AutoCAD Electrical

AutoCAD Electrical Subscription Advantage Pack 2

The Subscription Advantage Pack is a collection of value-added features available to subscription based users. As of November 15th, the Subscription Advantage Pack 2 (SAP2) is ready to be downloaded.

Here's a sneak peek at what's packed in this release:

Include Autodesk Inventor Parts in Panel Bill Of Material

In Electromechanical projects, if AutoCAD Electrical parts are linked to their corresponding Autodesk Inventor Parts, you can generate a combined Bill of Material Report. A new option is now available in the Panel Bill of Material report to include the Inventor Parts in the report. A “Source” column has been added in the report to distinguish Electrical parts, Inventor parts, and/or Linked parts from each other.

 

Linking AutoCAD Electrical components and Inventor parts in Location View Tab

If you’re working on an Electromechanical project, you can now link the AutoCAD Electrical component(s) to Inventor part(s) right from the Location View tab. Follow these simple steps:

1. On the Location View tab, right click on the component you want to link.

2. Select the “Assign to Existing in Component Tree”.

3. Find the corresponding component that you want to link to and select it.

The components are now linked.

Item Number Balloon update

In an active drawing, any modifications to balloon configurations can be applied to not only new balloons, but also already existing ones. The process is simple:

1. Open the Panel Drawing Configuration dialog.

2. Modify the balloon properties in the Balloon setup.

3. On selecting “Apply to all balloons in active drawing”, the properties are updated. 

 

Want to know more?

Please go through these links to know more about the new feature enhancements!

http://help.autodesk.com/view/ACAD_E/2016/ENU/?guid=GUID-E575CF90-629B-4554-B019-B7A357BC633C 

Please check out the following video:

 

Are you on subscription? Do you want these features?

Download from the Autodesk Subscription Center. If you need help on how to download, then please watch this tutorial.

We at Autodesk, value the ideas you post on the AutoCAD Electrical Ideastation which helps us understand the problems you face. We want to thank each one of you who took out the time to post new ideas and promote other valuable ideas. We encourage users to post new ideas & enhancement suggestions on this forum and give kudos to others’ ideas that they support which in turn helps us filter the most valued ideas.

Thanks,

AutoCAD Electrical Ideastation team

 

 

 

You Get. We Give.

Team up with Autodesk and Engineers Without Borders USA to improve the lives of people around the world. When you sign up for a free* Autodesk® 360 account, Autodesk will give US$1** to Engineers Without Borders USA.

You get. We give. Everyone wins.

You get Autodesk 360—a cloud-based platform that gives you access to storage, a collaboration workspace, and cloud services to help you dramatically improve the way you design, visualize, simulate, and share your work with others anytime, anywhere.

Autodesk gives to Engineers Without Borders USA—a non-profit humanitarian organization dedicated to partnering with developing communities around the world. EWB-USA works to build a world in which all communities have the capacity to meet their basic human needs, addressing challenges including water purifications and delivery, sanitation, transportation and infrastructure projects, and sustainable and renewable energy systems.

Sign-up Now:
http://autode.sk/Txx4JZ

Autodesk is a registered trademark of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. All other brand names, product names, or trademarks belong to their respective holders. Autodesk reserves the right to alter product and services offerings, and specifications and pricing at any time without notice, and is not responsible for typographical or graphical errors that may appear in this document. © 2012 Autodesk, Inc. All rights reserved.

*Free products and services are subject to the terms and conditions of the end-user license and services agreement or other terms and conditions that accompany the software or services.

**For every Autodesk customer who submits a qualified registration for an Autodesk 360 account, Autodesk will give US$1 to Engineers Without Borders USA up to a total of US$30,000

AutoCAD Electrical for design and service - AFM Customer visit

I was in Los Angeles last week and had the opportunity to visit with Charlie Irwin at AFM Engineering in Santa Ana, CA.  AFM makes automated machinery for printing for various industries including medical and consumer products and Charlie has been doing this for 32 years now.

             

They use AutoCAD Electrical for their schematic designs, whether it's for a new customer machine, or retro-fitting an old machine with new controls.  

The biggest benefit that Charlie sees in AutoCAD Electrical is that you get a complete documentation package when you use ACE for controls design.  The wires are numbered and colored you get full schematic documentation, and anyone who has the machine now has a manual to perform any servicing that is needed.  Most companies have AutoCAD, and the fact that they have the schematics documented in AutoCAD Electrical is a great selling tool for AFM.  In fact, they advertise on their website that they use AutoCAD for their documentation.  

Charlie also appreciates how easy it is to reuse old components, make modifications and swap out components, and create his own custom library of parts.  It may take a little work to create these custom components up front, but in the long run, there are less mistakes made on the shop floor and less rework needed.

Another invaluable part of Charlie's success has been the service he has received from his local reseller KETIV.  They are always there to provide support and training where needed.  KETIV is one of Autodesk's finest resellers, and my thanks to their President, Kanwar Anand, for taking me around to visit with customers when I was in LA.

Usability Testing – What’s it about?

 

We've all had experiences with poor software usability! You're sitting there working in a program, and then you go to do something simple, like make your text color turn green. But you can't find the command. You poke around and just can't figure out how to make it happen. Or worse, you end up formatting it in a huge font size and can't get it undone. "Gosh darn," you grumble, "don't these programmers ever even try to use the software they write?"

Well, I hope that hasn't happened to you with Autodesk software! In the Systems Design group, home of Autocad Electrical and ecscad, we are always looking for ways to make our software more user-friendly. One of the ways we do this is through usability testing.

In usability testing, we are testing an in-development version of our software on real users, to find out if our proposed design meets people's needs. A usability test can occur in several different ways – in person or online; working with prototype software designs on paper, software in development, or fully-functional software. We recruit participants for usability tests through a variety of different ways depending on what design we want to test – sometimes we are looking for people who do specific kinds of work, or have experience with certain software. We'll usually be looking for between four and six different users to participate in a particular usability test.

What happens in a usability test session?

Most usability test sessions last about an hour. A typical Systems Design usability test is conducted as an on-line meeting using screen-sharing software. Let's say you were participating in a usability test – we would spend the first ten minutes or so discussing your work environment and experience with our software. Then, I will share my screen and give you so they can actually interact with the software installed on my laptop. I will ask you to perform a specific task (say, create a new file and place three components in the drawing).

While you are engaged in the task, I will ask you to talk aloud about what you are trying to do, or what you are thinking. If you can't figure out how to do something, I might ask you to try again, or look around the screen to see if you can find some information to help you. During a usability test, we may focus on two or three different tasks. Or you might do the same task with two different versions of the same design.

At the end of the meeting, I might ask some follow-up questions about things I saw you do during the test. And I give you time to ask questions or give me more general feedback on the design you saw.

Sometimes people get a little frustrated if they are having a hard time accomplishing the task – you have to remember that this isn't a test of you! We're not looking for software whizzes who can figure out anything immediately. We're looking for average users who will help us find where our design isn't helping you to do the work you need to do. If you have a hard time, it's our problem, not yours!

Interested in learning more?

In my next blog post, I'll discuss what we do with the results from the usability tests, and how these can make a real difference in our software.

If you are interested in participating in future usability testing, we invite you to join us! Anyone can register with our Systems Design Beta Portal. Registration will add you to the list of people we may invite to participate in usability tests, beta tests, or ask for other forms of feedback on our products.

-Olivia Williamson

Make the time to get trained!

Over time I've been lulled into the false assumption that our customers are taking time to invest in some level of software training to better leverage their investment in Autodesk software solutions.

The foundation of this assumption I attribute to my good fortune of working for companies that recognize that there is no substitute for instructor-lead, hands-on software training. This has been particularly true with respect to CAD software. In most cases, I was told I would be taking training rather than having to ask. For the few times I had to ask, I only had to ask once.

This assumption was reinforced by my time spent working for an Autodesk Reseller where a big part of our business was training our customers to effectively use the software they purchased. Of course, the customers with whom I interacted most often enjoyed the same good fortune I did in my previous companies. While, on occasion it required some convincing, these customers saw the value in software training.

In my time working for Autodesk as a User Experience Designer, I've spoken with hundreds of end users and I'm struck by the fact that this level of appreciation for training is far from universal. When I have the opportunity to sit down with a customer and explore how and why they do things with their Autodesk solutions, I always bring up training as one of my initial questions: "Have you received formal training for this software? Is formal training a matter of policy for your CAD operators?"

There's a general 50/50 split on "yes" versus "no" answers.

A good portion of those "no" responses were directly attributed to management not being bought into the concept of training value. I like to think I'm preaching to the choir; it's not the reader I'm trying to sway here. If you're an end user reading this, if management has agreed to buy you one of our many outstanding design software solutions and couldn't see their way clear to fund training for that software, you haven't done a good job convincing them of that value.

Yes, there may be resident experts in your company. Yes, we are continually investing in Help resources both in-product and online. The online knowledge base for our products is absolutely unprecedented. There is no shortage of free, user-generated advice, video tutorials, forums, etc. All of these resources are a mere Google search away.

None of those resources, however, compare to the productivity gains realized immediately following live, instructor-led training.

One could argue that, as an Autodesk employee, I have learning resources in spades. I'm surrounded by experts, I have access to anything and everything that our Learning Experience team produces and yet, I requested and received end-user training for two different product solutions last year. This wasn't special, Autodesk-employee-tailored training. I attended the same end-user training, from an authorized training center, available to all of our customers. My understanding of the features and functionality of the software skyrocketed in just a few hours.

If you like analytics to make your case, there are pages and pages of cost-justification and ROI formulas for software training available online. I encourage you to review those if you need help making a case. I particularly liked this one.

However, I think the case for training is best made anecdotally rather than analytically. While statistically these people might exist, I've never met anyone who attended end-user training for Autodesk software that considered it a waste of time or money. Seek testimonials from customers and users who made the decision to invest in training. Your Autodesk Reseller / Authorized Training Center would be eager to provide you with testimonials. (Note that the reseller and authorized training center are typically one in the same, though there are exceptions.) If you don't know who your reseller is or are unsatisfied with your current provider, check the Autodesk website to find a reseller to best meet your needs.

For those among you that are convinced that training has real, tangible value and just haven't figured out how to make time in your schedule, this message is for you: you have to make time for training!

I don't remember who gave us this advice, but when my wife and I were young, both working DINK-YUPPYs (Dual-Income-No-Kids, Young-Urban Professionals), and wrestled with the timing of having kids, somebody (wiser and older than us) assured us that there is no ideal time. Just do it. If you wait for the ideal time, it will never happen.

That nameless, faceless person was right! (ask my kids) I view making time in your business schedule for software training in much the same light. Yea, that's right, I just compared software training to procreation – it's that important!

Many of our customers differentiate themselves from their competitors not on price, or even quality of output, but on turn-around time. The recession has forced everyone to have to do more with less. In today's business climate, I know that it's harder than ever to justify taking time away from billable work. I assure you, with respect to software training, it is well worth the time.

A good training center will help make that time investment as minimally disruptive as possible. There are a number of things that can be done to mitigate the impact to your busy schedule.

Consider

• "Jump-Start" training - Many training centers offer short (1-day, ½-day) seminars to get new users up-and-running quickly and efficiently. These sessions tend to focus on software features that provide the most favorable impact to user productivity.
• Customized training – Review a course syllabus and work with your provider to tailor the training to your specific needs. You can request to spend more time on one topic and less on another.
• Online training – many resellers and training providers offer live, online training curriculum. The ubiquity of broadband internet access has made online training an absolutely viable alternative to classroom training. I received online training back in 2000, 2001 and the capabilities are so much better now. Take advantage of all that bandwidth you're paying for!
• In-house training – Get enough users together, trainers will be more than happy to come to your facility to provide the same quality training you would get at a classroom.
• Flexible scheduling – Many Autodesk software fundamentals courses run about 40 hours; a solid week of your design team out of commission. Many resellers are happy spread that time over two or more weeks to minimize the disruption to your team's short-term productivity.
• Update training – Already an expert? New product features and features improvements are generally added every year. If you're on subscription, you're receiving these updates regularly. If you don't know how to take advantage of these new enhancements, you're not getting the full value out of the subscription dollars you're paying. These sessions are typically much shorter (only 1-2 days) than a general, fundamentals class.
• Project training – Pay for a trainer to come into your facility and sit down with your design team as they work on their own projects. I've done this for customers and it's one of the best ways to maximize the expertise of your trainer as it's being applied directly to your particular needs. This also gives the trainer the opportunity to advise on your particular licensing and deployment issues, hardware idiosyncrasies and network configuration.
• Send questions ahead of time – If the trainer knows where you're having trouble, it will help him or her address your needs more efficiently when you're in the classroom. Be prepared to share datasets as well!

Note that you need to approach training with the understanding that you may need to change processes and practices to best leverage the productivity enhancements our software solutions provide. This is particularly true if you're investing in one of our PLM or PDM solutions such as Autodesk Vault.

Finally, expect the best from your trainer! A good training center will work with you to provide the best value with minimal disruption to your work schedule. They'll also solicit feedback on their own performance to insure they continue to provide that value.

Good luck and happy designing!

- Andrew Faix

I really wish there was a keyboard shortcut for that!

If you are like me, then you often use keyboard shortcuts while working with an AutoCAD® product because you constantly have one hand on the keyboard and the other on the mouse. What if some of those commands you find yourself using on a regular basis don't already have a shortcut defined? Well if that is the case, then you can quickly create new keyboard shortcuts or to even edit existing ones to best meet your needs!

First, you will need to locate and access the "User Interface" command. You can find this command on the "Manage" tab in the ribbon as shown below:

Note: You can also type CUI at the command line to access this command

Once the "Customize User Interface" dialog is presented, you will want to look to the Customizations in All Files section and expand the Keyboard Shortcuts node:

Now locate the command(s) that you want to add new keyboard shortcuts for in the Command List:

Select the command and drag-n-drop it in the Shortcut Keys node, resulting in the addition of the command you selected being added as a new sub-node:

The last thing you need to do not is to assign the shortcut keys that you want to be assigned to that command. To do this you will select that new node under Shortcut Keys that was created then under Properties on the right choose the button in the "Key(s)" edit box. When you do this you will see the smaller Shortcut Keys dialog where you will make the assignment. As you make the assignment, the middle section of the dialog "Currently assigned to" will keep you updated as to whether the keys that you have selected are already assigned to another command or not.

In AutoCAD® Electrical I constantly find myself moving between the drawings in my project and using the Next/Previous Drawing commands all of the time!! One of these commands was what I used in my example above, and my reason for this post as I find it very convenient to assign shortcut keys such as SHIFT+Z and SHIFT+X (these keys allow me to execute the command with my left hand while my right remains on the mouse) to these commands to allow me to quickly move between drawings without searching for the commands. Think about the commands that you use most often, make a list, then take a few minutes to assign some shortcut keys to see how this may save you a few mouse clicks and a little bit of time.

If you would like more information on this topic or to view a video showing the workflow, you can follow the link below to the online help topic:

AutoCAD® 2012 Help - Show Me: Create a Shortcut Key

-Jared Bunch