CAD Managers

[#1]

What's a good place to get impartial advice among instructors? I teach 3 or 4 nights each week at various school nearby, and would like to share thoughts and ideas with other instructors. I don't want JUST the Autodesk sales talk, I want to hear from actual independant adjunct and full time teachers.

For example, does anybody bother teaching Groups? Multilines? Aerial View? Some of the features over the years weren't well received in industry, and in my opinion, shouldn't be taught unless time permits the "history lesson".

[#2]

You might try AUGI or visit CadTUTOR.net (a very lively bunch there) you may
even convince them of a need for an educators sub forum.

Funny you should mention Aerial View and "features not received well" in
the same paragraph. I use Aerial View extensively and find it to be a very
efficient means to navigate the drawing. I suspect the vast majority do not use
it but just because the industry does not "accept" something does not mean
teaching it has no value .

I suppose while I'm at it I might add that non teachers may contribute to the
discussion as well (after all, your students will need to adjust to the "real"
world).

--

Patrick Hughes

Engineered Design Solutions
CadTempo: Time Logging for CAD
visit http://www.Cadtempo.com
_____________________________

wrote in message news:6346623@discussion.autodesk.com...
What's a good place to get impartial advice among instructors? I teach 3 or 4
nights each week at various school nearby, and would like to share thoughts and
ideas with other instructors. I don't want JUST the Autodesk sales talk, I want
to hear from actual independant adjunct and full time teachers.

For example, does anybody bother teaching Groups? Multilines? Aerial View?
Some of the features over the years weren't well received in industry, and in my
opinion, shouldn't be taught unless time permits the "history lesson".

[#3]

There is a dedicated forum for Educators already on AUGI, it's under the
CAD Management section

http://forums.augi.com/forumdisplay.php?f=245

It's not extremely busy, but, if a couple of people start some good
conversations, I'm sure that could easily change.


Cheers,


Melanie Perry
***not all who wander are lost***
http://augi.com/autocad
http://mistressofthedorkness.blogspot.com

On 3/1/2010 7:05 PM, Patrick Hughes wrote:
> You might try AUGI or visit CadTUTOR.net (a very lively bunch there) you may
> even convince them of a need for an educators sub forum.
>
> Funny you should mention Aerial View and "features not received well" in
> the same paragraph. I use Aerial View extensively and find it to be a very
> efficient means to navigate the drawing. I suspect the vast majority do not use
> it but just because the industry does not "accept" something does not mean
> teaching it has no value .
>
> I suppose while I'm at it I might add that non teachers may contribute to the
> discussion as well (after all, your students will need to adjust to the "real"
> world).
>

[#4]

http://www.autodesk.com/edcommunity

[#5]

I assume you are referring to AutoCAD's Group command. That is in my opinion, one of the worst commands ever created. While other programs are able to group and ungroup things very easily, AutoCAD had that overly complicated dialog box. If I were to make a list of my least favorite AutoCAD commands, that one would be on the top. I never included the Group command in my courses for that reason, and nobody ever asked about it, either. Not only that; during the time I worked with AutoCAD in architectural offices, nobody ever mentioned it, used it, or knew about it. Not a popular tool at all.

Alfredo Medina
info@planta1.com

[#6]

Groups are nice for creating saved selection sets, but not if you have to
use the dialog box - we've got MG and EG macros to make group and explode
group (thanks, James Maeding). Those, with Ctl-H to toggle groups on/off,
is very handy.

I've used it for years and wouldn't want to see them drop groups.

"Alfredo_Medina" wrote in message news:6354538@discussion.autodesk.com...
> I assume you are referring to AutoCAD's Group command. That is in my
> opinion, one of the worst commands ever created. While other programs are
> able to group and ungroup things very easily, AutoCAD had that overly
> complicated dialog box. If I were to make a list of my least favorite
> AutoCAD commands, that one would be on the top. I never included the Group
> command in my courses for that reason, and nobody ever asked about it,
> either. Not only that; during the time I worked with AutoCAD in
> architectural offices, nobody ever mentioned it, used it, or knew about
> it. Not a popular tool at all.
>
> Alfredo Medina
> info@planta1.com

[#7]

Egads, Alfredo. I use the group command (automatically within our lisp
routines, and/or using Toolpac's grouping tool, and/or the dialog itself
(mostly for sleuthing what group something belongs to, then adding
additional object or removing object from it)), probably dozens of times a
day. MLines as well. I have a hard time understanding the mindset of
people who want to gut functionality from the software 'because they
personally don't see the need for it'.

Whether or not as an instructor you see the need to teach it is your cookie.
I would expect that about 3-5 minutes of instruction would be sufficient for
it. ("Here's something else that you can do, should you have the need for
it, it works this way...") Then move on. I can't really see the problem
myself.

As for anyone 'ever asking about it', what's to ask about if they never knew
it existed?

At any rate, I'd be pretty ticked if Autodesk ripped it out.

Regards,
David Kozina


wrote in message news:6354538@discussion.autodesk.com...
I assume you are referring to AutoCAD's Group command. That is in my
opinion, one of the worst commands ever created. While other programs are
able to group and ungroup things very easily, AutoCAD had that overly
complicated dialog box. If I were to make a list of my least favorite
AutoCAD commands, that one would be on the top. I never included the Group
command in my courses for that reason, and nobody ever asked about it,
either. Not only that; during the time I worked with AutoCAD in
architectural offices, nobody ever mentioned it, used it, or knew about it.
Not a popular tool at all.

Alfredo Medina
info@planta1.com

[#8]

David

You are the first person I have known of that actually uses the Group command. The other person was... some years ago, when I made the same comment about this command in these newsgroups. Probably it was you back then, too?
As of Mlines and Toolpac, now that you mention them together, ask Terry W. Dotson his opinion about Mlines, he would tell you: "Mlines are useless!" :-)

Alfredo

[#9]

Hijole...

MY drafting instructor had the best retort for that sort of nonsense:

"Do you wanna go home bawling?"




wrote in message news:6355184@discussion.autodesk.com...
David

You are the first person I have known of that actually uses the Group
command. The other person was... some years ago, when I made the same
comment about this command in these newsgroups. Probably it was you back
then, too?
As of Mlines and Toolpac, now that you mention them together, ask Terry W.
Dotson his opinion about Mlines, he would tell you: "Mlines are useless!"
:-)

Alfredo

[#10]

Mlines make good slots.

wrote in message news:6355184@discussion.autodesk.com...
David

You are the first person I have known of that actually uses the Group
command. The other person was... some years ago, when I made the same
comment about this command in these newsgroups. Probably it was you back
then, too?
As of Mlines and Toolpac, now that you mention them together, ask Terry W.
Dotson his opinion about Mlines, he would tell you: "Mlines are useless!"
:-)

Alfredo