it, it might not imported properly.

After you finished, save the file. You may see warning because you are working in txt format. Just click yes, because we want to keep it in that format.

Importing the values

You might already guess the next step. Yes, you can import the value after finish editing.

You can use import attributes or ATTIN.

Command: ATTIN

Reading the input file… Done.
10 Block inserts modified.

This is very handy if you work with many blocks in your drawing. Editing block attributes in drawing would take a lot of time.

Now, what do you think you can do with it?

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There are some enhancements/extensions missing from subscription center. I read in Revit extension readme, that some extensions will be available in Autodesk Exchange apps store.

I tried to search some extensions I’ve used in the past. And yes, now they are available too. So these extensions are available for public download?

Unfortunately no. Autodesk put them in Exchange app store, but they are still only available for subscription customers. As you can see in Revit extensions below, it clearly states that these are only available for subscribers.

Interestingly, I found this ‘subscriber only’ type of licensing is only for Revit extensions. Autodesk did release extensions for AutoCAD and Inventor, but all of them are free.

Obviously, Autodesk want to promote Exchange app store further. I won’t be surprised if they move all extensions there.

If you haven’t visited it yet, do it now. There are many great free extensions. And of course, there are also extensions that require you to purchase it.

Visit Exchange Apps store here.

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Uninstalling Autodesk 360 reported to cause some issues with properties palette in AutoCAD 2013 and 2013.

To prevent Autodesk 360 installation

You need to copy your whole installation media to your hard drive. Or you can work with deployment.

Find setup.ini file, open it with notepad. Find this line below:

POSTREQUISITE=ACAD_PSPACK;ADSYNC;ACADSKETCHUPIMPORT

Delete ADSYNC, so you get

POSTREQUISITE=ACAD_PSPACK;ACADSKETCHUPIMPORT

You can also remove ACADSKETCHUPIMPORT if you don’t want to install SketchUp import plugin. Save the file and close it.

Now you can use this media in your hard drive for installation.

Credit to:

• Mike Burke who originally share the tip.
• Jason Piercey for posting this in Autodesk forum. You may want to read the original post for more details and join the discussion.

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