Here are a few things you can do to help speed up AutoCAD. Read more »

Shaan Hurly wrote a great tip on publishing PDFs.

When plotting or publishing PDFs you can set it to publish individual PDF files or a single PDF file with many pages/sheets. The system variable is PUBLISHCOLLATE. Read more »

There may be times when you would want to turn on/off the dialog box when inserting an attributed block into your drawings. For example, if you are creating a script or macro that inserts an attributed block you might want to set ATTDIA to 0 (zero) at the beginning so that the it will prompt for attributes on the command line only. Read more »

Have you ever noticed that when you select a bunch of objects in AutoCAD, sometimes their grips appear and sometimes they don’t? No, this isn’t a bug. It’s something called Grip Object Limit. Read more »

One of the most powerful features of AutoCAD is the ability for multiple people to work concurrently a project. A typical way this is done is by using XREFs. One person can be working on details, while another is working on the base map, while another is working on the preliminary design, and so on. Read more »

I learned about the system variable OSNAPZ from Lynn Allen’s Circles and Lines blog.

When snapping to 3D points AutoCAD will grab the x, y, and z. However there are times when you don’t want it to grab the z value. To do this, type OSNAPZ on the command line and set it to 1. Read more »

There are three linetype settings to consider when setting up your drawings: LTSCALE, PSLTSCALE, & MSLTSCALE. Read more »

Have you ever tried to extend an object to an edge only to find out that it is not a boundary edge? Or maybe you, like I have wished it was possible to trim along an invisible edge. The system variable EDGEMODE does just that. Read more »

When Autodesk released AutoCAD 2007 I noticed that when I inserted a block or XREF it would sometimes scale up or down in a way I didn’t expect. After a little digging in the help file I found these system variables: INSUNITS, INSUNITSDEFSOURCE, & INSUNITSDEFTARGET. Read more »

Recently I made some recommendations for setting system variables relating to annotative objects in our standard drawing template (for AutoCAD 2008). Here they are with an explanation as to why. Read more »