Sheet set is a neat way to organize your drawings in a project. You can get the advantages of Sheet Set properties by having additional fields. And don’t forget that it’s easy to send part of your projects (in a sub set) with e-transmit. It is also easy to plot all the drawings at once.

I was thinking to create a list to the videos, unfortunately I haven’t got the time to search her blog for them. Luckily, Jimmy Bergmark managed to compile the video links on his blog.

If you want to see the list, you can find the list here: Sheet Set Manager for AutoCAD LT videos.

If you want to learn about Sheet set in details, you can also purchase our e-book: Document management with AutoCAD Sheet Set.

However, sometimes defining attribute value for each block can backfire to us. If we want to add many information to an object, we need to input data several times. For each block. If we have dozens or hundreds of blocks, using attributes and data extraction like this may not increasing our productivity, but reducing it.

If you have this condition:

1. The information are common for object with the same ID/part number.
2. We need to update attribute value regularly. It doesn’t make sense if we need to edit attribute value for each block, does it?

If that’s your situation, you can link AutoCAD data extraction to Microsoft Excel as external data. We only need to have one attribute as identifier in our block, then link it to a column in Excel.

It means we can have objects data separately, and link our drawings to that file. When we need to update the data, we only need to update it on Excel file. Then simply update the data extraction tables on our drawings.

Let’s see how we can use it.

Note: You need to have Microsoft Excel installed on your computer to use this feature

Preparing Excel file

Let’s prepare an Excel file. You need to have one column to match to an attribute in your block. In this example, I have door types, their prices, and several more data. I will use door types in my block as attribute. This value shouldn’t change regularly (unless I change its type). But door price can change often, right?

You may give style to your Excel file, like borders if you need to. It won’t affect linking data to AutoCAD.

Preparing AutoCAD block

Now let’s check our block. You need to have at least one block attribute to match the column in Excel. Here, I only have one attribute. I put other data in my Excel file. But you may have more attributes as necessary.

After you save your block, you can place it to your drawings.

Using data extraction

After you’ve done with the preparation and finish with your drawing, we can start using data extraction. Use it as usual (refer to this post as mentioned previously, if you’ve never done it before). When you get to 5th page (refine data) stop and follow steps below.

Linking data extraction to Excel file

In 5th page, you can see preview of your data extraction. Find link external data button on the right bottom of this dialog. Click it.

If you already link your drawing to an Excel file, you can choose the data link here. Since we haven’t create it, we need to create it first. Click launch data link manager in this dialog.

Create a data link to your Excel file. Give it a unique name and browse to file we prepared before. It should be straightforward. But in case you have problem, follow this tutorial from Donnie Gladfelter.

After you finish, we are back to link external data dialog. Now your data link should be defined as source (1).

Match your attribute to your Excel column (2). You can try to check if your data are matched correctly.

You can choose which column in Excel you want to include or exclude in this report (3).

Click OK. You should see additional column in your preview. You can see column header for external data showing linked symbol.

Arrange the column as necessary and place table on your drawing (or external file). Very nice, isn’t it?

If you have a problem setting external file as described above, you can see this nice video by Donnie Gladfelter: http://youtu.be/QLGoxHMg8Zw.

Updating value in table

What if value in your Excel file changed? Unfortunately data link is not updated automatically. We have to update it manually.

After your data changed, you need to select your table, right click, then choose update table data links from contextual menu.

You can use DATALINKUPDATE from command line

Another trick to automatically update data link every time you open AutoCAD drawing is to put DATALINKUPDATE in your acaddoc.lsp. I will cover about it later.

Do you think external data will be useful? How you do you think you can use it?

Ellen Finkelstein has released updated book of AutoCAD Bible. She’s a senior AutoCAD book author, and an advanced AutoCAD user.

This is my first time reading this book. And I’m impressed on how many topics she’s covered. Her expertise is expressed in her book very well.

This book is different with other books I’ve read before. Very interesting book… very thorough.

She started it with quick start, new users can quickly have the feel of using AutoCAD properly. Then Ellen started to cover almost every capabilities of AutoCAD 2012. The quick start section can encourage users to learn more, and not getting bored with details.

Not only new users can have benefits using this book, advanced AutoCAD users can also learn many new things here. (I never knew there are cylindrical and spherical coordinates until I read this book).

What’s inside the book

The book covers everything about 2D drawings, 3D drawings, and customization (includes AutoLISP and .NET programming!). She covers 2D and 3D tools in details, introduce you several ways to complete a task. And she gives you the basic of AutoCAD programming with AutoLISP and .NET.

You can see table of contents and sample chapter on this product page on Amazon.

Now I understand why she chose to name it AutoCAD Bible. It has everything you need to know about AutoCAD. A good start to explore every AutoCAD capabilities.

If you want to learn creating your own line types, shape files and fonts, macro, AutoLISP, even .NET programming you can find them here. Very useful!

Who’s this book for

It’s suitable for active new users who like to explore new things by themselves. And I also believe this book will be very useful for intermediate (and even advanced) users who want to explore more AutoCAD capabilities.

How to get the book

If you want the book, you should be able to find it on local book store, or order your copy from Amazon here.

You can see how it works from nice animation from alanjt.

image by: alanjt from CADTutor

Still doesn’t work?

So how it works?

Activate line/polyline

Activate parallel object snap

I thought we need to pick object/point after we activate the object snap. Just like when we’re working with other Osnaps. But no! You only need to hover above the line to make it as reference.

You should see the snap icon at your pointer.

Now move away your pointer until you see the rubber band line.

You can click a point to create the parallel line now.

I know it’s quite basic. But you might need it.

The materials you created is stored in AutoCAD library, not in your DWG file. So when you open other files, or create a new one, then they are still available. The question is, what if you want to save them and open in in other workstation?

There are two ways how you can do it: using tool palettes or saving them in materials library.

One thing you must remember when you use those two methods, you must make sure the image patterns are accessible for those computers. So if you use images from D:\material_maps then you must copy them too on the same location for the other computer.

Or a better way probably share them in a shared folder in your network.

Using AutoCAD tool palettes

Tool palettes has the ability to save the materials settings. Try to drag a rendering material to your palette, then see it’s properties.

You can even change the properties in this palette!

We can put the materials we want to export here, then export the palette. You can save the palette to .xtp file, then import it in other computer.

After you import it, you can access them!

If you’re working in networked environment, you can consider to share the tool palette and let all users in your office access it. See how you can share tool palettes here.

Using AutoCAD material libraries

Materials are saved in material libraries. You can create a new material library and save it to a shared location or in your computer.

Open your materials browser, click manage at the bottom left of the browser. Choose create new library from the dropdown menu.

You may want to save it in location that you can remember easily. Such as d:\material_libraries. The file extension is .adsklib.

You will  see the new library in your browser. Arrange your materials in the libraries. You can also arrange them based on categories. After you are done, copy the .adsklib files and open it in the other computer. If you save it in a shared location, then you can simply open it.

Now you can see them on your other computer!

Which one should you use?

Tool palettes and material library both give you easy access to your AutoCAD rendering materials. Which one you should use is really depends on your habit. If you prefer using tool palettes, then use it.

The important thing you should consider is using networked environment. There are several benefits accessing them from a shared location:

1. All users will see the same library, if the CAD manager add new materials or make changes, all users will see the modifications instantly.
2. You only need to manage one library, either you’re using tool palettes or material library. If you have dozens of users, then you don’t have to manage dozens of libraries.

In my personal opinion, Autodesk introduce named plot styles (stb) for it’s vertical products. We know that many applications today using AutoCAD as a platform. STB extends the capabilities and simpler to manage. Imagine if you have to manage the line thickness in AutoCAD Architecture based on object colors. You will have to use less colors in your 3D model (we usually use about 5 line weights, I never see more than 10). Or define many colors in plot styles tables. Either way, using color might be confusing in 3D.

However, if you only using AutoCAD for 2D drafting, color-dependent maybe more comfortable. Our eyes will quickly see (imagine) lines thickness by color.

If you want to compare them further, read this CTB and STB comparison by Mark Kiker.

Most AutoCAD users are already familiar with color-dependent (CTB). In this post, we will see how STB works.

Creating new STB

Let’s try to create a new plot style. You can create an STB file using Manage Plot Styles. You can access it from AutoCAD application menu> print> manage plot styles.

This will open a folder. Double click add-a-plot style table wizard shortcut.

This wizard will help you to create your STB. Let’s see the wizard pages:

1. This is an introduction page. You may want to read it, or just click next to see the next page.
2. Begin page. You can choose to import existing plot styles or pen tables. Let’s just use start from scratch for now. Click next
3. In the 3rd page, you can choose to use color style or named style. Choose named plot style table. Click next.
4. This wizard asks you for the style name. Give it a proper name like ‘my standard’ or ‘my company standard’. Click next.
5. We are now on the last page. We can edit the plot style table now, but let’s just click finish.

Now you should see the STB file in the folder.

Modifying STB

Let’s modify the plot style table. Double click my standard.stb (or whatever your STB file name is).

You can modify the table in table view or form view tab. They are the same, just choose the one that comforts you. I prefer to see it in form view.

We have one style already: normal. You can’t edit or delete normal style. Use it if you want to use object properties for plotting. They are all set to ‘use object properties’.

Create new styles

To create a new styles, click add style.

Creating style is pretty straight forward. We create a new style, give it a name to identify it, then define the plot properties. For example: I want to plot the object with thin line, I can give it name ‘thin – 0.10 mm’. I want it thick, I give it name: thick. That’s why we call it named plot style. You can give it a name we can recognize easily.

For each named plot style, you can set different properties. The properties are exactly the same with color-dependent plot styles. If you already familiar with plot style, you shouldn’t have a problem to set it.

Click save & close after you finish defining your styles.

As you can see, if we use 5 different lineweight, we only need to define 5 plot styles. But if you use color-dependent, you have to define the properties for each color.

Applying styles

Now that we have the STB, how do we use it? AutoCAD treat those two differently.

1. You have to choose one of them, STB or CTB.
2. You can’t use them both for one file.
3. However, you can convert from CTB to STB plot style or vice versa.

So now we need to create a new AutoCAD drawing file using STB.

Creating a new file

To create an AutoCAD file that use STB, you have to select proper template. It should be obvious when you see the available templates.

What if you already have drawings that use CTB? You can convert the plot styles. Read how to convert plot styles by Kate Morrical here.

Attaching plot style table

Now we can attach the plot style table to our file. The easiest way to do it is using properties palette. You know how to open it right? Press [ctrl] + 1.

When no object is selected, find your STB file and change it to your table. You can do it in model space or layout.

Another way to do this is using plot dialog or page setup. This method will also update plot style table in properties palette. I prefer to use it in page setup.

Using STB

Now we already ‘tell’ AutoCAD that our file is using my standard.stb. How can we apply them to layers? To object properties? It’s simple.

In layer manager, you can set it for each layer in plot style column. You can define each layer’s plot style there.

If you want to override the plot style to specific object, you can select the object and change it in properties palette.

Show lineweight on AutoCAD display

The downside of using STB is it’s hard to distinguish which object is thicker. We can activate show lineweight, but it’s not easy to see the difference.

All the lines below has different lineweight. But we can only see the difference for the 3rd line. We draw them in black, make it harder to see the difference. It will be easier to see the difference if we use different color, right?

Which plot style table we should use?

It depends on your needs. Vertical products (like AutoCAD Architecture) already define the thickness based on objects. There’re not many objects to handle. They are all defined in object styles. But when we draw them manually, it can be more difficult.

I still prefer to use color-dependent when I use AutoCAD as drafting tool. I can quickly tell if I draw in wrong layer. Sure we can define many layers with different color. But if we need to use so many colors, then using STB will not give any advantage over color-dependent.

However, if you customize your tools (using palettes, LISP, or other customization), using STB can be easier.

If you already use them both, which one do you prefer? Why do you choose it, is it because your workflow? Or because your company use it?

So Why Would We Need to Move/Rotate Our Coordinate?

1. Working on angled coordinate/object.
   UCS (user coordinate system) icon is showing you X axis and Y axis, an the origin. As you know, we input the point coordinate base on those axis. When we need to draw angled object in AutoCAD, in some cases it would be easier if we rotate the coordinate temporarily.
2. Working on local coordinate.
   Surveyor often need to work with local coordinate, but they may not mess up with the global coordinate. In AutoCAD, we can consider World Coordinate System (WCS) as global coordinate and User Coordinate System (UCS) as local coordinate.

*What a coincidence. When I’m thinking about this post, Autodesk release a video on YouTube: tip to work on angled portion of your drawing.

How We Can Control the Coordinate System?

In the old days, we type UCS [enter] and choose the options. We still can do it now, but if you are not command line big fan, you may want to use the ribbon panel. Go to view tab, coordinates panel. All the options are here.

The tools on first row, are used to move, save, or reset coordinate system to world coordinate system (WCS).

On the second row, you can use the tools to rotate AutoCAD coordinate system using coordinate axis. Except the last one, the one with the light bulb is for turning UCS icon on or off.

The last row, there are tools that you can use to quickly aligned the coordinate by view, object, or picking 3 points.

Try to see AutoCAD extended tool tip to see more explanation.

Examples

Aligned Objects

Let us see the building footprint below.

Let’s say we need to draw the interior, parking lot and more objects to complete the AutoCAD drawing. It would be easier to rotate the coordinate system to complete the job. In this example, I use object and pick a line in the drawing.

As you can see, the UCS icon is now moved and aligned to the top most line (I pick that line).

Now when we create rectangle, linear dimensions, etc it will be aligned to the current UCS orientation. And don’t forget, ortho mode and polar tracking also using the XY axis! Try to create linear dimension and see how it works.

Rotating View

Still find it difficult? Many of us prefer to work with the object aligned to our screen. No problem. After you rotate the UCS, now you can set the viewpoint preset. Type VP then [enter], you should see the dialog below. Or using DDVPOINT command also works.

Change the viewing angles option to relative to UCS. And change the from X Axis to 0.

Click OK. You should see now the view rotated!

Don’t you think this is much easier than working on rotated object? When you need to restore the view, open the view point presets dialog again, and choose absolute to WCS. Click OK. To restore coordinate system, click world coordinate on ribbon (the one with the earth globe)

Using Local Coordinates

Sometimes you need to draw or annotate relative to local coordinate and not to world coordinate. You surveyors should familiar with this. If you are in manufacturing industry, you probably need to annotate part/assembly coordinates, or holes coordinates. In Architecture drawing, you may need to annotate the elevation view.

This example, shows a rough elevation view (yes it’s bad and lazy drawing, I know), but the elevation level is not showing correctly. The bottom red line should be at 0,00 elevation. It’s because ordinate dimension use 0,0 as origin. We need to move the origin before create the ordinate dimension.

So after we restore the UCS to World coordinate, the dimension will use the world coordinate value? Nope. See below. The right dimensions was created in word coordinate. The left dimensions on local coordinate. The value never changed even we move the UCS around to new places.

So how do you use UCS to increase drawing productivity? Is there any other tips you want to share with us?

There will be time you need to modify your objects. It might because you make a mistake, or because sometimes it’s easier and faster you modify them later. Let us see the tools we can use to modify the objects.

You can find the tools in AutoCAD ribbon, home tab>modify panel. There are many tools you will see here. Most of the tool name are self-explanatory. Like several previous posts, I will not describe each tool. You can always get the tool description by moving your pointer above the tool. Wait a little longer, then you will get more detailed description.

What I want to emphasize here, is how we use AutoCAD modify tools. There are several possibilities of what you will see after activating a modify tool. Most basic modification tools will ask you to select objects to modify. And sometimes the tool will also ask you to define point coordinates. Some other tools will ask you several more options.

Let us try several AutoCAD modify tool.

Copy/Move

Try to activate copy or move tool.

Command: _copy
Select objects: 1 found

Select objects:
Current settings:  Copy mode = Multiple
Specify base point or [Displacement/mOde] <Displacement>: Specify second point
or <use first point as displacement>: 700

Specify second point or [Exit/Undo] <Exit>:

• After you activate the copy tool, AutoCAD will ask you to select objects you want to modify. There are many ways that you can use to select objects in AutoCAD drawing. The basic way to do it is by clicking each object you want to modify, or create a rectangular selection.
• Next question is the tool option. Of course the option will be different for each tool. Try them or read the documentation for more details.
• The last thing you need to do is defining the reference points to place the duplicate object.

All three question is the common steps you need to go through when you use modify tools.

Scale

Now let us try scale tool.

Command: _scale
Select objects: Specify opposite corner: 1 found

Select objects:
Specify base point:
Specify scale factor or [Copy/Reference]: 2

Scale tool will ask you to select object, define the base point, then the scale factor. Very similar steps with copy, right?

Array

Now array. Array is a little different. Not like most modify tool, it use dialog box.

Rectangular array have several options, and select object button. But it doesn’t require you to define a point. However, polar array does need you to define the center point of array.

Summary

Basically you need to select objects, change some settings, and define points. Not necessarily all of them, but most of the modify tool do. We will do some exercise later. In the mean time, try the modify tools by yourself to get familiar with them.

Noun-verb vs Verb-noun selection

I’m not really sure about this, but I guess the default workflow to modify object in AutoCAD is using verb-noun selection. You activate the tool, then select the objects. However, you can also select your object first, then activate the tool. This is a default workflow in most Windows applications: noun-verb selection.