Monday, April 24, 2006
Thursday, March 30, 2006
CAD Mgmt Toolbox: Autodesk Online Store
As I have mentioned before, Autodesk's fiscal year begins in February. Around this time each year you can expect to hear news from Autodesk resellers - territories change, product authorizations change, new offices or mergers are announced, and some resellers are even dropped (remember the reports about long time reseller Robert McNeel & Associates earlier this year?)
If you find yourself re-evaluating your Autodesk reseller(s) now or any other time during the year, don't forget that many Autodesk products and upgrades are available directly from Autodesk through the Autodesk Online Store.
Tuesday, March 28, 2006
CAD Mgmt Toolbox: CAD-e-Corner
Be sure to add Ward Romberger's CAD-e-Corner blog to your reading list. I'm glad he's entering the blog world. He has a great knowledge of CAD, a great sense of humor, and was great to work with for several years at Benham. That said, I expect him to have a great blog.
http://cadecorner.blogspot.com/
Monday, March 27, 2006
Monday, March 13, 2006
CAD Mgmt: AutoCAD 2007 Information Overload
Try to Google "AutoCAD 2007" and you get over 1,020,000 results (and rising). That's a lot of information for a product that isn't shipping yet. So, using the Durkee Method of Rounding Off, that's about 1,000,000 pages at 5 minutes per page, or 5,000,000 minutes of reading. That's over 10 years of reading. What's a CAD Manager to do? As the old saying goes, "How do you eat an elephant?" "One bite at a time."
As an appetizer, I'll start with a plug for the regular press. I really like the What's New in AutoCAD 2007 article by Sara Ferris of Cadalyst. It was one of the first posts available and has a clear, succinct explanation of new features.
Next, go straight to the elephant by checking out the information from Autodesk. I don't mean the marketing stuff on the autodesk.com site - it isn't even posted there yet, and you'll get more than your share of it soon enough. Go to the Autodesk blogs at http://autodesk.blogs.com. At Shaan Hurley's Between the Lines blog you'll find a link to download the AutoCAD 2007 Preview Guide. Print it for some between meal snacks (i.e., offline study time). Shaan also has a growing list of side dishes at AutoCAD 2007 links.
And since we're talking about side dish links, have you subscribed to TenLinks Daily yet? (See CAD Mgmt Toolbox: TenLinks.com) Links come through there at an almost manageable rate and they have been featuring AutoCAD 2007 articles. Unlike a search engine, the links are categorized, so you don't have keep passing the same green bean casserole to find something you really want to chew on for a while.
From there you can narrow your search based on the new features that interest you most. But a healthy AutoCAD 2007 requires both diet and exercise. Don't spend all of your time digesting - spend some time doing. Beta users have a head start on this, but non-beta subscription users will be exercising soon. Install your software, browse through the New Features Workshop, and start exercising.
Now, what's for dessert?
MARCH 23, 2006 UPDATE:
The Google search of "AutoCAD 2007" now results in only 196,000 hits. Is this a result of Google's recent acquisition of @Last Software, the makers of SketchUp? :)
The Autodesk web site has now been updated to include information on the new 2007 products.
Be sure to check out the online AutoCAD 2007 New Features Workshop and AutoCAD LT 2007 New Features Workshop.
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
CAD Mgmt Toolbox: Free Autodesk File Viewers
Here is a quick list of free viewers from Autodesk:
Autodesk DWG TrueView views and prints Autodesk DXF and DWG files
www.autodesk.com/dwgtrueview
Autodesk Inventor View views and prints Autodesk Inventor assemblies, parts, and drawings
www.autodesk.com/inventorview
Autodesk DWF Viewer views and prints Autodesk DWF files
www.autodesk.com/dwfviewer
And the free convertor:
Autodesk DWG TrueConvert converts between AutoCAD Release 14, 2000 (i.e. 2000, 2000i, and 2002) and 2004, (i.e. 2004, 2005, and 2006) DWG file formats.
www.autodesk.com/dwgtrueconvert
CAD Mgmt Toolbox: Autodesk Blogs
In my interview with Shaan Hurley of Autodesk (Interview: Shaan Hurley of Autodesk), Shaan said that other Autodesk blogs were on the way. The latest is from Scott Sheppard.
Here is the new list of Autodesk blogs from http://autodesk.blogs.com/:
“Between the Lines" AutoCAD Blog
http://autodesk.blogs.com/between_the_lines/
Hosted by Shaan Hurley
"Between the Walls" Architectural Desktop Blog
http://blogs.autodesk.com/adt
Hosted by Chris Yanchar
"Between the Poles" Geospatial Blog
http://geospatial.blogs.com/
Hosted by Geoff Zeiss
"In The Machine" Autodesk Inventor Blog
http://blogs.autodesk.com/inventor
Hosted by: Amy Bunszel, Pete Lord, Andy Palioca, Jeff Wymer
"Beyond the Paper" Autodesk DWF Blog
http://dwf.blogs.com/
Hosted by Scott Sheppard
Lynn Allen's Blog
http://blogs.autodesk.com/lynn
Hosted by Lynn Allen
AutoCAD Insider
http://heidihewett.blogs.com/
Hosted by Heidi Hewett
March 14, 2006 UPDATE:
"Between the Poles" by Geoff Zeiss was added to the list above (but for some reason it doesn't show up on http://autodesk.blogs.com/).
