AutoCAD Tutorials: Learning Basics for Beginners

Back in the year 1979, drawing by hand with traditional drafting tools, was in high demand for mechanical and hardware industries. So, people there find AutoCAD© remarkably useful and adopt it for their works and projects that need a long time to be accomplished because of the huge amount of details included in each drawing. (See the figure above for an example of mechanical detailed sheets)

Later, in the year 1979, the first edition was released under the name of Interact CAD, which then became AutoCAD, the official commercial name of the application.

2- Does AutoCAD work by Itself? | The AutoCAD common misconception

The answer to this question is a big NO! But before starting, I'd like to bring your attention to a misconception that some people, especially those who don't know much about how the technology works, believe that AutoCAD© can do the designing job for you!... At least such was the idea of our instructors at the Architecture Institute!

• It lets you make updates and corrections easily without redrafting the whole drawing; In the old times, when a correction was provided to a drawing, we were obliged to redraw the entire document and spent precious time finding a way to erase the parts to be modified.
• Clarity and cleanliness of drawings and better presentations without traces and ink marks which are from the past.
• More precise and detailed drawings to reduce cumulated errors perfectly for execution and shop drawings production.
• More productive for the contractors' offices is a critical matter ahead regarding their work strategy: The more shop drawings produced equals the more money to get from the consultant.

• AutoCAD provides various sets of Entities for constructing your multiple drawings.

Let's first define the word "Entity" in AutoCAD terminology. An Entity is a Drawing Element in AutoCAD that constitutes only one geometric element each, such as a Line, Circle, Text, Rectangle, etc...

Almost all the AutoCAD commands have this same sequel of entering commands:
1- Entering the command_name.
2- You will be shown a list of options to choose from, depending on each command.
3- Press the Enter button again to exit or re-enter another command.

I will be extracting here, a useful paragraph from where I discussed the how-to enter commands within the program in a previous post as the following:

1. Utilizing the Pull-Down Menus In the event that you take the most advantage of the AutoCAD screen, or what we called the model space,  you will notice menus like Draw, Edit, Modify, and so forth, located on the top side.
Interfere with these menus to dispatch AutoCAD commands.
As you become progressively acquainted with AutoCAD you may choose to utilize the toolbars and the "Command Line" prompt along with aliases to give orders.
However, new users and beginners learn and work quicker with the option of having all their familiar commands stuck inside the drop-down menus.

• Read more: In the meantime, you can read the complete article about the 10 Tips and Tricks for New AutoCAD Users working in Companies previously posted on my blog.

Sometimes entities are formed from multiple other geometric elements that will form a one-unit entity by itself; this is what we call the "Blocks", to be discussed in a later post from this AutoCAD Tutorial.

6- The Essential Tools of AutoCAD | What Makes Working with AutoCAD Easier

• 6. a- Using the right tool at the right place → Organizing your Work
• 6. b- Getting the Most of AutoCAD → Using the proper Tools

E-Tutorial Recommendation

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Other Valuable Books Recommendation