CADTutor

Learn AutoCAD with our Free Tutorials

Welcome to CADTutor

CADTutor provides the best free tutorials and articles for AutoCAD, 3ds Max and associated applications along with a friendly community forum. If you need to learn AutoCAD, or you want to be more productive, you're in the right place. See our tip of the day to start learning right now!

Free Tutorials and More…

The Tutorials section provides over 100 original tutorials for AutoCAD, 3ds Max and other design applications. Michael’s Corner is an archive of productivity articles that brings you the best AutoCAD tips and tricks. Our Forum is a lively community where AutoCAD users can ask questions and get answers. The Downloads area provides free AutoCAD blocks, free AutoLISP routines and free images.

Tutorials of the Moment

Recently viewed tutorials

CADTutor Tutorials

Our tutorials are comprehensive but straightforward introductions to AutoCAD and related software. They are designed to help beginners get to grips with design workflows as quickly as possible. There are over 100 to choose from, some text/image based and others in video format. Whatever stage you are at in your learning, you should find a tutorial to help.

Forum Latest

Currently Active Topics

This Week's Hot Topics

CADTutor Forums

Our forum is a vibrant community of experts and beginners. The main focus is helping beginners get to grips with AutoCAD and to help more advanced users become more productive. The AutoLISP forum is one of the busiest out there, providing expert advice for busy professionals.

AutoCAD Productivity

Original Dimension Value

by Michael Beall

From: AutoCAD Productivity Articles #143
Originally published: December 2015

Since the dimension text of an associative dimension is Mtext, double-click anywhere on an associative dimension and you can add additional information… or modify the value to what you want.

Dimension 1

But what if you want to put the dimension back to the original value?

Insights:
If you reposition an extension line origin grip of a dimension and the value doesn't change, the original value was modified.

If you double-click a dimension and the edit box has a white background — not blue — the original value was modified.

Dimension 2

Solution:
Double-click the dimension, then put the less-than and greater-than characters in the dimension box, like this… <>

The original value will be restored.

See all the articles published in December 2015

Michael's Corner

Between 2003 and 2016, Michael Beall (and one or two guests) wrote almost 600 articles for CADTutor. The focus of these articles is AutoCAD productivity, and although some of them are now more than a few years old, most remain relevant to current versions of AutoCAD. The article above is just one example. Check out Michael's Corner for a full listing.

Tip of the Day

Object Snap Cycling

Object Snap CyclingWhen drawings get crowded with lots of detail, it can be difficult to select the required snap point with running object snaps. Invariably, the snap point AutoCAD finds is not the one you want. This is where object snap cycling comes to the rescue. With running object snap turned on, hover the cursor close to the snap point you want and hit the Tab key on the keyboard to move between the various possible snap points near the cursor. Keep hitting the Tab key until you find the snap point you want. When you've got it, left-click to select the point.

Today's tip is by David Watson

Missed a Tip?

Did you miss yesterday's tip? Maybe you forgot to drop by or maybe you don't visit over the weekend. If so, you can now see all the tips published during the past week. Also, if you have a tip you'd like to share with us, you can post it on our forum and if we like it, we'll publish it here.