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Beginners AutoCAD Civil 3D Setup for Land Surveyors: Setup Drawing Settings

August 18, 2012 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics, Business, Continuing Education, Geomatics, Land Surveying, Members, Premium Membership, Professional Land Surveyor Practice, Surveying Software

Civil 3D Help

Civil 3D Help

Premium Members Only

Premium Members Only

This Premium Members Post is part of a the Beginners AutoCAD Civil 3D Setup for Land Surveyors series.

Today, let’s look at a few of the basic AutoCAD Civil 3D Drawing Settings to setup. There are five important settings that every land surveyor and designer must know how to set.

These instructional articles are for Premium Members Only. You can register here »Premium Signup.

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Basic AutoCAD Civil 3D Setup Planning and Preparation

July 28, 2012 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics, Business, Continuing Education, Geomatics, Land Surveying, Members, Premium Membership, Professional Land Surveyor Practice, Surveying Software

Civil 3D Help

Civil 3D Help

Premium Members Only

Premium Members Only

This Premium Members Post is part of a the Beginners AutoCAD Civil 3D Setup for Land Surveyors series.

Today, let’s begin the real work in the Beginners AutoCAD Civil 3D Setup for Land Surveyors series with some preliminary planning and preparation. While this may not sound sexy, too many land surveyors and designers overlook or skip this step, resulting in unnecessary frustration with AutoCAD Civil 3D.

All these instructional articles are for Premium Members Only, which means you must signup and login to this site to get access. You can register here »Premium Signup.

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Intro to Beginners AutoCAD Civil 3D Setup for Land Surveyors

July 14, 2012 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics, Business, Continuing Education, Geomatics, Land Surveying, Members, Premium Membership, Professional Land Surveyor Practice, Surveying Software

Premium Members Only

Premium Members Only

I get many request to write about how to set up AutoCAD Civil 3D for land surveyors. This Premium Members Post is an introduction to a series of articles for setting up AutoCAD Civil 3D for land surveying.

If you’re struggling with setting up AutoCAD Civil 3D or you feel that you’re missing some key secret to efficiently work with AutoCAD Civil 3D, then these articles will help you out. We’ll cover the basics of AutoCAD Civil 3D drawing settings, Survey Databases, working with Points, Description Keys Parcels, and Surfaces. Along the way, we’ll  keep things simple with a focus on getting you from raw survey data to plan.

All these instructional articles are for Premium Members Only, which means you must signup and login to this site to get access. You can register here »Premium Signup.

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AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics: Creating a New Description Key Set

January 4, 2011 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics, Business, Continuing Education, Land Surveying, Premium Membership, Professional Land Surveyor Practice

AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics

AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics

In today’s AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics, I’d like to discuss how to create a Description Key Set. This is the second in a series of Premium Posts about description keys. In this post I’ll show you how to create Description Keys Sets and where to find your Description Key Sets for land surveying using AutoCAD Civil 3D.

If you used Description Keys in versions of AutoCAD prior to Civil 3D, then you will mostly find using Description Keys in AutoCAD Civil 3D fairly familiar. In general, these are a few changes you’ll notice:

  • Instead of one global file, now there’s a Description Key Set (or more) in each drawing, provided you setup one or copy one into each drawing.
  • There are new ways to control blocks for point nodes (Markers via Point Styles) and how the points can be labeled (Point Label Styles).
  • You can now reorganize, filter and override the Description Keys to update which points show in your drawing, the Marker they use, and how they are labeled, using Point Groups. While point Groups aren’t Description Keys, you’ll find they work togehter so you can get more work done.

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AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics-What to do Before Creating a New Description Key Set

December 24, 2010 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics, Business, Continuing Education, Land Surveying, Premium Membership, Professional Land Surveyor Practice, Surveying Software

AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics

AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics

In today’s AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Topics, I’d like to discuss what to do before creating a Description Key Set. This is the first in a series of Premium Posts about description keys. I’ll start here with what to do before creating a new Description Key Set, then move on to how to setup Description Key Sets, and finally, how to use Description Keys in your everyday land surveying using AutoCAD Civil 3D.

I first embarked on setting up my first Description Key Sets when AutoCAD Civil 3D first came out, several years back, and recently prepared my first AutoCAD Civil 3D template, AutoCAD C3D Survey Essential Template Framework, but I was surprised at how much I’d forgotten from that first experience. You see, this past week I’ve been helping out a Premium Member who is setting up his first AutoCAD Civil 3D template, and it brought back all of the pitfalls and mistakes I made in creating my own first template.

I’d like to help you have an easier time setting up, or fixing, your Description Key Sets. Of course, you could go over to the Store and purchase the AutoCAD C3D Survey Essential Template Framework or if you’re a Premium Member it’s one or your free downloads, but you’ll at least have to think about the following steps to make any template meaningful and useful to you and your land surveying firm.

What to do Before Creating a New Description Key Set: Read the rest of this entry →

Are AutoCAD Civil 3D 2011 Label Style Layers Not Working?

June 11, 2010 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, Business, Land Surveying, Surveying Software

Professional Land Surveyor Forum

Professional Land Surveyor Forum

Last night I posted on the Professional Land Surveyor Forum a discussion topic, “Are AutoCAD Civil 3D 2011 Label Style Layers Not Working?” Here is what I posted there:

Is anyone else having this problem? I’m now using AutoCAD Civil 3D 2011, and when I set a layer in any Label Style the label, when created, does take on the attributes of that layer, but does not reside on the layer specified in the Label Style. It looks to me like the overrides are not fully functioning.

I bring this up for three reasons:

  1. I’m looking for an answer.
  2. I’m curious as to how many people this is happening to, besides me.
  3. I want you to be aware of this before you create a ton of labels and then have to manually select them all and switch them to the layer you wanted them on to begin with.

Follow this Professional Land Surveyor Forum »» Are AutoCAD Civil 3D 2011 Label Style Layers Not Working?

I first noticed this earlier this week when I was creating a whole bunch of General Note Labels and General Line Labels. After the labels where created, and I was selecting labels to be on/off and/or thaw/freeze in different viewpots in paperspace, I noticed that when I turned the layers off, or froze them, nothing was happening.

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AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Quick Tips and Tricks: Add Ribbon Menu Items To The Quick Access Toolbar

February 12, 2010 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Quick Tips and Tricks, Business, Continuing Education, Land Surveying, Surveying Software

Quick Access Toolbar

Quick Access Toolbar

In today’s AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Quick Tips and Tricks I’m going to show you how to Add Ribbon Menu Items To The Quick Access Toolbar.

This technique is very useful when you want to have easy access to a favorite AutoCAD Civil 3D menu item but don’t want the hassle of switching Ribbon Panels (particularly if you use that menu item often but don’t use or have its Ribbon Panel open for much else).

I must have discovered before how to Add Ribbon Menu Items To The Quick Access Toolbar and forgot about it, because I apparently did this to place Copy With Base Point on my Quick Access Toolbar sometime in the past. However, I “rediscovered” how to do this recently from another CAD blog. Unfortunately I don’t remember which one. I thought I had bookmarked the site, or added it to my Twitter Favorites, but when I started to put this Quick Tips and Tricks post together I couldn’t find or remember the source.

So, if it was you who recently blogged about the Add Ribbon Menu Items To The Quick Access Toolbar, where I got the inspiration for this post, please let us know in the comments or contact me so I can give you the credit you deserve!

Now on to the AutoCAD Civil 3D Surveying Quick Tips and Tricks to Add Ribbon Menu Items To The Quick Access Toolbar: Read the rest of this entry →

AutoCAD Civil 3D: 10 Tips for Setting it up for use in Land Surveying

July 8, 2009 in Associate Membership, AutoCAD Civil 3D, AutoCAD Civil 3D, Business, Land Surveying, Premium Membership, Professional Land Surveyor Practice, Surveying Software

AutoCAD Civil 3D

AutoCAD Civil 3D

In the Beginning

This is the beginning of a series of posts about setting up and using AutoCAD Civil 3D in your land surveying work. I know from the many conversations I’ve had with other professional land surveyors and mapping professionals that there is some confusion, and certainly a lot of frustration, with setting up and using AutoCAD Civil 3D.

Setting up and learning to use AutoCAD Civil 3D can be a daunting task, but it is well worth it once you’ve configured it to your company standards and learn to use, at the very least, some of the basics. I speak from experience and I know full well that you have a lot (A LOT) of setup ahead of you. I also went through this rocky experience, so I hope to make this a less painful experience for you.

Learning to use AutoCAD Civil 3D has not been as simple or as trouble free as I would have liked. However, I think it is unfair to lump all of the blame on AutoCAD Civil 3D. In all honesty, part of the problem with setting up and using AutoCAD Civil 3D is that it does require a lot of initial setup which is dependent upon your professional land surveying practice having standards in place.

A Brave New World

So,  you can look at this initial setup of AutoCAD Civil 3D as a negative or you can take a positive approach and use the setup of standards as a holistic overhaul of your surveying standards and procedures. And, this is where I shall start.

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