This is one of my favorite parts of the 2009 release. 2009 allows labeling of objects that are in external reference drawings. The ability to label both parcel segments and parcel area labels is sweet. It takes a little getting use too…

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I’m hereby offering to test in a controlled environment any network WAN accelerator that will agree to the test. You can have your guy on site, you can tweak and config based on what I throw, but you won’t know what I’m throwing until the day of the tests (hell, I probably won’t either.) Interested, gentlemen? Then read on. Read the rest of this entry »

In case you don’t get a monthly subscription  to CE News, or just want to get a head start, Mark’s article on the future of Civil Engineering and 3D cad, “Changing the Landscape,” is the cover story this month. He discusses a bit of background, and has some commentary from leaders at Autodesk, Bentley, and Carlson. This is the article to put on the boss’ desk if he doesn’t understand why C3D matters.

Good stuff. Go read it.

This is my first post here and I feel excited to be able to post to Civil3D.com! As some of you may know, I am a strong proponent of Data Shortcuts. Of course, currently Vault has its place, especially in larger engineering firms. Civil3D 2009 has changed the way to work with Data Shortcuts that has really made it a competitor in the data management arena.

What to learn more?

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A few weeks ago I wrote a post called REGEN Rules that presented some ideas for datasharing and layout creation that would (hopefully) mitigate the torturous regen times that some of you are experiencing. Since then, I’ve had a little help understanding more about what is happening in the program. Special thanks to Lisa, one of the developers in Manchester, for helping me brainstorm some ideas and giving me a look behind the scenes.

Read on…

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Sometimes we just want to share an article that’s cool, or amusing, but doesn’t really fit in with the rest of the civil3d.com theme. Well, we’ve added a new section on the left titled We’re Reading that will show you the last 10 things the civil3d.com team added to our del.icio.us link list. Now you can read along, or laugh at the stuff we read and share outside the blog.

This should be interesting.

I’ll be teaching a pre-conference workshop on Tuesday April 22, 2008 at the DE GIS Conference in Dover, DE. The Conference itself is on Wednesday, April 23, and is always a great program. I’ll be attending the conference as well. If you hustle up and register by April 4, the conference is only $90, and add $20 for the pre-conference workshops. I’d say that’s a STEAL, wouldn’t you?

I’ll be giving away two (2!) copies of Mastering AutoCAD Civil 3D 2008. So bring your business card!

GIS for Civil Engineers and Land Development Professionals in the CAD Environment (Dana Probert, Engineered Efficiency)
Tuesday, April 22, 2008 1:00pm - 4:00 pm

Learn more about the Pre-Conference Workshops here:

http://www.degis.org/workshops.html

Read below for my agenda (which is also on the Workshops page)

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I’ve posted here before about using expressions to modify how a label component offsets. In the upcoming 2009 release one of my favorite new features is the Drawing Scale Conversion in expressions.

The Drawing Scale Conversion is the scale of the drawing in Model Space or the scale of the viewport in Paperspace. Previously if you wanted to adjust a value by the viewport scale in an expression you had to create a style for each scale or enter the scale conversion manually when the scale change. In 2009 the Drawing Conversion Scale will automate the task.

Another possible use of the Drawing Conversion Scale would be to make a block a constant size, regardless of the viewport scale. Or use an if then statement in the expression to vary the text height based on the viewport scale. This way a label could be one size for scales 1"=20′ to 1"=50′ and another text size for larger scales.

The Opportunities page just added a new position for a CE in the Alabama area. If you’re looking for a new gig, or looking to bring on some experienced C3D users, check it out and get in touch about placing your ad.

I received an email this morning from Joerg at Autodesk in Munich with some really neat things you can do with the new View/Edit Corridor Sections interface.

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