Layers not showing up in layer drop down menu

[timothy.morral]

Hello,

I am a high school teacher that is currently learning AutoCad23 and teaching it to my students at the same time. Things were going well until we started to go over layers and about 5 out of 25 students do not have any layers in their drop down menu. Other students had a list with layers such as: borderline, centerline, etc... Why are the layers there for some students but not there for the others? Could they have made a mistake when configuring AutoCAD? 

Any help would be appreciated. I have been scouring the internet for a while but I can not seem to find a solution. 

I had them go in and manually put in the layers that I want them to have but I want to know why they weren't preloaded like the other students. 

[RSomppi · Accepted solution]

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@timothy.morral wrote:

I am a high school teacher that is currently learning AutoCad23 and teaching it to my students at the same time.

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Sounds like you're putting the cart before the horse.

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@timothy.morral wrote:

I had them go in and manually put in the layers that I want them to have but I want to know why they weren't preloaded like the other students. 

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They may have started with a different template.

[chadwickt · Accepted solution]

Hey Timothy!

Being in education myself, I am certainly familiar with learning as you go, and trying to stay ahead of the students!

If I had to guess, I would say that students are probably selecting the "New" button from the Home screen. This creates a new drawing based on the last template that was used. This might not be the same for every computer. The ones that are getting blank drawings are probably starting from the acad.dwt template.

Instead, have students select the "New" button from the Quick Access toolbar. That will bring up the "Select Template" dialog box. Then they can choose Tutorial-iArch for architectural drawings, or Tutorial-iMfg for mechanical drawings.

If you are looking for a book to use, I have a suggestion! 🙂

https://cadapult-software.com/product/a-practical-guide-to-autocad-2023/

Feel free to reach out to me at drafting@hutchcc.edu

-Tracy

[Kent1Cooper]

What shows up in the little drop-down listing is affected by what is set for filtering in the bigger Layer Properties Manager dialog box.  Make sure they all have the same filtering selected [All Layers vs. All used Layers vs. Xref Layers vs. non-Xref Layers vs. ...].

[RSomppi]

They were added manually. If what you are saying were the case, wouldn't there be a warning about duplicate names?

[timothy.morral]

Thank you so much! I worked with AutoCad when I was in college but haven't messed with it much since college. It dawned on me that the students that did not have the layers also did not open the drawing template that I asked them to. I appreciate the help!

I should have noticed in the lab but when you have 30 students in one computer lab things can get a little hectic. 

[timothy.morral]

That is exactly what it was. I should have noticed but the students that did not have the layers started a new drawing rather than loading the template that I wanted them to use. We are following a book but unfortunately some things aren't in the book and I am having to learn it on my own. I appreciate the help!

As far as putting the cart before the horse, that's pretty much public education in a nutshell. Educators teach what their told to teach to the best of their abilities or they find a new job. 

[RSomppi]

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@timothy.morral wrote:

As far as putting the cart before the horse, that's pretty much public education in a nutshell. Educators teach what their told to teach to the best of their abilities or they find a new job. 

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That explains a lot about what I've been seeing for years. How are these kids supposed to learn?

[Kent1Cooper]

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@RSomppi wrote:

They were added manually. If what you are saying were the case, wouldn't there be a warning about duplicate names?

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I'm not sure what you're referring to.  What I said was just about what Layer names are displayed in the different ways of seeing a listing of Layers -- they could have the same Layers, but just have different combinations of them showing in display.  [Or was this really in reply to someone else?]

But in any case, in the Layer Properties Manager dialog box, yes, you would get scolded for trying to create a new Layer with the little New Layer icon using the name of an existing one.  But in a command-line -LAYER command, if you use the New option to create a new Layer, and give it the name of an existing one, a message goes by:

Layer "{whatever}" already exists.

but the command is not bothered by it -- it just goes back to the regular options prompt and carries on, so it would be easy not to notice.  If you use the Make option to both create a new Layer and set it current in the process [something that it appears you can't do in the Layer Properties Manager in one step], and give it the name of an existing one, you don't even get that message -- it just does the set-it-current part of Making, and carries on.

[timothy.morral]

I try my hardest to stay in front of the students and ask questions when I need help. It takes a lot of preparation on the teachers part. I had some AutoCad experience when I was in college but it was Civil 3d. Unfortunately what I have to do is rely on a book and seek help. My students are picking up the basics and should leave with a basic (maybe very basic) understanding of drafting and design. I also enrolled on an online AutoCad course to better meet the needs of my students. But that is on my own time paid out of my pocket. 

Its the side of teaching that the general public does not understand. So when teachers complain about the amount of time they have to spend doing things outside of their contracted day the majority of them are not lying. Its one of the many  reasons leading to the teacher shortage in the United States. But that's probably a topic for another forum

[RSomppi]

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@Kent1Cooper wrote:

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@RSomppi wrote:

They were added manually. If what you are saying were the case, wouldn't there be a warning about duplicate names?

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I'm not sure what you're referring to. 

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The OP added them manually, as stated above. If they were successfully added, then they weren't present and hidden by a filter as you suggested.

[timothy.morral]

The problem was solved and it was a problem that resulted purely from inexperience. I am using a book that has a drawing template called inch-helper.dwt. The students were supposed to open the template rather than just clicking "new drawing". I was overthinking and never thought to ask my 14 and 15 year old students if they were using the appropriate template. Turns out the ones that followed directions had no issues in experimenting with layers, line weights, line styles and line colors. They also learned how to turn on/turn off layers, freeze/thaw layers and lock and unlock layers. I really do appreciate all of the help and how quickly I received the help! Even if my question was fairly basic. 

As far as adding the layers manually. The students that did not use the template had a layer labeled "0" and no other layers so there were no warnings about duplicating a layer. Tomorrow I will have those students open the template and hopefully that will help them understand the importance of reading and listening to all of the instructions. 

I really do appreciate the help and I apologize if my question was unclear. Hopefully I can rely on this community in the future as we proceed with AutoCad.