AutoCAD is a computer-assisted drafting program. AutoCAD is the world's best-selling 2D drafting software and is used by more than four million people worldwide. Learn more at Autodesk.com.
AutoCAD has seen a lot of progress over the years, and it's now a powerful tool in its own right. But it's still one of the programs that make or break CAD startups.
If you're building a company with a particular focus on CAD, you'll know that having great autoCAD software is essential for your business to flourish. AutoCAD is a hard program to use, because its legacy of clunky user interfaces makes it difficult to get the hang of. But in the last few years, its new user interfaces have been much more intuitive. If you're new to AutoCAD, we suggest that you start with the free version (AutoCAD Lite or AutoCAD.NET) first to get a feel for how to use the program, and move up from there.
If you're new to AutoCAD, it's always a good idea to start with one of the programs that can run in AutoCAD's own direct-drawing mode. These programs — Inventor, Grasshopper and Creo — are much easier to use than AutoCAD (a quirk in AutoCAD's programming means that it's not possible to use these programs from within AutoCAD, and you won't be able to change to them while you're working on a drawing).
In many ways, AutoCAD has been leading the pack for years. Inventor, the other 2D CAD programs, are available on Mac OS X, but not Windows. And Creo is still something of a niche product. And yet, there's more than a quarter of a million AutoCAD users. Now that your company is more mature, you're likely to want to keep on top of AutoCAD's latest developments, especially with the coming of AutoCAD 2011. So, you might be surprised to find that there's even more to AutoCAD than you thought.
With the new version, AutoCAD has got itself a new look. It's a big change from the rather retro look that was around for the first versions of AutoCAD, and it's a lot less visually cluttered. The icons and menus that you'll use every day have been redesigned. AutoCAD also adds a new set
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