Year End Offers on AutoCAD 2007 from Envision IT

Year End Offers on AutoCAD 2007, Upgrades especially from R14, 2000, 2000i, 2002

Received this email from Steve Bungay of Envision IT. Steve is a member of Vicaug, and, as such deserves your support. Contact Steve at the address below if you’re interested.

As usual, we are running year end special pricing, especially on AutoCAD Upgrades from R14, 2000, 2000i and 2002 under the loyalty program

We encourage VICAUG members to upgrade their products through the promotional offer. We offering AutoCAD 2007 Under Loyalty Program, with Subscription just for $4444. AutoCAD LT 2007 New Seat is priced @$1945 and many other attractive offers. This Includes GST & Delivery.

To avail this offer, VICAUG Members should place order by 30th June 2006. If they are interested, we will be able to offer discount on Hardware, Onsite Services (@$90 Per Hour). We also are offering two Seats of AutoCAD Training, 3 Day Course for just $795.

Please circulate this amongst VICAUG members. We would be happy to hear from them.

Regards

Steve Bungay

Envision IT – Specialised products & solutions for workplaces, environment & Communities

Envision I.T. Pty Ltd – ABN No. 59 104 555 688

Tel: +61 3 9886 7240

Fax: + 61 3 9886 7377
Mob: +61 425 732 510

Email: steve@envisionit.com.au
Web: www.envisionit.com.au
Add: 7/251 Blackburn Rd , Mount Waverley VIC 3149, Australia

AutoCAD 2007 Hotfix Available

Fatal Error During Save 

Here's a beauty if you are using AutoCAD 2007. It's available from

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=7450147&linkID=2475161

Description of Problem
A fatal error occurs during an auto save or an explicit save of a drawing. The problem occurs randomly, most often when using Autodesk® Civil 3D® 2007, Autodesk® Land Desktop 2007, and Autodesk® Architectural Desktop 2007. It is known to occur when using other products on the list below as well, but less frequently.

Minutes of Committee Meeting 14 June 2006

A GENERAL INTEREST SUMMARY OF THE COMMITTEE MEETING OF THE VICTORIAN AUTOCAD USERS GROUP INCORPORATED (VICAUG INC.) www.dbm.com.au/vicaug
HELD ON WEDNESDAY 14 JUNE 2006
Opening:
The President declared the meeting open(ed) at 8.30 pm.

General Business:
a.
GST system – VICAUG to stay in or “Opt Out” from the “GST System”?:
There was some discussion on the merits and effort of VICAUG remaining in the GST system or whether to “opt out” of it. The Committee will discuss and decide on the issue/s after receipt of a report.

b.
Suitability of new RMIT General meeting venue and tenure:
RMIT Building 94, 5th. Floor, 23-27 Cardigan Street, CARLTON VIC 3053 (“Melway” Reference: 2B-E11):

The meeting at the “new” “RMIT” venue at the RMIT Building 94 in Carlton was most impressive in all respects. The members in attendance agreed that it was an ideal venue. The venue seems to be regularly and readily available.

The Committee decided that we would continue to use this venue until the December 2006 General meeting at least. Prior to this time it would/is to/will be reviewed to determine if we should “stay” there for an as yet to be determined time.

Alternative possible venues were discussed but will not be pursued further with unless and/or until necessary i.e. they are “on the back burner”.

c.
2006/07 membership subscription:
The membership subscription for 2006/07 was discussed. It will be decided by members at the AGM (August) and will be due and payable one calendar month after the AGM i.e. 07 August + 1 month = 07 October 2006.

d.
2006/07 Committee – nominations etc:
The President advised that all of the 2004/05 Committee would (re)nominate for their current positions in/on the 2006/067 Committee.

2006 Annual General Meeting (August 2006) matters:
The 2006 Annual General Meeting (AGM) at which the 2006/07 Committee will be elected, Reports received and discussed and 2006/07 subscription set will be conducted as part of the General Meeting to be held on Monday 07 August 2006 – of which members will receive due notice.

2006 General meetings: Presentations and other matters for August, October and December meetings :
General meetings will continue to be held on the first Monday of “even” months of each year at:
RMIT Building 94, 5th. Floor, 23-27 Cardigan Street, CARLTON VIC 3053
(“Melway” Reference: 2B-E11)

Meetings, to commence at 6.30 pm, are to be held on Monday(s): 07 AUG (AGM); 02 OCT; 04 DEC.

Members will be advised by email of Notice/s of Meetings. Notices/advices will also be published on the “VICAUG News” web log (“blog”).

Presentation Topics:
a. August 2006:
- AGM;
- Air-conditioning software/utility”: Ian Hunter, AEC Software Systems;
- “Navisworks” reviewing software;
- “News from the Pews”: Mark Miller;
- “Tips and Tricks”: Mark Miller.

b. October 2006:
- “Sketchup” – by Chris Needham (Mark Miller/Peter Godfrey to confirm);

- “News from the Pews”: Mark Miller;
- “Tips and Tricks”: Mark Miller.

c. December 2006:
- to be advised (by Mark Miller)
- “News from the Pews”: Mark Miller;
- “Tips and Tricks”: Mark Miller.

Possible topics for future meeting/s (to be determined/confirmed):
- Security of Drawings and files
- Presentations of Drawing Standards and AS1100 – Mark Miller
- Various computer/computing-related general interest and AutoCAD-specific interest items – by various Committee members
- AutoDesk “Inventor” – Mark Miller to advise.
- “Shareware” and “Freeware” (various) – Mark Miller to advise.

Minutes of Committee Meetings:
Full copies of the Minutes of Committee meetings in email (i.e. *.eml format) form are to be forwarded by the Secretary to all Committee members for review and comment.

“Summarised” versions/copies of the Committee Meeting Minutes are to be forwarded as emails by the Secretary to Committee members for review and comment prior to the “blog” administrator/Editor (Peter Godfrey) forwarding it/them to subscribing members.

A general interest summarised version of the Minutes will be provided for up-loading to the “blog”.

“VICAUG Newsletter” “weblog” (“blog”):
The “VICAUG Newsletter” web log (i.e. “blog”) is (to be) regularly revised and updated by the “blog” Editor as an informative, informal readily down-loadable source of information to members and the wider AutoCAD community.

Notices and Minutes of VICAUG General meetings are to be up-loaded to the blog as soon after the events as is reasonably possible

Catering:
Catering remains well organised and cost-effective.

General Business:
General Discussion and Speculation (On-going):
General discussion on CAD, computer, training and employment matters.

Dates of and venues for Committee Meetings:
Committee Meetings are run in accordance with the agreed Agenda which will be included in the Notice of Committee Meeting which is to be e-mailed to all Committee members prior to each and all Committee meetings.

Dates of monthly Committee meetings are:
- “even” months: the Wednesday evening of the week following a General meeting; and
- “odd” months: Wednesday evenings four weeks (28 days) after the “even” month Committee meeting.

Venue for Committee meetings:
Committee meetings are to be held at the residence of a Committee member.

VICAUG members are welcome top attend Committee meetings.
Members of VICAUG are more than welcome to attend any or all Committee meetings. Contact the Vice president (Peter Godfrey),
Phone: 03 9602 4273
email: trouserspgodfrey@netspace.net.au (remove trousers to get the actual email address!)

Next Committee Meeting:
The next Committee meeting will be held on Wednesday 19th. July 2006 commencing at 8.00 pm.

Closure:
There being no further business, the President Closed the meeting at 10.30 pm.

(M.J. Ginnane)
Secretary and Public Officer.

Notes on the June 2006 Meeting

Mark welcomed all to the first meeting in the new RMIT venue and especially the presenters Chris Needham, ImaginIT and Ian Hunter. The new venue is well set up and meets our needs, although car parking in the street is difficult to find at 6 o’clock. Next month, we’ll start the meeting at 6:30 to see if that makes life easier.

Tables, Fields and Hatching Improvements
Chris Needham
Chris presented a “leftover” session from last month, but a tasty one nevertheless! He covered some of the features which have been introduced or enhanced in the newer versions of AutoCAD.

Tables have been around in AutoCAD for a while now – they first arrived in AutoCAD 2005. To draw a table, first make sure that you have a suitable table style defined. These are a bit like DIM styles. The default size of table elements is assuming that they are to be drawn in paper space, or at least in a drawing whose plot scale is 1:1.
In AutoCAD 2006, you can reference cells by rows and columns, which opens up the possibility of using formulas to calculate the contents of other cells. You can now inert blocks in a table cell as a graphic image. This is useful for creating a legend of drawing symbols. You can even put fields in cells which can, for example, contain polyline areas for a live room area schedule.

Fields too, have a range of formatting options like m2 instead of mm2. You can then generate a live updating schedule of areas in the drawing. If you’re familiar with the way that Microsoft Word handles fields, then you’ll be right at home here. Fields really come into their own when used with the Sheet Set Manager, but that’s a whole topic for another meeting.

Hatching has been much improved in later versions. There’s a new system variable called HPGAPTOL that controls what size gap in the hatch boundary will be covered in the hatching. Still it does tend to get confused by arcs and other objects which “touch” the hatch area. Sometimes it’s still better to draw a polyline boundary in a no-plot layer and just use that to generate the hatch.

Hatch origin used to be controlled by the SNAPBASE system variable but now there’s a new one called HPORIGIN. You can easily set the hatch origin in the hatch or hatchedit dialog box. Osnaps can be set to ignore hatch objects if you wish. Find this under “Drafting Setting” in the Options dialog. Other recent enhancements include the ability to trim (but not extend) hatches and to re-create boundaries.

There have been a lot of new system variables introduced recently. Have a look at the list of system variables in the AutoCAD 2007 help file. Spend five minutes per day here and in no time you’ll be an AutoCAD power user!

AutoCAD Mechanical
David Morgan and Kent Matthews of ImaginIT.
David introduced himself and the company and explained the basic relationship between the various Autodesk mechanical products. They are resellers of mechanical products including AutoCAD, AutoCAD Mechanical, Mechanical Desktop and Autodesk Inventor.

Kent is a contractor working mainly in Inventor, but is presenting AutoCAD Mechanical tonight, so it’ll be interesting to see how he gets on with a major software program which is relatively new to him. He opened a drawing with a feature tree. This is something you don’t see every day in vanilla AutoCAD! They’ve beefed up the standard xref command to take heed of the mechanical features of the model. You can structure your models and assemblies with a mixture of local and externally referenced objects. This is a facility which is lacking in many 3D CAD programs. It gives you a lot of freedom in constructing your model. One neat way of doing this is to do your models in Inventor and then bring them into AutoCAD Mechanical to generate the 2D documentation.

The question was asked: Why don’t you simply do it in 3D all the way? There are a few good reasons, but one is that it’s simply a marketing response from Autodesk to the fact that many engineering drawing offices still prefer 2D design. This may be due to the steep 3D hardware requirements, increased productivity in simple parts or simply inertia. Whatever the reason, there’s still plenty of demand for a slick 2D mechanical drafting package.

Slick’s the word, too. Kent is happy to admit that he’s a novice in AutoCAD Mechanical 2007 – he only loaded it today – but he made a creditable attempt at drawing a shaft using the built in shaft generator. It was interesting to see the method of generating a shaft that a novice takes. The “wrong turns” that Kent took were in fact most instructive and generated a lot of healthy audience participation to put things right. This sort of demonstration can be more valuable than a smooth “canned” presentation where everyone falls asleep!
The big difference between AutoCAD Mechanical and vanilla AutoCAD is that you’re drawing “parts” rather than just dumb lines. You can manipulate these parts by moving, copying etc. yet keep track of their attributes. Even though it’s only 2D, in many situations it’s faster than trying to model everything in 3D.

Minutes of the June 2006 General Meeting

(Victoria Associations Incorporation Act 1981(as at 01 July 1998) Registered No. A 13467)

www.dbm.com.au/vicaug

Postal Address: PO Box 466, ELSTERNWICK VIC 3185

MINUTES OF THE JUNE 2006 GENERAL MEETING

HELD AT:

RMIT BUILDING 94, 5TH. FLOOR
23-27 CARDIGAN STREET, CARLTON

ON:

 MONDAY, 5TH. JUNE 2006

Attendance:

As per Attendance Book.

Apologies:
Apologies were received.

Opening:
The President, Mark Miller, welcomed everyone attending and opened the June 2006 General Meeting at 6.30 pm.

Minutes of Previous Meeting (April 2006):
The Minutes of the previous General Meeting held on the 3rd. April 2006 as circulated with the Notice Paper in the "Newsletter" aka "Vicaug News" – ((we)blog) were received, adopted and approved. There was no business from the Minutes of the previous Meeting.

The President's Opening Address (the Prez Sez):
The President in his opening address, welcomed all in attendance to this new venue. He advised that our previous venue was no longer available and that this venue was being "trialled" by the Committee to see if ti suited VICAUG and its members. He asked if there were any comments (only good – with reservations about arriving early before the adequate "free" car-parking became available). He asked if the members in attendance approved of the venue as this is required by the Committee to determine future booking/s of this venue. All in attendance agreed that the venue suited in all respects. 

Keeping up to date with VICAUG news and any other matters:
The President advised that members should regularly "log on" to the VICAUG Weblog ("blog") site at  http://vicaug.wordpress.com and VICAUG's web page at  www.dbm.com.au/vicaug  – both of which are (to be) regularly updated – to keep themselves aware of items of interest. This particularly applies to the venues for future General Meetings and other items of interest.

If members have any ideas, let a Committee member know or drop an email to Peter Godfrey at pgodfrey at netspace dot net dot au. (replace the appropriate words with punctuation or course); and keep "logging on" to the VICAUG "blog" at: http://vicaug.wordpress.com  and web site at www.dbm.com.au/vicaug  for regular updates of/on a variety if matters of interest to members.

Presentations:

1. AutoCAD "Tips and Tricks" – by Chris Needham:

Chris gave an excellent informative and entertaining delivery as the final presentation in his AutoCAD Tips and Tricks series.

Subjects covered included – amongst others – Tables; Fields; and Hatching.

2. AutoCAD Mechanical 2007 – by David Morgan and Kent Matthews of Imaginit Technologies:

David Morgan and Kent Matthews introduced themselves and their Company (Imaginit Technologies) and how they had used and provided tools for efficiency gains in and with AutoCAD Mechanical 2007 – as compared to previous releases of AM and competitive "third party" products. This too was a very well presented topic with a comprehensive "question and answer" session.

 

3. News for the Pews: by Mark Miller, President of VICAUG:

Due to other previous obligations, this was a shortened presentation but included: insights into the world of gadgets (not just  AutoCAD) and technology.

"Thank You's":
The President thanked Chris Needham, David Morgan and Kent Matthews for their excellent presentations. He also thanked members who had attended and participated in the presentations.

Reporting on Technical Aspects relating to Technical Aspects of Presentations Etc:
These minutes are of a general(ised) and "précis" nature only.

A more focussed, technical and topic-specific report by "others/another" will appear in the VICAUG  Weblog (i.e. "blog") – which is published on a "continuing/ongoing" basis at: http://vicaug.wordpress.com

The "blog" report/s will also include all links relating to the subject matter of these Minutes.
Next Meeting:
The next General meeting is intended to be held on Monday 7th. August 2006 at this venue i.e. RMIT Building 94, 5th. Floor at 23-27 Cardigan Street, CARLTON – commencing at 6.30 pm.

Members should note that the 2006 Annual General Meeting (AGM) and election of the 2006/07 Committee will take place during the August 2006 General Meeting.

Closure: 
There being no further business, the President thanked all for attending, and closed the meeting at 9.30 pm.

(M.J.Ginnane)
Secretary and Public Officer.

Notice of the June 2006 Meeting

Here's the text of the email sent out to the membership last night.
Note New RMIT Venue!

VICTORIAN AUTOCAD USERS GROUP INCORPORATED (VICAUG INC.)

(C&BAV Incorporation Registration Number: A 13467S)

ABN: 65 553 575 021

Greetings friends

*** Next Vicaug Meeting ***

A quick reminder: Only a few sleeps to go to the next Victorian AutoCAD Users Group meeting on

6:00pm Monday  5th June

at our NEW VENUE

which is

5th Floor, RMIT Building 94, 23-27 Cardigan St Carlton

This is on the west side of Cardigan St, just north of Victoria St. Car parking is available at the kerbside or in the centre of the road. There is also a multi-storey Wilson car park right next door, which is open until 10pm (fee payable). Alternatively, the area is well served by public transport: trains to Melbourne Central station and / or trams along Swanston Street.

Our meeting room is called Studio 1, room number 9405007. Take the lifts up to the fifth floor, go through the double doors opposite, follow the corridor around to the left and Studio 1 is on the left side, towards the end of the corridor.

Please don't turn up to Walsh St – they might be a little surprised! Again the venue is at RMIT – see above.

We are trialling this venue to see if this suits us as a permanent home. Therefore, we welcome your comments and suggestions.

All Welcome!

As before, food and drinks will be provided, along with the opportunity to meet up with fellow AutoCAD users.

And, in case you were wondering, the presenters and topics for the meeting are…

As well as presentations on AutoCAD Techniques, the June meeting features demonstrations of

AutoCAD Mechanical 2007

Ian Hunter's AutoCAD addon for ductwork design

and

the conclusion of Chris Needham's AutoCAD Tips and Tricks session

 plus the usual News, Tips and Tricks, Your AutoCAD Questions Answered and friendly chat.

Note: order of business may be amended at the discretion of the President.
Check the Vicaug web page at www.dbm.com.au/vicaug and the blog at www.vicaug.wordpress.com for any late breaking news of this and other upcoming meetings.
A summary of the official agenda for the meeting is as follows:

6:00   Meeting room opened for social chat

6.30   Meeting Opened

6.30   President's address

          Minutes of Previous Meeting

          Business out of the Minutes of the Previous Meeting

          General Business

7.00   Presentations of Topics of interest

9.00   Such other Business as the President allows

9.30   Closure

Note: order of business may be amended at the discretion of the President.

Make the most of your Vicaug membership by coming along and learning, socializing and discussing any topics at all, even CAD-related ones! If you haven't been to a Vicaug meeting before, don't be shy – we're a very friendly bunch!

If you're not yet a member or need to renew your membership, please consider joining by printing out and completing the form below and posting it, together with your cheque to Vicaug Inc., P.O. Box 466 Elsternwick Vic. 3185. This will ensure that you continue to receive notifications of events, are entitled to vote at Vicaug elections and attend all Vicaug meetings. If you received this reminder, but not other benefits, it most likely means that you are not financial and that your "complimentary" subscription has expired. We also send the Newsletter to certain industry representatives and to those who have assisted the Group in major ways. If you have received this in error, or do not wish to have the newsletter sent to you this way, please accept our apologies and advise Peter Godfrey by email at pgodfrey@netspace.net.au and your name will be removed from the mailing list.

Regards

Peter Godfrey

Vicaug Vice President and Newsletter/Blog Editor

  Note New RMIT Venue!

*************************************************************************************

Vicaug Membership Application Form

To join or renew, print this form out, fill it in and post to PO Box 466 Elsternwick Vic. 3185

Vicaug Registration Number A13467, ABN 13 391 159 543 . This form becomes a Tax Invoice upon payment in full.

Member name

Company name:

Address:

Suburb

Postcode

Contact name for newsletters:

Contact name for invoices:

Telephone (BH)

Telephone (AH)

Telephone (Mobile).

Fax number

Email address

Area(s) of interest

Other attending representatives

Note the following scale of fees (simple huh?): $50.00 for first attending

member and $50.00 for each subsequent member. These figures include 10% GST,

being $45.45 subs plus $4.55 GST making a total of $50.00.

This form will become a Tax Invoice upon payment in full of the above dues.

Membership is current from AGM to AGM each year.

The VICAUG Committee has a policy of not issuing or disclosing member

information to any outside parties.

In the event of my admission as a member, I agree to be bound by the rules

of the Association for the time being in force, such agreement also being on

behalf of the other representatives nominated above.

Signed

Date

*************************************************************************************

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 Note New RMIT Venue!