Friday, November 07, 2014
Are you getting the most out of your Offsets in AutoCAD?
Lynn Allen's Blog: The OFFSET command has been around since the VERY early days of AutoCAD - and has seen some nice advances in the past few releases. But did you know that the system variable OFFSETGAPTYPE is a crucial piece of the OFFSET puzzle? If you're offsetting polylines...you need to check out my Cadalyst Video!
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8 comments:
In my last AutoCAD class, we just learned what the offset tool was, and what it can do. I find it fascinating that there are so many tools in the program that people don't completely know how to use, even if they were around from the very beginning of AutoCAD. It's also interesting just how many things that can be done in that program that make drafting easier, yet no one knows how to use the tools. It seems like people learn the basics such as line and rectang, and then never bother to learn the advanced tools.
This is a cool command, I forgot it was a thing. Technical design wise I don’t know many uses for having the offset gap type be more than 0. Design wise however it could be cool to be able to fillet objects just by basically scaling them (which is what you would be pretty much doing with an offsetted closed polyline). This was a nifty video and I wonder about other videos this woman has put out. In my freshman year AutoCAD class we were all told that using AutoCAD for theatrical purposes was like cutting butter with a chainsaw. The fact that there are SO many commands and ways of manipulating objects in CAD pretty much proves that point. I want to soon teach myself as much Inventor as I need to at least get started and I think it’s the same concept, so much to learn for relatively simple uses.
Hmmm. I wasn’t of this feature before, but that’s not saying much. I’m probably only well versed in about 1/4 of the functions that AutoCAD is capable of performing. There’s generally 5 or more ways to perform any task, and every once in a while you stumble on something new. This would be one of those times. And I certainly expect to make use of this feature especially when working on mechanical designs, and even when drawing structural shapes. This would allow you to draw the inside shape of box tube and then offset, and POOF! already filleted. I mentioned using it for working on mechanical designs, this option could potentially be useful when drawing sheave plates or something similar…it’s hard to say for sure, because it all depends on the situation. I know for a fact though, that I’ve wished I didn’t need to individually fillet each corner of an object and this could be the solution.
In our CAD class, I had learned about the offset tool, and how to use it. Generally, there seems to be more than one way to accomplish something, with one being more intuitive but slower. With this, it's a more obscure way to get the same result, that with a little extra knowledge can save a lot of time. I'm glad that instructional videos like this are available for those who aren't satisfied just fudging it with the basics.
In our CAD class, I had learned about the offset tool, and how to use it. Generally, there seems to be more than one way to accomplish something, with one being more intuitive but slower. With this, it's a more obscure way to get the same result, that with a little extra knowledge can save a lot of time. I'm glad that instructional videos like this are available for those who aren't satisfied just fudging it with the basics.
With anything in AutoCAD there are so many ways to do the same thing. We just talked about he offset tool in class. For me it makes drawing a lot faster and more accurate using offsets. I think that the simple basic version is easier, even though the more complicated might be a little bit faster.
AutoCad system variables are so foreign to me. Even as a regular AutoCad user, there is just so much to learn and master. It doesn't help that the only good instructional videos on YouTube are done by foreign draftsmen in half broken English.
Talking about this offset sys variable in particular brings up a good question about general CAD practices. Is it more valuable to spend time figuring out how to harness a more complex tool that can potentially save you some steps, or just jump in and draw something in a manner that you know will work. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to draw things in a faster manner, only to give up and have to use a more manual or rote process. I still don't really know the correct answer, although I assume that "It depends."
I'm not surprised at all I hadn't heard of this before. I've been using AutoCAD now for about a year, and probably only know about an 1/8th of the program. Using AutoCAD was my first time really using a computer program that allows one to manipulate and configure hundreds of thousands of things. The possibilities and combinations and ways to achieve something are seemingly endless. This program has so many facets to it that it still boggles my mind a year later. I can only hope that one day I'll actually be able to master a portion of what these complex drafting programs have to offer, but until that day it's work work work, and struggle struggle struggle.
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