Interestingly, it can operate both ways: you can enter text commands into the window and control your drawing from the command line while maximizing the use of the keyboard and minimizing use of the mouse and menus.

Autocad 2011 Won'T Mac After An

AutoCAD, the industry-standard Computer Aided Design (CAD) application from Autodesk, is back on the Mac after an 18-year hiatus.

This is good news for many Mac fans in the architecture, engineering, and design professions who have been unwilling to give up their MacBook Pros and iMacs for the sake of a single application, despite its status as a very important part of their workflow.

With the new Mac version of AutoCAD for freeform 2D and 3D design and drafting, Mac users no longer need to use Boot Camp or Parallels ( )or suffer a PC on the same desk with their Mac.

Autocad 2011 Won'T Mac OS X Interface

Rather, Autodesk has programmed this version for the Mac from the ground up with a conscious effort to take advantage of the Mac OS X interface.

Floating tool palettes also include most of the same tools as the menus, while the interface will look familiar to users of other Mac CAD applications.

Autodesk has also taken advantage of multi-touch trackpad gestures (and offers similar moves on Apples Magic Mouse ( ) For example, two-finger swipes scroll up or down, pinching can zoom in or out, and a shift plus two-finger swipe can rotate around a 3D model.

Cover Flow navigation lets you easily flip through your designs.

It makes the viewing your 3D model from different angles easy and intuitive.

While AutoCAD is a complex and powerful application, the system requirements are higher than much of the competition on the Mac (such as Vectorworks ( ), TurboCAD ( ), and Ashlar-Vellum), starting with a minimum of 3GB of RAM and higher screen resolution (1280 x 800 pixels).

The program works with only with more recent Mac hardware such as Mac Pro (early 2009), MacBook Pro (mid-2009), and iMac (early 2008).

To be fair, youd want to use a high resolution monitor with a CAD program anyway, given the quantity and level of graphic detail youre typically working with.

But, you are less likely to be disappointed with AutoCADs performance if you bought your Mac in the last couple of years.

When you first launch AutoCAD 2011, you will be presented with the drawing canvas or Modelspace, the window where you will build your drawing or model.

The menus are extensive, and the tool and information palettes are arranged to the left and right of the canvas.

One of the first things you will notice is that the default background in AutoCAD is black or slate-colored with the lines and objects you draw in white (or bright colors).

This differs from most Mac CAD or graphic design applications, which typically have a white background with black and color drawing elements on top.

You can change the background color in the preferences and, in fact, much of the interface can be altered to suit your own tastes, including which tools show up in the palettes and where the palettes are located on screen.

One interface element Autodesk brought over from the Windows version is the ViewCube, a very useful graphical navigation element for controlling 3D views.

It allows you to rotate your drawing and model, or jump to standard 3D views and orientations with a single click.

The ViewCube rotates as you click on it, giving you a visual representation of your drawing at various angles.

Moving around a 3D model can be disorienting, and the ViewCube does a good job of letting you know whether you are looking from above, below, or at some oblique angle.

Another uniquely AutoCAD interface element is the Command Line window.

At first it looks like some DOS operating system throwback, but it is actually a very useful window because it displaysin text formateverything that is going on while youre drawing, line-by-line, command-by-command.

Autocad 2011 For Mac Won'T Install