Datasheet
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Part I: AutoCAD 101
Why choose AutoCAD? AutoCAD is just the starting point of a whole industry
of software products designed to work with AutoCAD. Autodesk has helped
this process along immensely by designing a series of programming interfaces
to AutoCAD (but not, alas, to AutoCAD LT — see the “Seeing the LT” section
later in the chapter) that other companies — and Autodesk itself — have used
to extend the application. Some of the add-on products have become such
winners that Autodesk acquired them and incorporated them into its own
products. When you compare all the resources — including the add-ons, exten-
sions, training courses, books, and so on — AutoCAD doesn’t have much PC
CAD competition.
The Importance of Being DWG
To take full advantage of AutoCAD in your work environment, you need to be
aware of the DWG file format, the format in which AutoCAD saves drawings.
Here are some DWG facts to keep in mind:
✓ In some cases, an older release of AutoCAD can’t open a DWG file that’s
been saved by a newer AutoCAD release.
✓ A newer release of AutoCAD can always open files saved by older
versions.
✓ Some previous AutoCAD releases can open files saved by the subse-
quent one or two versions. For example, AutoCAD 2007 and AutoCAD
2008 can open DWG files saved by AutoCAD 2009. That’s because
Autodesk didn’t change the DWG file format between those releases.
However, the drawing file format did change with AutoCAD 2010, so
drawings created in the current release must be saved in an older
format to be openable in AutoCAD 2009 and earlier.
✓ You can use the Save As option in newer releases to save the file to
some older DWG formats. In fact, AutoCAD 2011 can save as far back as
AutoCAD Release 14, which dates all the way back to 1997!
Table 1-1 shows which versions (described later in this chapter) use which
DWG file formats.
Table 1-1 AutoCAD Versions and DWG File Formats
AutoCAD Version AutoCAD LT Version Release
Year
DWG File
Format
AutoCAD 2011 AutoCAD LT 2011 2010 Acad 2010
AutoCAD 2010 AutoCAD LT 2010 2009 Acad 2010
AutoCAD 2009 AutoCAD LT 2009 2008 Acad 2007
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