Level: REGULAR USER/INTERMEDIATE

OK, so here we are for Part 2 of Measuring Areas in AutoCAD 2012.

What I am going to show you is how to use the AREA command in AutoCAD and the good thing is that we already have polylines that have an area so there is no need to trace around the edges of rooms in the AREA command.

Always try and use polylines (POLYLINE) when drawing your floor and room areas. It is so much easier to work with and manipulate a polyline rather than a group of regular AutoCAD lines. Plus, you have the added advantage that polylines retain their area as xData, as mentioned in Part 1.

Level: REGULAR USER/INTERMEDIATE

I work in Facilities Management (FM) on a regular basis, often working with proprietary Computer Aided Facilities Management (CAFM) systems such as FM:Systems and ARCHIBUS. Now these systems are great and do many things to build a CAFM inventory linked to your CAD drawings.

However, what I want to do here is start with the basics rather than teach you a whole new system.

Let’s do this piece by piece so that the theory goes in to the grey cells, right? :-)

OK, so you've just started using AutoCAD proper. You've just done your Learning AutoCAD course at your local Autodesk Authorised Training Centre (ATC) and you're ready to go.

Here's a kicker. Did they show you how to utilise the STARTUP variable to your advantage? Many training courses don't and leave you to use the Select template dialog box which is kind of confusing.