What's New in AutoCAD for Mac

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: OK, let's get started. Is the audio OK? Can all of you hear me? OK, so welcome guys. Thank you for attending this class. Before we get started, let's get a sense of who's in the room. So how many of you currently use AutoCAD for Mac?

Great. How many of you are planning to use it in the future? How many of you are on the 2017 version of Mac? Awesome. So hopefully this class will have something for everybody here. Let's start with introductions. My name's Rajeshree Demblar, and I'm the product manager for AutoCAD for Mac. I've been with the company for three years.

What does product manager mean? So I work with people like you, customers, who have needs and pain points with the product. I identify those, take it back to Autodesk, take it back to the development and designer team. And we have [INAUDIBLE] for those big points, and then give you features and enhancements.

JIAN AN WEI: OK, my name is Jian. I come from Shanghai. I have been on Autodesk for 10 years I participated in AutoCAD for Mac development, at least starting from 2008. Now I'm leading our engineering team, taking charge of build and then release all AutoCAD for Mac every year, every release.

OK, here is the safe harbor means to share legally. No purchase decision should be made by today's confidential information we share in this class. Because the we don't guarantee any promise, the developments may be changed by unforeseen future, as the situation changes.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: So what are we going talk in today's class? We're first going to talk to you about how the product has evolved in the last few years. We're to talk to you about how we're changing our delivery model with the subscription business model. We're going to talk to you about some features that we'll release in our update, and a sneak peek into future release features. And then we're going to talk to you about a few ways you guys could engage with the product teams. And then we're going to open it up for any questions you guys have for us.

So let's talk about the product evolution. So the first time Autodesk decided to support Mac, it was in 1992. But in 1993, we decided to drop that support, and we started supporting it again in 2011. 2011 was, you could kind of say, officially the first Mac release, where we had features, and we had a great UI for you guys.

Over the last eight years, we've continually invested in the product, giving you new features that could make you more productive, that could help you design faster. Start like ETRANSMIT, so you can package your drawings. PDF underlay, PDF import, and even a new modern UI, which you guys could use to set AutoCAD the way you like it, focus on what is important, and put everything you don't need away. 2017, like I said, is the current release that's out there in the market, and some of you are already using it.

Let's move to talk a little more about subscription. What happened traditionally, and what happens today. So traditionally, every year we gave you one large release with features. We were like, these are the 10 new features, and then we followed that up with hotfixes and smart package updates for you guys. So you could continue working.

We gave you a release, you said, [INAUDIBLE] this doesn't work for me, or your [INAUDIBLE] product crashes. Then we said, OK, we'll fix it for you. So we were focused on fixing throughout the year. But now the way we do it is, we have a continuous update. You're continuing throughout the year, getting features and updates. When you ask for things, you don't have to wait for a whole year to get them delivered to you. We focus on what's important, we hear you guys. And as [INAUDIBLE] in the process, we'll keep updating for you.

So let's look at what we did just in the last one year, if you look at AutoCAD for Mac. Two years ago, around this time, we released 2016. We continued to support that throughout the year. So you see the first thing that we did was a new hotfix for 2016.

Then we went forward, and around this time last year, we released 2017. We got a lot of feedback from you guys about things that you would like improved, and a few months later we had an update with those enhancements and improvements. We also supported, you see you have 2017.2, which is we supported the new macOS High Sierra that was released by Apple. So you see that throughout the year we're doing multiple things, versus just one big release and fixes.

Talking to some customers, because I do that so often, everyone is just like, how do you guys even decide what do you want to work on, what do you want to build? So today we're going to share with you guys some confidential information. Not exactly confidential, but this is how we work.

So the three things that we focus on is, one being customization. We know how important it is. Everyone uses AutoCAD uniquely. You want it to look and feel for your use, for your needs. So we focus on giving you tools to be able to customize your AutoCAD for your needs.

We also hear all the time, hey, AutoCAD for Windows has this really cool feature, why is it not on the Mac? So we're like, OK, we hear you again. We look at all those features that Windows has, and it's missing in Mac, and we try to build on that Windows parity, so you guys can function better and AutoCAD can be robust, too.

We also partner closely with Apple to support everything that they release, whether it's a new technology like the TouchBar the new OS. Here's how we think, here are the things we focus on, and we continue to invest in them.

Let's talk about our first theme, how are we helping you guys customize AutoCAD for your needs.

JIAN AN WEI: OK, the first thing is about the new user interface. We made massive interface changes to provide a smart, intuitive, and customizable UI in the last release. And the we continue to make an improvement this year. We understand the joy in real estate is of the primal importance, and now we made two enhancements for you this year.

The first is the float and the dock palettes. As you know, in the last 30 days, the palettes on the right side is not its face, not able to move. And now we would like to provide the dock and the float palettes to optimize your joint estate on the [INAUDIBLE] screen and the second screen.

If you are floating the palettes, and you drag a job to the second monitor to maximize your drawing canvas on the main monitor. But if you only have one screen, you can dock your active palettes on the right side of the window with tabs. So you still can be able to get more canvas size. Let us take a look at how it works.

Here's the tab. You can use the tab, and then click a button to float in the window palettes and the position anywhere you want to place. If you click it, it will go back at the dock inside the other tab.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: So this was one of the key things we heard when we released 2017, because our UI, you could not unlock any palettes. And users were like, that's not cool. We have two screens, how do we take it? We can't see our drawing in one screen and the pallets in the other screen.

And for users who use one screen, they were like, but we can't have so many palettes open, right? What do we do? So here's how we simplified it. If you thought this is cool, there's more to come. So let's look at this video first, and then I will talk you through it.

So you can dock it, you can have multiple palettes together, but that's not all. You can now even hide those palettes that you've docked together to have more space for your drawings. And then all you need to do is access it easily. You just hover on it, and it shows up. You go back to your drawing, and it hides. So you can hide everything you need and you can show whatever you want.

This is what we've done, in terms of customization, to help you guys.

JIAN AN WEI: OK, next is the migration. We understand customizing your AutoCAD, every time you're upgraded to our new release, is a time-consuming and frustrating process. Now you can migrate your settings, your custom files from AutoCAD Mac 2017 to the current release.

The migration utility will start automatically whilst you launch AutoCAD Mac, the first time you upgrade. You can click on the OK button to migrate your setting immediately, or you can click the View Details button to choose which settings you want to migrate.

In just a few seconds, your settings will migrate into the current release. That means you can start your designing work again instantly.

If you want to know details, which files we help you migrate, we provide a detailed report for you. Every file we change we list inside these reports, so you can know everything. What file, which settings are migrated or not. OK.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: Who doesn't use commands in AutoCAD, right? That's just how we learn how to use AutoCAD. So we have something that's going to get your world rocked. You can now have customized commands in there. You can go to the command alias editor, you can create your own customized commands.

You can provide the shortcut, no need to remember the long names or the names we provide you. If the name is already being used, AutoCAD will detect that conflict and it will warn you. Like, hey, this is already in use, are you sure you want to change it? If you still do, you can override it, change it, and then the legacy one that we've named it goes away.

You can go into the command alias editor, at first you could see all. Now you can click on just custom, and see the ones that you've created, edit them, or modify them in there. Let's talk about Windows parity.

JIAN AN WEI: Plot. Plot is the most important workflow tool you converting your [? joy ?] into a PDF to share or to print. We got a lot of feedback about the legacy printer dialog, and not working efficient for you. For example, you're only be able to select the paper size provided by your physical printer. You cannot easily add a custom paper size in this dialog.

You'll have to click the Add Pages tab button to open another pages tab editor to modify your plan setting, and then back to the printer dialog, [INAUDIBLE] and open the dialog again and again. So this process introduces a lot of clicks, not very efficient.

We look into the data, we understand it, and [INAUDIBLE] demand, and we break the older process into several important steps, and maybe enhancement in this release. Let's take a look.

The first is Load the Previous Setting. Previous [INAUDIBLE] setting is disabled inside of your layout, inside of the Pages tabs. So we introduced a No Printer, same as Windows. This means, once you have the physical printer's lost, or name's changing, we still keep your previous paper size listed inside the tab. You will not lose that information when you start on your print.

The next is about Select a Printer. PDF is very important for you to share that information with others. We looked into the data. PDF is most populated what printer driver you used on the Windows side. So this year we make it work on Mac, as well.

So with this important, what your printers support, you can have a new PDF with the layer information kept inside the PDF drawing.

If you select No Printer or the PDF Printer, we provide a full list of the paper size, including the customized paper size and your previous paper size list here. So once you open the drawing which contains the PDF driver. Nothing will change, and you can start you print immediately. You also can add your custom paper size here.

[INAUDIBLE] the Plot Settings, we add lots of the frequent use, the Plot Settings, into the dialog. For example, the offset, the plot stamp, the page set up. You can save, load, switch the page stuff in the dialog. And after you modify the settings, you can click Apply to Layout button to save those information in your actual layout.

So with all these kind of settings set up, you can finish your plot job efficiently.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: OK, let's talk about flatten. How many of you get 3D drawings from your customers, and you're like, I just want to convert it to 2D, and I want to start designing, and I want to move on. I don't want to have to use flatshot, I don't have to use workarounds.

Well, we got something for you. Now, for Windows, we got the flatten command, where you can easily convert all your 3D drawings to 2D pretty soon, and high-performing. Let's look at the video.

JIAN AN WEI: OK, the off-screen selection is small, but a very critical enhancement we provided to you. Starting from now, you can start a window selection from part of your drawing, and then pan and zoom your drawing to another part, keeping your selection of off-screen objects. Let's take a look.

You can start started with window selection, and then pan, zoom to another part of the drawing. All the selection of the off-screen object are kept.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: I remember at AU this year-- last year, actually. Windows presented this feature and everyone in the room was so delighted. And we're like, OK, Mac has to get this. We need to delight our customers, too. So you guys know that we now allow you to import a PDF in the drawing, revolutionary while changing. But we want to keep enhancing it and improving the performance.

So we know PDF doesn't support SHXTEXT. What happens when you bring in SHXTEXT? Look at the way AutoCAD generates it. It's like the geometry, you can't edit that text. it's small lines making the geometry, so we wanted to improve that for you guys.

Now you can bring in SHXTEXT and you can convert it to normal text. You use the command, and it takes you to a dialog box. You can either add your custom text to it, or you can select any. We do a match to see that at least, if it's 95% accurate, then we change the text for you. If it's not, we ask you to try something else.

A different-- try maybe Roman, or Complex, or something else. Once that match is made for 95%, we change the text for you. So it says, your geometry has been changed, the visual fidelity has been maintained. And now if you look at the bottom image, all your text is editable and works fine. So that was one of the enhancements we made.

JIAN AN WEI: OK, the XREF. We normally see some XREF path broken, so for this year, we made [INAUDIBLE] to avoid this kind of situation. First, we set a relative path as the default setting of when you insert a drawing, a PDF, an image. If the host drawing hasn't been saved, it AutoCAD will automatically calculate the relative path, your first time saving the drawing. So you don't have to save your drawing before you insert relative X-reference.

If you saved the host drawing to another location, you will be prompted to ask whether you need to update the relative X-reference to the new path. So if you click yes, the old reference will be refreshed and correct, once you save it to another location. That's the first.

The second, if you open a [INAUDIBLE] drawing, which contains some full path, they have not been set up correctly, they are missing, they are broken. We provided a new method to help you resolve that. You select the one broken path, and then select the New Pass menu item. Then select the correct reference inside of your Finder.

After that, you'll be prompted to apply this path to the other reference. If Yes, then the path will be applied to all the other reference, including the PDF image, and all the paths will be resolved correctly.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: OK, let's talk about how we partner with Apple to support you guys. So the TouchBar, Apple introduced that about a year ago. We did something to enhance and support it. Now when you're within a command and you want to use OSNAP, you can. We have about 15 icons for you to choose, and you can customize your TouchBar for the icons that you use.

You can select it while you're in between a command, it's basically easy select on your screen all the time, when you're using AutoCAD. So let's look at this video to learn more.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

- Previously, users needed to memorize functions and shortcuts to quickly access general controls. And for that you'd then need to press additional fn key with function keys, since the default function keys are occupied by macOS. The new default TouchBar has replaced iconic buttons for function key shortcuts, providing a simpler and clearer way to access general controls.

[INAUDIBLE] extremely short, no hard memorization required. The control [INAUDIBLE] are more visible, and it's only one press away, same as Windows. The initial [INAUDIBLE] of the [INAUDIBLE] manages the sequence of F1 to F12 function keys. Pressing a key, users tend to use the existing keyboard combinations to access general controls as before.

Besides, users can also customize the [INAUDIBLE] bar by dragging down from the [INAUDIBLE] control buttons. [INAUDIBLE] We will pick more frequently used keyboard [INAUDIBLE] to allow users to [INAUDIBLE] that meet their needs.

[END PLAYBACK]

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: That's cool. So if any of you have a TouchBar laptop, you can know that the one that's on default, you can customize and change it from the menu. OK.

JIAN AN WEI: OK. As the Rajeshree mentioned, we work with Apple very closely to support the latest the macOS. Here is our macOS support plan, please keep in mind. So far, we support High Sierra, the current release, with APFS supporting, and we support two releases back.

So in the future, if Apple releases a new macOS, we will continue to support the latest the one, and we my drop the last one, like El Captan, in the future.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: So at the start during the agenda I told you that at the end, we'll talk about different ways you guys can engage with us. There are three different ways you can do that today. We have a beta platform, where as and when we build the software, we release them for you guys to test.

So you guys can tell us what are the bugs, issues, and you guys can help us build high-performing products, with great quality. We also have product research, where we show you some designs before we implement, or we do some discovery surveys of needs and issues that you have.

And then we have the public forum, where we have a community of AutoCAD for Mac users, where you can ask your questions. We have product support, product teams looking at it and helping you get your answers. The third one is a public forum. The first two are exclusive groups with only invite access. So if you guys want to be invited to those, come ahead, give us your names and emails, and then we will invite you.

Great. With this, I think we've shown you what's coming up next, and what's really out there in the market today. And we open it up to any questions that you have for us.

[APPLAUSE]

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: Thank you.

AUDIENCE: I have a question.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: Yes?

AUDIENCE: Does AutoCAD for Mac allow for plugins? Like Adobe, or I don't know if [INAUDIBLE] is integrated with them, yet. But do you know if there are any plugins available? [INAUDIBLE] like PDF [INAUDIBLE]

JIAN AN WEI: So far, the plugin is a variable on the systems side. If you install some plugin on the macOS at the system side, you can choose it as what you print, or list inside our printer, and it should work.

AUDIENCE: So it wouldn't be like a toolbar button or something?

JIAN AN WEI: No, no.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: If it's a [INAUDIBLE] on the OS, then we should be able to use it with AutoCAD. Any other questions?

AUDIENCE: So the three main categories, you had the Windows parity, you had customization, you had Mac support. What about new features? Do you guys have stuff that are [INAUDIBLE] on the Windows side, like your customizable properties palette, and things like that? What category does that fall under?

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: That falls under customization, because it's still about how you're using it. Or if you look at our new tool sets-- our UI is, it's AutoCAD, but it's a little different from the way Windows is. So that still falls under customization for us, and how you use your AutoCAD.

With these three, it's not just that whatever Windows does, we take them. Within each of them it's, OK, what's new, what can we enhance, and so forth.

JIAN AN WEI: So do you have something in your mind not fitting these three categories?

AUDIENCE: I was just meaning like new, new stuff. Like anything that is, not even on the Windows side or something like that, [INAUDIBLE] Not just the user interface, but something new, [INAUDIBLE] different things like that. New, new stuff. Maybe getting some stuff before the Windows [INAUDIBLE].

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: We'll think about that.

AUDIENCE: Let's say that support of Autodesk in the future for AutoCAD for Mac, [INAUDIBLE] in 1992 stuff, right?

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: Yeah.

AUDIENCE: But do you foresee that [INAUDIBLE] for you?

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: We've been there for eight years, and we continued to give you better products and enhancements. We're there, we're a team working on AutoCAD for Mac, and investing in its future.

AUDIENCE: What about [INAUDIBLE] or anything like that, have you [INAUDIBLE]

JIAN AN WEI: Yeah, [INAUDIBLE]. Yeah, we partially support the [INAUDIBLE].

AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE]

JIAN AN WEI: Yeah, the [INAUDIBLE] inside another kind of Mac, not for LT. But are we don't fully support it, because some the DCL, and some of the function of the [INAUDIBLE] would not support it. But generally, that we support it.

RAJESHREE DEMBLA: Awesome. Thank you guys so much for attending this class. We'll still be around, if you have more questions.