Tip Archives - Page 3 of 4

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2011, Bug, Cloud, Customer Service, Customisation, Development, Other Autodesk Products, Subscription, Tip, Web Stuff

Filling the holes in Autodesk’s CHM Help stopgap

By Steve Johnson 7 May 2010, 1:18 pm 7 May 2010 itemprop="discussionURL"6

It was good to see Autodesk react to criticism of AutoCAD 2011’s browser-based Help with an acknowledgement of the problems and an attempt to provide a workaround by making a zip file of CHM files available for download. That’s much better than ignoring people’s concerns, denying the validity of those concerns or shooting the messenger, which has been known to happen in the past. However, there are some holes in the workaround, only some of which can be filled. Under 64-bit Windows 7, the Search pane is blank, as it is in the CHM Help for earlier releases on that platform. This …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2011, Customisation, Nostalgia, Tip

AutoCAD 2011 – Putting things back to “normal”

By Steve Johnson 25 March 2010, 9:17 pm 25 March 2010 itemprop="discussionURL"137

Edit: If you’re running a more recent release of AutoCAD, have a look at the post AutoCAD 2017 – Putting things back to “normal” instead. Easily the most popular post on this blog, in terms of both hits and comments, is AutoCAD 2009 – Putting things back to “normal”. Not too far behind it is AutoCAD 2010 – Putting things back to “normal”. Apparently, lots of people find these posts useful, so here’s an updated version for the latest release. Some of this post is based on the originals, but there are significant additions and differences in this year’s Luddite …

AutoCAD, Cadalyst, Other Blogs, Tip

AutoCAD tip – which drawings use an xref?

By Steve Johnson 15 March 2010, 10:42 pm 15 March 2010 itemprop="discussionURL"5

Here’s a tip I just rediscovered while cleaning out my old emails. It applies to all recent AutoCAD releases. Let’s say you have a drawing that you think has been used as an xref by at least one other drawing, and maybe more. How can you find out which drawings use it as an xref? First, turn on DesignCenter. You can do this with Tools > Palettes > DesignCenter, the ADCENTER command, or Ctrl+2. Pick on the Search button at the top (the magnifying glass thingy). In the Search dialogue box, change the “Look for” item to Xrefs (but have …

Other Blogs, Tip, Web Stuff

Repost – how to get your picture next to your comment

By Steve Johnson 15 March 2010, 5:11 pm 15 March 2010 itemprop="discussionURL"3

This is a revisit of a post I made about a year ago. You may have noticed that some people’s comments have an avatar picture next to them (no, not the film with the Roger Dean visuals), while others have a randomly assigned pattern. On this blog, the avatar picture is a gravatar (globally recognised avatar), and you can have one too. Once you set it up, you will find that it works in all sorts of places, not just this blog. Some other blogs may use other avatar standards, though. Here’s how to do it: Visit gravatar.com and pick …

AutoCAD, Tip

Quick and dirty clicks and drags in AutoCAD

By Steve Johnson 12 March 2010, 2:19 pm 12 March 2010 itemprop="discussionURL"12

I’m sure most of you draw your objects with great precision. But sometimes even the most precise among us may want to make a quick and dirty move or copy of some drawing objects and are not too bothered about the exact place they end up. Text, for example. As always in AutoCAD, there are many ways of doing this. Long-termers like me may automatically gravitate towards the short-form commands for Move and Copy, but there are various alternatives. In this post I’m going to cover the click-and-drag method. This isn’t grip editing; although you will see grips appear when …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2011, Autodesk, Customer Service, Nostalgia, Other Autodesk Products, Spin, Subscription, Tip

AutoCAD does a Cheshire Cat

By Steve Johnson 19 February 2010, 3:06 pm 19 February 2010 itemprop="discussionURL"4

In Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the Cheshire Cat gradually disappears until nothing is left but its smile. The AutoCAD packaging has done the same thing over the years until now nothing is left but the 0s and 1s. In Release 13, one box was not enough to keep all the materials, but Autodesk gradually slimmed it down until in recent years your slab of upgrade or Subscription cash gets you nothing but a DVD in a case (with or without a pack of cards). However, you can go cap in hand to Autodesk and ask for a real manual of …

AutoCAD, Autodesk, Bug, LISP, Tip

AutoCAD virus protection update

By Steve Johnson 14 August 2009, 5:29 pm 14 August 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"3

As I mentioned in my last post, I had some reservations about the code provided by Autodesk to deal with suspect acad.vlx and logo.gif files. Based on a suggestion from Jimmy Bergmark, I have written my own, safer version which you can download here: clean_virus_safe.lsp. The comments at the top of the clean_virus_safe.lsp file explain what to do with it, but I will reproduce some of the relevant points here. Purpose: Checks for existence of acad.vlx and logo.gif files, which are associated with virus AL/Logo-A, also known as ACAD/Unexplode, ACAD/Agent.A or ACM_UNEXPLODE.B. Written as a safer alternative to Autodesk’s code …

AutoCAD, Autodesk, Bug, LISP, Other Blogs, Tip

Another AutoCAD malware warning

By Steve Johnson 10 August 2009, 4:58 pm 10 August 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"2

Shaan Hurley has posted some useful information about another AutoCAD-based virus that is doing the rounds, and I strongly suggest you read it. However, I have some reservations about the solution that is posted there and in the Autodesk knowledgebase. The LISP code suggested will delete any files called acad.vlx or logo.gif that are located in the current user’s current AutoCAD search path. There are a couple of problems with that. The search path will change depending on the user, the profile, the startup folder and the drawing folder. That means you can’t just use the code once and expect …

AutoCAD, Other Blogs, Tip

AutoCAD malware warning

By Steve Johnson 9 July 2009, 10:08 am 9 July 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"0

There is a piece of malware out there written as an ObjectARX application, i.e. it will only affect AutoCAD users. It’s a China-based adware client, which Andrew Brandt at the Webroot threat blog has named Trojan-Pigrig. For full details, see here. Also, see here for AutoCAD-specific advice from the AutoCAD support team at the Without a Net blog.

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2010, Other Autodesk Products, Tip

AutoCAD 2010 – Putting things back to “normal”

By Steve Johnson 16 June 2009, 12:44 pm 16 June 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"106

Edit: If you’re running a more recent release of AutoCAD, have a look at the post AutoCAD 2017 – Putting things back to “normal” instead. Easily the most popular post on this blog, in terms of both hits and comments, is AutoCAD 2009 – Putting things back to “normal”. Lots of people seemed to find it useful, so I guess it’s worth doing an updated sequel for the current release. Much of this post is the same as the original, but there are differences. Note: there are updated versions of this post for AutoCAD 2011 and 2012. One thing that’s …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2000, AutoCAD 2007, AutoCAD 2008, AutoCAD 2009, AutoCAD 2010, Bug, Interoperability, Tip

AutoCAD’s magic vanishing attachments

By Steve Johnson 30 April 2009, 10:36 pm 30 April 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"1

There are now quite a few file types that you can attach to an AutoCAD drawing as a reference, in the same way that you can attach other drawings as xrefs. We’ve been able to attach other drawings since Release 11 (1990) and images since Release 14 (1997), but every release since 2007 has introduced a new kind of attachment. In AutoCAD 2010, you can now also attach PDFs, MicroStation DGNs (v7 and v8), DWF and DWFx files. But should you? Maybe not. It depends who is going to use those drawings after you. If you know for certain that …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2007, Bug, Tip, TrueView

Older AutoCAD loses (part of) the plot

By Steve Johnson 23 February 2009, 11:58 am 23 February 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"26

I know there are plenty of people still using AutoCAD 2007 and earlier, so this bug warning may save some of you some grief. I have no idea how widespread or isolated this problem is, but under some circumstances I haven’t worked out yet, AutoCAD 2007 fails to plot all of certain dynamic blocks. Some attributes have a habit of being plot-shy. Even if you don’t use dynamic blocks yourself, you could receive a set of drawings, check them on-screen, approve them, plot them and send out paper drawings without all of their parts. Unless you’re carefully manually checking the …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2009, AutoCAD 2010, Customisation, Polls, Tip

AutoCAD 2010 – Will you miss the Menu Browser?

By Steve Johnson 20 February 2009, 2:48 pm 20 February 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"6

I’ve closed the poll that asked AutoCAD 2009 users about their MENUBAR setting. It’s very clear that pull-down menus are still very much in use in the Ribboned world of post-2008 AutoCAD. In AutoCAD 2009, an attempt was made to provide access to pull-down menus without sacrificing that strip of screen real estate. That attempt was called the Menu Browser, it was one of the thing you could find under the Big Red A, and it really didn’t work very well. In AutoCAD 2010, the Menu Browser has gone away. The A hasn’t gone away, just the ability to access …

Comments, Other Blogs, Tip, Web Stuff

Gravatars – how to get a picture next to your comment

By Steve Johnson 17 February 2009, 1:11 pm 17 February 2009 itemprop="discussionURL"4

After some recent site maintenance here, you may have noticed that the comments look a bit different, and that some people’s comments have a little picture next to them. This little picture is called a gravatar (globally recognised avatar), and you can have one too. Once you set it up, you will find that it works in all sorts of places, not just this blog. Here’s how to do it: Visit gravatar.com and pick a sign up link. Provide a valid email address; the same one you provide when adding comments to blogs. I have not received any spam as …

AutoCAD, Development, LISP, Tip

What is loaded at AutoCAD startup, and when?

By Steve Johnson 1 September 2008, 2:03 pm 1 September 2008 itemprop="discussionURL"23

Warning, CAD nerd stuff ahead. This is a long and technical post and if you’re using AutoCAD in a largely out-of-the-box state you probably won’t care about any of it. If your modification of AutoCAD extends beyond the trivial, you may find it useful to know what AutoCAD loads, and in what order things are loaded. It is possible for LISP files in particular to tread on each other’s toes, so knowing what gets loaded when can be useful information for diagnosing such clashes. This post aims to provide that information. It uses AutoCAD 2009 as an example, but the …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2009, Tip

AutoCAD 2009 – Ribbon content for Express Tools

By Steve Johnson 13 June 2008, 2:49 pm 13 June 2008 itemprop="discussionURL"0

One of the many unfinished aspects of the AutoCAD 2009 Ribbon is the lack of Express Tools content. One enterprising user has put the effort into correcting this, and has posted an Express Tools CUI replacement in this Autodesk newsgroup thread. I have not tested this myself. As usual with CUI, be paranoid. Back up everything before you touch anything. While I wouldn’t normally suggest you do any Ribbon custom work in 2009 in its current state, it shouldn’t hurt in this case as it should be easily redoable once Autodesk has fixed up the worst of the 2009 CUI …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2009, Bug, Tip

AutoCAD 2009 – Drawing integrity tip – urgent!

By Steve Johnson 5 May 2008, 8:50 pm 5 May 2008 itemprop="discussionURL"0

AutoCAD 2009 users, I strongly suggest you go and set the new system variable OPENPARTIAL to 0. Now. Why? Because if it’s set to the default value of 1, purging can be harmful to your drawings. I’ll fill in the details in a future Bug Watch column, but for now I suggest you just go and fix up that variable. It’s stored in the Registry, so you should only need to do it once unless you use multiple profiles, in which case you should do it once per profile.

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2009, Other Blogs, Tip

AutoCAD 2009 – Putting things back to normal revisited

By Steve Johnson 1 May 2008, 9:52 am 1 May 2008 itemprop="discussionURL"0

I see Lynn Allen has written a post explaining how to restore the “classic” interface. I commend Lynn for doing this in response to the requests she’s been receiving. It must be pretty painful for some people at Autodesk to see their Technical Evangelist showing people how to turn off AutoCAD 2009’s Big New Feature, but it’s absolutely the right thing for her to do. The worst thing Autodesk can do right now is go into denial mode, which has happened more than once in the past when users have reacted negatively to various things. This post from Lynn gives …

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2008, AutoCAD 2009, Bug, Other Blogs, Tip

The _XREF_XREF killer – update

By Steve Johnson 28 April 2008, 10:41 am 28 April 2008 itemprop="discussionURL"0

If you saw my post or Shaan Hurley’s post about this utility and grabbed it on or before 27 April, please go and grab it again. It’s been updated to fix a couple of bugs.

AutoCAD, AutoCAD 2008, AutoCAD 2009, Bug, Other Blogs, Tip

The _XREF_XREF killer

By Steve Johnson 25 April 2008, 9:45 pm 25 April 2008 itemprop="discussionURL"0

If you’re an AutoCAD 2008 user you probably already know what the title refers to. If not, you probably don’t need to know. If your drawings are afflicted, I suggest you hop over to Between the Lines, grab the scale list cleanup utility and start cleaning up. Although I’ve found that this utility works very well, paranoia is usually wise in computing so make sure you back up everything before you start! The utility is installed into the AutoCAD 2008 or 2009 main installation folder, and you can make a shortcut to the CleanupScales.exe file on your desktop if you …