Today's enewsletter marks the 10th edition of the new CADzette. I would be interested in hearing your comments and feedback. So far, I have heard one person tell me that I am more boring than he remembers and another person emailed that they like the html format.

I'll be speaking in Adelaide on Wednesday, August 20 for the Adelaide AutoCAD User Group. That meeting starts around 6 PM.

Meetings are held at the Douglas Mawson Institute of TAFE, Marleston Campus, First Floor 252 Richmond Road, MARLESTON SA. For more information

If It's Saturday, It Must Be Hobart

I tried to set up a presentation in Hobart on Saturday, Aug 23, but wasn't able to get it off the ground. Understandable, who wants to talk AutoCAD on Saturday? You'd have to be a total geek...which I am, but Aussies are obviously way too cool for that.

If It's Sunday, It Must Be Melbourne

Find out more....

	Success for Design
Product innovation is crucial - but risky. Improve your odds of developing successful products. The Stanford Center for Professional Development's Success by Design short course will expose professionals in the technology, manufacturing, and medical device industries to product design techniques proven to Designed for professionals throughout the high technology, manufacturing and medical device industry, this course enhances cross-functional communication between Marketing, R&D, Finance, and Manufacturing with particular benefit for: Design Engineers Product Developers Product Marketing Managers Manufacturing Engineers Research Scientists This three-day course incorporates the latest developments from Stanford's highly acclaimed graduate Mechanical Engineering series, Design for Manufacturability, including: *Embodying the Voice of the Customer *Product Priority Matrix Decision Making *Design for Variety and Family Product Architecture *Advanced Failure Modes and Effects *Design for Six Sigma Quality *Embodying the Voice of the Customer *Product Priority Matrix Decision Making *Design for Variety and Family Product Architecture *Advanced Failure Modes and Effects *Design for Six Sigma Quality To learn more... »

	AutoSolids to release 2004 Version
AutoSolids Version 3.0 is currently available for AutoCAD versions 2000/2000i/2002 and their corresponding vertical market products(Mechanical Desktop, AutoCAD Architectural Desktop, etc.). AutoCAD 2004-compatibile versions of AutoSolids are currently in the final testing phase and will be released in the near future. AutoSolids provides numerous methods for creating 3D solids. Basic primitive shapes such as boxes, sphere, cylinders, etc. are quickly created by issuing the appropriate command and providing corresponding parameter values in the dialog box. Custom primitive shapes can be created by selecting 2D shapes for extruding, revolving, or sweeping. All creation commands allow the solid to be previewed, and if the results are not as expected the parameters can be revised as the preview continually updates to reflect the parameter changes. Primitive shapes can be combined together to form complex composite solids through boolean operations (union, subtract, intersect). The boolean operations can be performed either during primitive creation or as a separate step, providing unique flexibility unmatched by feature-based systems due to their dependence on ordered relationships. Any primitive parameter or boolean operation used during construction of a solid can be easily and completely edited at any time via the "soledit" command. When a composite solid is selected for editing, all of the primitives within the composite are made available for editing. The primitive parameters can be immediately changed or the primitives themselves can be directly moved, copied, rotated, etc. Unlike conventional parametric modelers, AutoSolids requires no time-consuming constraints, workplanes, workpoints, or any extraneous control entities either during solid creation or editing. QuickDraw instantly creates and aligns up to (6) orthographic and (4) isometric 2D drawing views with one command, and includes options for layer and linetype controls and selectable inclusion/exclusion of hidden, visible, and tangent lines. 2D geometry created by QuickDraw is regular 2D AutoCAD lines and arcs, only created much faster and with perfect view-to-view accuracy every time. To download a demo version of AutoSolids »

	What is Six Sigma?
It's been mentioned in recent Dilbert cartoons, must be worth a look. Six Sigma is the latest quality fad, following on the heels of ISO of the '90s and Quality Circles in the '80s. To achieve Six Sigma quality, a process must produce no more than 3.4 defects per million opportunities. An "opportunity" is defined as a chance for nonconformance, or not meeting the required specifications. This means the company needs to be nearly flawless in executing their key processes. Six Sigma is a vision to strive toward and a philosophy that is part of business culture. At its core, Six Sigma revolves around a few key concepts. Critical to Quality: Attributes most important to the customer Defect: Failing to deliver what the customer wants Process Capability: What your process can deliver Variation: What the customer sees and feels Stable Operations: Ensuring consistent, predictable processes to improve what the customer sees and feels Design for Six Sigma: Designing to meet customer needs and process capability The American Society for Quality ASQ's 3rd Annual Six will be holding a Sigma Forum Roundtable on September 11-12, 2003 at the Hyatt Regency New Orleans. To learn about the conference> What do you need to know to be a Six Sigma Black Belt? »

	New Lisp Routine - List Your Layouts
The lisp routine below creates a txt file with a list of all your layouts. ;;begin code (defun c:getlayouts (/) (setq eprDict (entget (cdadr (member (cons 3 "ACAD_LAYOUT") (entget (namedobjdict)) ) ) ) ) (setq cnt 10) ; set counter (setq num (length eprDict)) (setq tlist (cdr (nth cnt eprDict))) ; get layout val (setq fn (getfiled "Create text file of Layout Names" "Layout-list" "txt" 1 ) ) ; create file (setq pw (open fn "w")) (while (< cnt num) (setq cnt (1+ cnt)) (setq flag (car (nth cnt eprDict))) ; get layout val (if (= flag 3) (progn (setq tlist (cdr (nth cnt eprDict))) ; get layout val (princ tlist) (princ "\n") (write-line tlist pw) ) ;end progn ) ; end if ) ;end while (close pw) (alert (strcat fn " was created.")) ) ;end defun ; end code

	ADT Property Sets
Property Sets play an important part in your building design using Architectural Desktop. ADT 2004 has actually enhanced how you use property sets. The data in your property sets is used in your schedules. To download a tutorial on how to define Property Sets for Structural Members... »

	Inventor Tips
In order to set visibility of decals in views in an idw file, set the view to Shaded. You can control the transparency of decals in Inventor 7. Select the decal, right click and go to Properties.

	Intervision provides FREE Training Classes
Intervision will be hosting a FREE Inventor training class on Friday, August 8th from 8:30 am to noon. This is a hands-on workshop. Each student will get their own system to work on; learning how to create views, assemblies, and work in the 2D drawing environment. Because this is a hands-on workship, seating is limited. To reserve a seat, call Jessica Lowe at 408-567-4252.

	CLEANSCREENOFF & CLEANSCREENON - NEW 2004 SYSTEM VARIABLES
Want to freak out a co-worker? Type CLEANSCREENON at the command line. Be sure to do this when he leaves for a bathroom break or to refresh his coffee. Once he recovers from his heart attack and has spent at least ten minutes trying to get his menus and toolbars back, swoop in and type CLEANSCREENOFF at the command line. Make sure he buys you lunch for bailing him out. This new command now available in 2004 wins my USELESS SYSTEM VARIABLE THAT USERS DON'T WANT, DON'T NEED, AND WILL HATE FOREVER Award.

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