By Randall S. Newton
Editor-in-Chief
The AutoCAD competitive landscape of the last few years can be summarized as encroachment from all sides. Tools like SketchUp, Rhino, and FormZ have gained popularity as AutoCAD alternatives for conceptual design and visualization. Faster computers have made 3D modeling a reality among progressive firms, relegating AutoCAD to either a background role (Autodesk Architectural Desktop) or no role at all (Graphisoft ArchiCAD, Nemetschek VectorWorks and ALLPLAN, Autodesk Revit). Bentley’s MicroStation has become the gold standard for civil engineering and plant design, and Adobe PDF is pushing hard to become essential for design review and documentation. Even within AutoCAD’s core strength, design detailing, there has been price-based encroachment from TurboCAD and AutoCAD LT. Behind all this encroachment stands the Open Design Alliance, the consortium that has successfully reverse-engineered AutoCAD’s DWG format for the sake of the competition.
In past years, Autodesk has added features that appealed to the existing user base but did little to shore up the encroachment or address the new realities of computer automated design. AutoCAD 2007 changes all that. It is—finally—an AutoCAD for the 21st Century. Most of the new features focus on conceptual design, addressing issues for both the initial stages of design and its presentation to non-technical viewers. Other new features improve visualization, documentation, and the sharing of drawings. To accommodate these new features and to maintain a competitive edge, Autodesk has changed the DWG format yet again.
One of the first new features experienced AutoCAD users will notice is the design dashboard, an interface element that consolidates all solid and surface modeling tools. Just having these tools in one place may help some die-hard 2D drafters to begin to fiddle about in 3D. Also helping the transition to 3D is the extension of grip-based editing into solid and surface modeling. There are new tools for the creation and editing of surfaces (as opposed to mesh objects), and users can now create solid objects that have faces defined by more complex surfaces.
To make it easier to navigate in 3D, AutoCAD 2007 offers transparent pan and zoom while in perspective mode, and it allows editing to take place during use of the Orbit command. There is a new “walk mode” feature that mimics video games in its ability to easily navigate a path through a model, and a new camera function for taking point-of-view snapshots from within a model.
When Autodesk first starting pushing 3D modeling with Revit for architectural design and Inventor for mechanical design, there was no obvious conduit between AutoCAD and these new tools. AutoCAD 2007 offers new import tools for both Revit and Inventor, finally offering the smooth transition from 2D to 3D that is essential for Autodesk’s fiscal health.
New to AutoCAD 2007 is Visual Styles, a toolset that allows all elements of 3D display to be incorporated into a specific reusable style. There is also a new interactive light tool, allowing users to place distance, point, and spot lights in an AutoCAD model. Applying materials to 3D objects is easier in the new version. Users drag materials from a predefined library onto any solid face or surface. The material then scales automatically to fit. The accompanying materials editor allows customization of existing materials.
To help the transition from conceptual design to construction documentation, AutoCAD 2007 offers Section and Flatten tools, which extract 2D details from a 3D model. The Section tool allows movement of a dynamic, adjustable cutting plane through a solid or surface model. The Flatten tool then takes the selected plan and prepares it for representation in 2D.
Blocks in AutoCAD are now dynamic. They can be given various parameters and actions including Move, Scale, Stretch, Polar Stretch, Rotate, and Flip.
One of the most tedious aspects of 2D drafting, creating a table, has been improved in AutoCAD 2007 with the Table command. Predefined table styles control elements such as border properties, cell properties, and location of headings.
Autodesk continues to find new ways to incorporate its DWF publishing format in its products. AutoCAD 2007 introduces the ability to reference a DWF file as an underlay. The information can then be used as the basis for creating new drawing information; the DWF underlay cannot be altered.
Autodesk gives a nod to successful competitors in two important ways with AutoCAD 2007. The first is the ability to publish to the Adobe PDF format, the second is the addition (not initially) of support for Bentley MicroStation DGN files. The latter feature is a work in progress. A public beta open to all AutoCAD 2007 users will start this summer; Autodesk hopes to release DGN capability before the next edition of AutoCAD ships.
There’s an added bonus for AutoCAD 2007 users who are also on subscription: Autodesk Vault, previously only available to Manufacturing customers, will be available for AutoCAD 2007 as an add-on.
The current iteration of DWG is not capable of displaying and storing complex 3D features. Fixing that weakness is, I think, Autodesk’s primary motivation for changing DWG in AutoCAD 2007. Anti-AutoCAD bloggers will go berserk in the coming weeks with their accusations of new, devious DWG encryptions. The only “encryptionite” that will be poison to these bloggers is a tag that identifies whether or not the file was created by an Autodesk product. The drawing data itself, Autodesk says, remains unencrypted.
All but the die-hard, 2D-only cadders will find much to appreciate in AutoCAD 2007. It could well slow down defections to other products for tasks that until now have been seen as beyond AutoCAD’s capabilities.