CADRAF MT 01: Intro to AutoCAD

computer aided drafting

drawing or drafting with the aid of a computer and drawing application

drafting

the production of the drawings used to document design

autocad

program used to draft plans and technical drawings that are used to build things

drawing area

• where you will draw

• represents piece of paper

crosshair/cursor

• movement controlled by a mouse

• used to locate points, make selections, and draw objects

command line

• where you enter commands and prompt to put information

coordinate display: absolute mode

• coords = 1

• displays location of crosshair in reference to the origin

coordinate display: relative polar mode

• coords = 2

• displays the distance and angle of the cursor from the last point entered

status bar

displays current settings

user coordinate system icon

indicates location of the origin

origin

• location where the x, y, and z axes intersect

• 0,0,0

quick access toolbar

• includes buttons for some of the most commonly used functions

autocad commands

• tells the action you want to perform

command prompts

• tell the status of an action

• give options from which you must choose to complete a command

f1

help

• explanations of commands

f2

flipscreen

• toggles from text screen to graphic screen

f3

osnap

f4

tablet

f5

isoplane

• changes isoplane from top to right to left

f6

coordinate display

f7

grid

f8

ortho

f9

snap

• toggles increment snap on or off

f10

polar

• toggles polar tracking on or off

f11

otrack

• toggles object snap tracking on or off

escape key

cancels current command, menu, or dialog box

enter key

ends a command, or will repeat previous command if command line is blank

space bar

same as enter key except when entering text

current instruction

• select

• enter

• specify

point command

• draw a single point

pdmode

• specifies how point objects are displayed

pdsize

• specifies the size of point objects

line command

• draw a straight line segment from one point to the next

ray

• creates a semi-finite line commonly used as construction line

• has finite starting point, extends infinitely

construction line

• creates infinite lines whcih are commonly used as cronstruction lines

  • xline

multiline

• creates multiple parallel lines

  • mline

arc

• draws an arc based on three points

• drawn counterclockwise

circle

• draws a circle based on a center point and radius

rectangle

• draws a rectangle after you enter one corner and then the second

ellipse

• draws an ellipse or an elliptical arc

polygon

• creates an equilateral closed polyline

polysides

• stores the current number of polygon sides

• range: 3 - 1024

spline

• creates a quadratic or cubic spline curve

• fits a smooth curve to a sequence of points within a specified tolerance

• uses nurbs (non-uniform rational b-splines) mathematics - stores and defines a class of curve and surface data

polyline

• creates two-dimensional polylines

• connected sequence of line or arc segments created as a single object

erase

• erases an object

  • select object, right click, erase

oops

• restores the object erased by the last erased command

u

• reverses the effect of the previous command

undo

• reverses effect of multiple commands and provides control over the undo feature

• more versatile version of the u command

redo

• reverses the effects of a single undo or u command

selection set

• consists of a single object or complex grouping

selection windows

• crossing window

• box

crossing window

• create window from right to let

• any object that crosses the border of the window is added to the selection set

• shown as dotted line

box

• create window from left to right

• only add items that are completely within the box

• shown as solid line

last (L)

• select last object you created

previous (P)

• select previous selection set

all

• select all object on layer

fence (F)

• allows to draw a series of lines to select objects

crossing polygon (CP)

• similar to crossing box but you can pic points on the screen to create a polygon

redraw

• forces autocad to re-display the graphics on the screen

• clears away some extraneous graphics - marker blips left behind by pointing operations

save

• causes all editing changers to the current drawing to be saved to the disk file

end

• terminates the drawing editor

• saves current drawing to a disk file

• returns to main autocad menu

quit

• terminates drawing editor

• without saving the changes made tot eh current drawing

• returns to main menu of autocad