AutoCAD Basics - Section 1

4.3 Start with an Assistant

If we change the value of Startup to one, the New menu, or the button of the same name, opens a dialog box different from the one we saw in the previous section in which we have all the options to start our work: open a drawing, start a new one with default values, use a template, or determine the parameters of the drawing with any of its two assistants.

The difference between Advanced configuration and Quick configuration is the level of detail for the determination of the basic parameters of the drawing. Obviously, Advanced Configuration allows us greater control over these data, so it is important to review it.

The wizard consists of 4 windows where we specify the units of measure, the units of the angles, the precision of both, the direction of the angles and the drawing area. We have already mentioned that the equivalence between the units of the drawing and the units of measurement depend on your project.

As already explained in the topic about polar coordinates, the angles begin to be counted on the X axis and counterclockwise. As can be seen in the window of the assistant, in a wind rose the angle zero is in the East direction, 90 degrees would be North, and so on. And while we can define the beginning of the angles at any of the cardinal points, it is not advisable to change this criterion unless your specific project justifies it fully.

In the last window of the advanced configuration wizard, we must indicate the boundaries of the area of ​​our drawing. Here we can say that this has the effect of defining the presentation area and that it does not really limit the area we have to draw. In other words, we can define a drawing limit in this window and then draw out of it, although in the next section we will mention how it is possible to avoid drawing outside the limits. On the other hand, remember that here we talk about drawing units and that although in the wizard window it says that for a drawing of 12 x 9 meters we must put 12 in width and 9 in length, if we decide that a drawing unit is equal to one centimeter, then we should indicate 1200 in width and 900 in length for a drawing of the same measurements. In other words, we insist once again on what is already explained in the 3.1 section.

The other assistant, the quick configuration, is the same as this one; the difference is that it only asks for the units of measure (first window of the previous assistant) and for the area of ​​the drawing (last window), for the rest of the parameters the default values ​​are considered. So it is no longer necessary to review it here.