Chapter 2 – Quick Start
• Create a new drawing
• Saving your work
• Switch between Layout Space and Model Space
• Draw some basic AutoCAD objects
• Toggle the Grid, Snap, Ortho and Polar Tracking settings on
and off
• Zoom around the drawing
• Examine and change object properties
• Create drawing layers and move objects from one layer to
another
• Make some basic modifications to the drawing.
• Add basic dimensions and annotation to your drawing
• Plot your drawing
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Drawing Template
Viewport
Objects
Rubber Band
Object Snaps / Osnaps
Orthographic / Ortho
Polar Tracking
Direct Distance Entry
Absolute Coordinate Entry
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Zooming
Properties
Freeze/Thaw
Dimension Style
Associativity
Building a Selection Set
Crossing Box
Grips
Page Setup
Use a Template
Templates may contain:
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Title blocks
Settings for text
Dimension settings
Plotting
Create your own
templates
• Save any drawing
as a template
Two distinct drawing environments:
• MODELSPACE is used for creating the geometry of your
drawing. Anything that exists in the physical world.
(Walls, Doors, Mechanical parts)
• PAPERSPACE is used for objects that would exist only on a
piece of paper.
(Annotation, Dimensions, Notes, Title blocks)
• When you create a drawing, you are placing AutoCAD objects
in the drawing.
• These objects include lines, arc, circles, text, etc
• Each type of object has a unique set of properties.
• AutoCAD will ask you to specify the various aspects of that
object.
• AutoCAD will prompt you for information at both the cursor
and the Command: line area.
• This is one place where AutoCAD communicates with you
• AutoCAD 2008 will display the command name in the command
line window and then prompt you for more information.
• The command line window is docked at the bottom of the drawing
area by default
• The command line window can be undocked and moved or can be
turned off completely.
This floating (Dynamic) command prompt moves with
your cursor and provides instant, dynamic feedback as
you move around the drawing.
The process you’ll follow when creating
drawing objects is:
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Select a tool
Read the Command: prompt
Pick points and answer prompts
Press <Enter> or <Esc> to end the command.
Object snaps include the endpoints and midpoints of
lines and arcs, the center and quadrant points of circles
and arcs, intersections points of multiple objects
Ortho will restrict the crosshair movement to either
horizontal or vertical movement.
POLAR toggle indicates when your crosshair is close to
a vertical or horizontal angle.
UNDO will take you back through your drawing session,
one command at a time.
REDO will move you forward, one command at a time,
until you’ve restored everything.
REDO can only be used immediately after using the
UNDO command.
SNAP setting simply locks your crosshair movement to a
predefined increment.
GRID is a visual display; it does not print and does not
control the cursor movement.
GRID and SNAP settings are set separately.
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Zoom Window
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Zoom Previous
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Zoom Extents
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Zoom Realtime
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Pan Realtime
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Zoom Scale
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Using the Wheel Mouse to Zoom
properties of an object
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layer
color
Linetype
radius of circle
height of text
Other properties
Layers give you a way to logically
group objects together
Each layer consists of:
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Name
Color
linetype
lineweight
on/off settings
Other Important Layer Options Include:
• Freeze and Thaw a Layer
• Lock and Unlock a Layer
Placing dimensions
DIMLINEAR
DIMDIAMETER
DIMBASELINE
Process for modifying objects:
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Select an editing tool
Specify which object(s) you want to modify
Read the Command: prompt
Specify points and answer prompts
Press <Enter > or <Esc> to end the command
Grips give you a quick way to modify objects
Grips appear when you select objects
Grips are located at strategic points on an object
There are five grip editing modes:
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Stretch
Move
Rotate
Scale
Mirror
Setting the Viewport Scale
Adjusting the Dimensions
Place Text
Settings for plotting:
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printer
paper size
orientation
margins
color settings
plot scale