AutoCAD 2012 and AutoCAD LT 2012 Essentials

Chapter 1 Getting Started 1

Exploring the AutoCAD 2012 for Windows User Interface  1

Exploring AutoCAD’s Graphical User Interface  1

Exploring AutoCAD’s Workspaces 5

The AutoCAD Ribbon 7

Setting Drawing Units  11

The Essentials and Beyond  12

Chapter 2 Basic Drawing Skills 13

Navigating 2D Drawings 13

Drawing Lines and Rectangles 17

Drawing Lines  17

Drawing Rectangles 19

Canceling, Erasing, and Undoing  21

Using Coordinate Systems  22

Using Absolute Coordinates 23

Using Relative Coordinates  23

Using Polar Coordinates 24

Drawing Circles, Arcs, and Polygons  28

Creating Circles  28

Creating Arcs  31

Drawing Polygons  32

Filleting and Chamfering Lines 34

Joining Nonparallel Lines  34

Joining Crossed Lines  35

The Essentials and Beyond  36

Chapter 3 Using Drawing Aids 37

Grid and Snap 37

Ortho and Polar Tracking 40

PolarSnap . 42

Running Object Snaps  44

From Snap 47

Object Snap Tracking  48

The Essentials and Beyond  50

Chapter 4 Editing Entities 51

Creating Selection Sets 51

Creating a Selection Set at the Select Objects: Prompt  51

Creating a Selection Set before Deciding upon a Command 55

Move and Copy  58

Rotate and Scale 61

Arrays 64

Rectangular Arrays 65

Polar Arrays  66

Trim and Extend 69

Lengthen and Stretch 70

Offset and Mirror 72

Grip Editing 74

The Essentials and Beyond . 76

Chapter 5 Shaping Curves 77

Drawing and Editing Curved Polylines  77

Drawing Ellipses 83

Drawing and Editing Splines  85

Working with Control Vertices  86

Working with Fit Points 90

Blending Between Objects with Splines  92

The Essentials and Beyond  94

Chapter 6 Controlling Object Visibility and Appearance 95

Changing Object Properties 95

Setting the Current Layer  98

Altering Objects’ Layer Assignments 101

Controlling Layer Visibility 103

Toggling Layer Status  103

Isolating Layers  106

Saving Layer States  108

Applying Linetype 109

Assigning Properties by Object or by Layer 112

Managing Layer Properties  113

The Essentials and Beyond  116

Chapter 7 Organizing Objects 117

Defining Blocks 117

Drawing a Chair and Defining It as a Block  117

Drawing a Door and Defining It as a Block 121

Inserting Blocks  122

Editing Blocks 126

Editing Block Definition Geometry 126

Assigning Floating Properties 127

Nesting Blocks  130

Exploding Blocks  131

Redefining Blocks 132

Working with Groups  135

The Essentials and Beyond  138

Chapter 8 Hatching and Gradients 139

Specifying Hatch Areas 139

Picking Points to Determine Boundaries  139

Selecting Objects to Define Boundaries  143

Associating Hatches with Boundaries  145

Hatching with Patterns  148

Specifying Properties 148

Separating Hatch Areas 150

Hatching with Gradients  153

The Essentials and Beyond  156

Chapter 9 Working with Blocks and Xrefs 157

Working with Global Blocks 157

Writing a Local Block Definition to a File  157

Inserting a Drawing as a Local Block 160

Redefining Local Blocks with Global Blocks  163

Searching for Content Across Multiple Drawings 165

Storing Content on Tool Palettes 169

Referencing External Drawings and Images  171

The Essentials and Beyond  176

Chapter 10 Creating and Editing Text 177

Creating Text Styles  177

Writing Lines of Text  179

Creating Text to Fit  179

Justifying Text  181

Transforming and Creating Text 182

Writing and Formatting Paragraphs of Text Using MTEXT  184

Editing Text 187

Editing Content and Properties 187

Working with Columns  188

The Essentials and Beyond  190

Chapter 11 Dimensioning 191

Styling Dimensions 191

Adding Dimensions 196

Using Inquiry Commands  197

Adding Dimension Objects  199

Adding and Styling Multileaders 203

Editing Dimensions  205

The Essentials and Beyond  208

Chapter 12 Keeping In Control with Constraints 209

Working with Geometric Constraints  209

Applying Dimensional Constraints and Creating User Parameters  212

Constraining Objects Simultaneously with Geometry and Dimensions  216

Making Parametric Changes to Constrained Objects 218

The Essentials and Beyond  220

Chapter 13 Working with Layouts and Annotative Objects 223

Creating Annotative Styles and Objects 223

Working with Annotative Text 224

Working with Annotative Dimensions  227

Creating Layouts 229

Adjusting Floating Viewports 232

Working on Layout1 232

Working on Layout2 234

Overriding Layer Properties in Layout Viewports 237

Drawing on Layouts  241

The Essentials and Beyond  244

Chapter 14 Printing and Plot ting 247

Configuring Output Devices 247

Setting Up a System Printer 248

Setting Up an AutoCAD Plotter 248

Creating Plot Style Tables 252

Using Plot Style Tables  255

Configuring New Drawings for Named Plot Style Tables 255

Assigning Plot Styles by Layer or by Object  258

Plotting in Modelspace  260

Plotting Layouts in Paperspace  264

Exporting to an Electronic Format  267

The Essentials and Beyond  268

Chapter 15 Storing, Presenting, and Extracting Data 271

Defining Attributes and Blocks  271

Inserting Attributed Blocks  275

Editing Table Styles and Creating Tables 278

Using Fields in Table Cells  282

Editing Table Data 285

The Essentials and Beyond  290

Chapter 16 Navigating 3D Models 293

Using Visual Styles  293

Working with Tiled Viewports  297

Navigating with the ViewCube 299

Orbiting in 3D 301

Using Cameras  302

Navigating with SteeringWheels  305

Saving Views  307

The Essentials and Beyond  310

Chapter 17 Modeling in 3D 311

Creating Surface Models 311

Making Planar Surfaces 311

Revolving 2D Profile into a 3D Model 313

Sweeping Out 3D Geometry  314

Extruding 2D Geometry into 3D 316

Editing Surface Models 317

Trimming Surfaces with Other Surfaces  318

Projecting Edges on Surfaces  319

Trimming Surfaces with Edges 321

Creating Solid Models 323

Extruding Solid Objects 323

Lofting Solid Objects 327

Editing Solid Models 328

Performing Boolean Operations  328

Editing Solids 331

Smoothing Meshes 334

The Essentials and Beyond  336

Chapter 18 Presenting Your Design 337

Assigning Materials 337

Placing and Adjusting Lights 342

Adding Artificial Lights  342

Simulating Natural Light  348

Creating Renderings 349

The Essentials and Beyond  353

Appendix AutoCAD Certification 355

Index 365