Subtitles of the Movie

So what is new in AutoCAD 2009? The first thing that any previous AutoCAD user is notice is the complete change to the user interface; it looks completely different to any previous version of AutoCAD. Let's first look at the Menu Browser, this is on the capital A at the top left corner of the screen, when we click on the Down Arrow you'll notice that a dialog box appears and the names on the left will look familiar. They are what was the original AutoCAD Pull-Down menus. You'll notice that when I click on File here, that all of the Pull-Down availability is still within AutoCAD. There are some new features though, look at Export to Autodesk Impression for example. When I look at tools I have all the standard AutoCAD commands but as I move down the list you'll notice that it is still the same. When I got to Insert, you'll notice I can still insert drawings, DGN's, raster images. If I go to the Modify option here you'll notice there is again a new command, Change Space, I can change the space of an object between Model space and Paper space. You also have your Express Tools still available to you as well. On the Recent Documents option here on the browse I can browse to drawings that I've previously had open, very similar to the start-up dialog box in previous versions of AutoCAD. I can look at any documents I have open, in this case Drawing1.dwg and I can look at any recent actions I may have performed in AutoCAD. The Options button here allows me to open up the Options dialog box. But before I do that I can also exit AutoCAD through the Menu Browser if necessary. Clicking on the Options button this brings out the AutoCAD Options dialog box allowing you to edit your AutoCAD settings. So I can work my way through the tabs, customizing my AutoCAD interface to my requirements. That covers the Menu Browser; let's look at the next new part of the AutoCAD 2009 user interface. This is the Ribbon at the top of the screen, you'll notice that we now have a Ribbon at the top of the screen instead of the original Pull-Down menus, on the Ribbon itself it follows a drafting process, a work flow, notice on the Home tab here I can Draw, Modify, Create Layers, Annotation, blocks and Properties. On the Blocks & References tab I can work with blocks and Attributes and also reference drawing I can import and export files and I can edit data that may link to external sources and so on. Going back to the Home Tab here you'll notice as well there's a repetition, I have Annotation here as well, I can Annotate by adding text dimensions, Multileaders tables, Markups and annotation scaling and then with the tools I can also, you'll notice new features, I can Action record a group of AutoCAD commands. I can run animations if I need to in 3D AutoCAD, I can load applications, perhaps plug-ins that I've written for AutoCAD myself that may run within AutoCAD. I can also apply standards; I can then view my drawing by way of using UCS' Viewports, palettes, windows and window elements. Notice as well Status Bar, drawing Status Bar, I can lock information, these are window locking tools allowing me to fix my user interface. And then finally output, I can Plot, Preview, Publish, eTransmit and Export my drawings if required. Notice the Export to Impression Panel on the Ribbon as well. Going back to the Home tab now let's have a look at the actual functionality of the Ribbon itself, each panel can be expanded by way of clicking on the little triangle in the bottom right corner. It can then also be pinned open, so notice there that the Draw Panel is now pinned open and it will stay that way until I click on the Pin again and notice the Draw Panel receded back into the Ribbon there. This little icon here above the Ribbon minimizes the panel titles, so now all I do is hover over each title and as you can see I can hover over the panel arrow as well to expand the panel. But when I move away the entire panel goes back into like Auto-Hide Mode. I can bring my panels back by double clicking on that icon on the top of the screen there. So the Ribbon and the Panels are new to AutoCAD, what I have found as a trainer is they work very well. All of the original AutoCAD commands are there, its just a case of working in a work flow, in a processing environment now, rather then just going and finding them, you can work your way through them and build up a drawing in a known organizational output.