37 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent, Cost Efficient, Methodical, September 17, 2006
This review is from: AutoCAD 2007 and AutoCAD LT 2007: No Experience Required (Paperback)
Just as any study text should be, this book is plodding in its presentation. As an engineer familiar with AutoCAD 11 but very rusty indeed, this manual was a relief. I easily mastered all of its concepts and even managed to figure it out ahead of the author's demonstration. For its price, this is the place to go for any beginner or, like me, an old dog learning, or in my case, re-learning old tricks. The book starts out slow with basic line commands and builds slowly. It was difficult sometimes, and I sometimes referred to a second book as a reference; this is usually a good idea unless you are a masochist -- buy a second highly recommended book. Later, the manual goes into more sophisticated drawings. It has not been effortless but the author should be commended for achieving his goal of making learning AutoCAD as painless as possible. And, the price is reasonable. In 2002, I took an AutoCAD LT class. It was far more difficult and less comprehensible than this manual. It seems to me, that a company could save money by using this text instead and allowing self-paced training.
The second book I purchased as a backup is twice as expensive although it has a training CD. I planned to use it but decide it was unnecessary. Perhaps, I will use it as a refresher.
After completing Frey's manual, I plan to go on to more complicated training material. Why should I apologize for being a perfectionist?
This is an outstanding text on AutoCAD 2007.
As I completed the last sections of the book, I found a few errors. While the crucial chapters in the beginning are accurate, a few errors crept into the later chapters. Fortunately, the student should be able to maneuver around these problems with the skills learned at that point.
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19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
makes autocad easy to learn, September 28, 2006
This review is from: AutoCAD 2007 and AutoCAD LT 2007: No Experience Required (Paperback)
what i like about this book, over the books that come from autodesk, the makers of autocad, is that it's trimmed down. it isn't filled with lots of extra stuff you will never use. this book is simple and straight forward, which is what you need when you're using a monster of a program like autocad. the reason for the monster, is so anyone, with varied applications, can use this program. ideally, the program be would customized per use; eg there could be autocad for drawing small mechanical parts, one for designing hvac systems, one for architecture (this finally exists in the form of autocad architectual desktop), one for circuit design, etc. with specialized versions of autocad, a manual could be written specific for each use. maybe this type of manual exists already, using autocad for each specific use, but i haven't found it yet.
if you are new to learning autocad, get this book or another that's labeled "for beginners." this way you'll learn the just basics, without memorizing stuff, you'll never need.
i also like 'introduction to autocad 2007' by paul richard, but it's 80.00! the books i've read from autodesk that i like are: 'autocad 2007 a problem solving approach,' 'autocad 2007 quick ref illustrated guide' and 'autocad 2007 fundamentals' (also good for beginners). there's also 'autocad 2007 the basics,' but i haven't read that one yet.
autocad the basics:
before you begin:
SAVE AS to name your dwg file
now use the format pull-down menu to:
set up LAYERS. one for drawing your paper layout (with borders and name of the drawing, etc), one for drawing your object or model, one for text, one for hidden lines, one for viewport (call it "vport". this is necessary when printing or "plotting" as it's called), ..
set your drawing LIMITS: (0,0) to however big your object is (200,200), for example.
set up your UNITS: decimal or arhitectual (feet-inches)
you'll need to know how to draw a line or other object with RELATIVE POINT ENTRY as well as POLAR.
polar is easy and is automatic when drawing with your mouse. when drawing a line, click the first point and a window will appear with distance and angle options. enter distance and angle or do it with the mouse.
relative point entry is drawing a line or object in relation to another line or object. click on the line icon (or other object to draw), make sure dynamic is on, see the "DYN" and the dark line to the left and top of the DYN icon at the bottom tool bar, at the bottom of the screen. pick a point on your current object, enter the "@" symbol and x and y coordinates (how far you want it to go in the horizontal direction, x, and how far in the vertical direction, y).
MIDPOINT, ENDPOINT, CENTERPOINT
when drawing in autocad, it's helpful to select current drawn objects at the end, exact middle, center, etc. to do this, make sure "OSNAP" is on, dark line at left and top, at the bottom of the screen. now go to "OTRACK", right next to OSNAP and right-click. a small window will pop up, click on settings. another window will pop up and you can select center, midpoint, endpoint, intersection, and many other options.
i'll soon make a blog of other cool autocad stuff, but made simple and with a more detailed explanation.
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23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
3D coverage, June 2, 2006
This review is from: AutoCAD 2007 and AutoCAD LT 2007: No Experience Required (Paperback)
I work with 160 people in one office of a large national architecture firm that just migrated from AutoCAD 2002 to AutoCAD 2007. Excited about AutoCAD 2007's refined 3D user interface and expanded capabilities in this area I bought this book for use in our office.
As it turns out, Frey does not include a full discussion of 3D. Instead he relegates it to a 46 page appendix stating, "Covering 3D in real depth is beyond the scope of this book...." (page 609). The book description above that states, "Understand the new 3D capabilities that make AutoCAD 2007 the complete design tool" is misleading.
-Mark
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