Subtitles of the Movie

We're now going to look at Dynamic Input in a little bit more detail. I did mention earlier that we have a Dimensional Input Mode for Dynamic Input and also a Pointer Input Mode. So let's have a look at both of those. What I'm going to draw is a polyline, this is on the Home Tab up here on the ribbon and the poly line is this little Fish Hook shaped icon here. So click on the Polyline Icon and come into the drawing area. Now the Dynamic Input prompt at the moment is in Pointer Mode, its asking me for a point to start from. Now I'm actually going to cheat here for really the benefit of this exercise. I'm going to cheat and I'm going to use my Object Snaps. So I'm going to use the end point snap here of this line. So when I hover over the end point of that line my end point snap appears and I left click. So now my polyline is starting from the end point of the last line drawn. So let's have a look at this Dimensional Input Mode. It's very simple; it's asking me to input a distance and an angle that is Dimensional Input. I have a tool tip which is the specify next point. Now you'll notice there is a funny little blue icon next to the specify next point, that is meant to indicate the Down Arrow on your keyboard. You've got your Arrow Keys on your keyboard, if you press the Down Arrow you get a Menu up here on the screen, have a look at the Command Line. You'll notice that, that menu is the same as the Command Line Input Options, you also get those options if you right click in the Polyline Command, they will come up on the Shortcut Menu as well. So what we're going to do there is we're going to specify an Arc, so I literally just move the pointer over the Arc and now we're back in Dimensional Input Mode but we're drawing an Arc as you can see. So I'm going to drag that Arc using my Polar Tracking like so along there and what I want is I want that Arc, that actual cord length there to be 100 long along the 180 degree line. So I still get a Dimensional Input even though I'm drawing an Arc. So in that blue highlighted box I type in 100 and I press Enter. So that is Dimensional Inputs using Dynamic Input. So there's my Arc there, now I'm still trying to draw an Arc because I haven't come out of Arc Mode. Notice I still have the Down Arrow Icon there on the tool tip. So I press the Down Arrow again, different menu this time because I'm in a different content in the Polyline Command and I can select Line Mode on the menu. I click on Line and now I'm back to drawing a line and again for the benefit of this exercise what I'm going to do now is I'm going to cheat and use the End Point of this line here, there's the end point there and I'm going to left click and then I'm going to press Enter to finish the Polyline Command. So that is Dimensional Input using Dynamic Input on the screen. Pointer Input is very easy, we've actually covered it already but I haven't mentioned it. It's literally where you put in the information on the pointer. So let's go to the Line Command now, again on the Draw Panel on the Home Tab. There's my Pointer Input. Now it doesn't matter I can put in an coordinate or I can use an Object Snap. I'm going to use an Object Snap, I'm going to use the end of the line that I've just drawn there, left click that is pointer input. Notice it goes Dimensional Input there, but if I just specify the next point, let's say using an Object Snap I don't have specify a distance or angle, I just left click on that intersection snap there and that is Pointer Input. I press Enter to close out the Line Command. That is Pointer Input using Dynamic Input. Now what I've done now is I've finished that Line Command by pressing Enter, the last thing we need to look at now are the options available to us for the settings for Dynamic Input. Dynamic Input is very important, it brings a heads up design to you, because all the information is there on the crosshair, you don't have to keep looking at the Command Line anymore like you used in older versions of AutoCAD. I'm going to go down to the DNY Button on the status bar, I'm going to right click over it and select settings on the Shortcut Menu there. The Drafting Settings Dialog Box appears and I've got the Dynamic Input Tab current. So as you can see there I can enable Pointer Input, I can enable Dimension Input. Normally by default they are switched on. Settings wise I can go in and change the settings such as what coordinate format I want to use, I'm going to cancel that because I don't want to change any of these settings, it's the same with the Dimension Input, if I click on the Settings Button, show 2 Dimension Input Fields at a time or 1 or I can actually show the following Dimension Input Fields as you can see. Their grayed out at the moment because I haven't selected it, but if I do select it I can switch them on and off using the tick boxes. I always show 2 Dimension Input Fields at a time, that's my personal preference. I'm going to cancel that there so that no changes are implemented. You can also change the drafting tool tip appearance in the Model Tab Preview there and in the Layout Tabs. So there's the Model Preview, there's the Layout Preview. You can change the colors if you wish, as you can see that goes into the standard drawing window colors which is all of your AutoCAD drawing window colors. I'm going to cancel that there and you can change the size and the transparency. Again I normally only use the default settings, its up to you if you want toe experiment with these and change them to something you're more comfortable with. I'm going to cancel all of that now because my Dynamic Input appearances are set the way I want them to.