Polyhedral Mesh To Solid

From the Autodesk App Store:

Polyhedral Mesh to Solid is for hard to convert Mesh or Polyface Mesh objects, which won’t convert to 3D Solids because of self-intersecting faces, T-Junctions, gaps, inverted normals, etc. These are common problems when working with a mesh imported from other sources. Polyhedral Mesh to Solid’s conversion method optimizes the mesh to reduce tessellation and removes unseen faces, producing a more visually clean solid without affecting the accuracy of the geometry. Polyhedral Mesh to Solid can also be used to split a mesh into its component shells if desired, producing a separate 3D solid of each shell within a single mesh.

Polyhedral Mesh to Solid has also been optimized to convert Tekla Structures models to ACIS Solids!

Use Polyhedral Mesh to Solid to optimize your Mesh for 3D Printing!

After Conversion the 3D Solid has 413 Faces and 533 Vertices.

BlockMatrix – View and Modify Attributes and Visibility States of Blocks Across Multiple Drawings

From the Autodesk App Store:

BlockMatrix delivers powerful, easy editing of block attributes in a familiar spreadsheet style format.

BlockMatrix is a considerable time saver. Find/Replace across multiple drawing files, increment integer values (very useful on tag numbers!), and change the visibility state of dynamic blocks.

The BlockMatrix dialog, displaying the visibility states of dynamic blocks,
as well as the incrementation of integer values in the
find/replace/increment dialog

Free Apply Current Date – Apply Current Date to Attributes, Multiline Text or Text

From the Autodesk App Store:

After typing ADA command Autodesk® AutoCAD® will prompt to select attribute, multiline text or text object to apply current date. Program start with default format date Day.Month.Year (07.23.2013).

 All commands:

• ADA - main shortcut,
• ADAF - 'Format' window, in this window user can select predefined format date,
• ADAE - 'Edit' window, used to edit list of dates (move items up, down, delete or go to 'Add date' window)
• ADAA - 'Add date' window, used to add new format date,
• -ADA - all commands are combined under one shortcut.

User date formats

Free Polyline Quantities

From the Autodesk App Store:

Polyline Quantities, generates a CSV file with total lengths and areas of selected polylines and creates a new entry for each layer allowing you to easily see what the total length or area is of polylines on each particular layer.

Example input polylines

Free Background Mask – Manipulate the Background Mask Properties of MText and MLeaders

From the Autodesk App Store:

The program allows the user to manipulate all properties of the background mask for a selection of Multiline Text (MText) and Multileader (MLeader) objects.

Following selection of multiple MText and/or MLeader objects, the program presents the user with a dialog interface through which the background mask may be enabled or disabled simultaneously for all objects in the selection. Furthermore, the offset, transparency and colour of the background mask applied to all objects in the selection may also be controlled.

Program Dialog

Free and Open Source Flatten – Convert 3D Polylines to 2D and Vice Versa

From the Autodesk App Store:

NEWS: All of my apps are open source now, you can find more details here: https://lexman42.github.io/LexmanCAD-Website/

Want to work with a 2D polyline but for some reason your drawing contains a 3D polyline instead?

Applying the "LCAD_FLATTEN" command to a 3D polyline will replace a 3D polyline with a 2D polyline.

The X and Y geometry will be preserved and the resulting 2D polyline will be placed at a user-specified elevation.

If you need to convert several 3D polylines within a drawing, multiple 3D polylines can be selected and "Flattened" at once.

From version 2.0 onwards, the reverse is also possible. Using the command "LCAD_RAISE" 2D polylines can be converted into 3D polylines.

Converting a 2D Poly into a 3D Poly.

Free Associative Textbox – Create Associative Textboxes of Various Shapes

From the Autodesk App Store:

The program enables the user to create an associative textbox surrounding a Text or MText object in the drawing. The size, position, orientation & rotation of the resulting textbox is automatically updated following modification to the associated Text or MText object.

Program Demonstration

The user can create a new associative textbox using the TBOX command. The user is prompted to specify an offset factor for the textbox, and to indicate the shape of the textbox to be created.

Free BOM Extractor

From the Autodesk App Store:

BOM (Bill of Material) extractor is a tool to extract information from Block Attributes and Dynamic Block properties of Autodesk® AutoCAD® blocks available in the Drawing File.

The fields or columns to be displayed in the BOM table can be easily configured.

The columns header name, width can be set by the user. The quantity will be calculated and grouped based on the number of same block information available in the drawing.

Quantity (Base Quantity) per block instances can be configured in settings either as ‘1(each) or with any block attribute.

Sorting of BOM items will be done based on the sorting settings and Items can be manually arranged and renumbered.

Same value available in the adjacent row value can be merged with in each column. Merge settings is available in the settings.

The BOM/BOQ layout setting can be configured through simplified User interface settings.

It functions bidirectional. This tool can help you to extract information as well as it can update the block attributes in drawing as modified in user interface.

ID Spec Plugin

From the Autodesk App Store:

ID Spec plugin allows you to do the pre-design of electrical system inside Autodesk® AutoCAD®.

Using ID Spec, you can create an electrical power plan with the architectural layout of the building in the background, taking in to account various electrical loads in the building and their connection details with automatic determination of cable length.

The Plugin proposes feasible solutions for the electrical power plan by analyzing load distribution, sizing and selection of electrical equipment. You can now optimize your electrical distribution design inside the building by barycenter calculation and evaluate the overall energy performance of the electrical system. ID Spec Plugin generates a high-level bill of equipment and a detailed technical specification of the electrical equipment to allow the customers to have their proposals ready in no time!

Chainage – Generate Station Marks Along Arcs, Lines or Polylines

From the Autodesk App Store:

Chainage, allows chainage / station marks to be created dynamically along lines, arcs and polylines.

Settings such as text height, text offset, justification, precision, tick length and tick position can be adjust on-the-fly for precise display of chainages to suit any needs.

Select an arc, line or polyline

Excel and Table Utils

From the Autodesk App Store:

With Excel & Table Utils you can quickly and easily share information between Autodesk® AutoCAD® and Excel.

• Create AutoCAD or Excel tables from AutoCAD entity property information.
• Create Excel tables from AutoCAD Tables.
• Create AutoCAD tables from Excel selections.
• Create Legend tables from blocks.

3D Printing App for Autodesk® AutoCAD®

From the Autodesk App Store:

This easy to use app installs our 3D printing app in Autodesk® AutoCAD®. After clicking the 3D print button, you can repair, analyze and scale your model. On the platform you can choose among a wide range of materials and compare different 3D printing services.

The app features:

1. One-click upload, 
2. Showing prices from 3D printing services, 
3. Effective 3D requirement, 
4. Wall thickness analysis, 
5. Download of the repaired file (STL), 
6. Secure file transfer with SSL.

Free RefUcsSpy – Toggle UCS for XREF Attachment

From the Autodesk App Store:

Many Autodesk® AutoCAD® users have reference files set up in World coordinates. Attaching such files when in a different User Coordinate System (UCS) can result in the contents appearing at incorrect locations.

The RefUcsSpy plugin can be used within AutoCAD to detect when reference files are being attached when the UCS is not ""World"". If it is not, the user will be prompted whether they would like to temporarily set the UCS to World for the duration of the attach command.

The dialog displayed by RefUcsSpy during an
attachment with a non-World UCS active.

AVCSlice – Peeling of Flat and Curved Faces of Solids

From the Autodesk App Store:

The AVCSlice plugin contain 1 command ASL. It will help speed up your 3D-modelling of furniture or any products made from sheet materials. The command "slice" is usually used to separate fine details from solids.

Unlike the "slice" command, ASL does not need to specify the cutting plane, and you do not need to tell it what part to cut away and/or leave. All you need to do is specify a surface to peel and what thickness of the material you need.

What a time saver! Moreover, the smart command ASL can be peeled from the surface of a cylinder, cone and other curved surfaces. You can easily model thin curved plating. No calculator, no preliminary construction are needed. There is no need to rearrange the coordinate system. No need to draw supporting segments and build section surface for slice. Just click on the solid surface and adjust the delamination (peeling) thickness.

Design ambry using AVCSlice

Free Palette Auto-hide Speed

From the Autodesk App Store:

With this app you will be able to change the time it takes to show/hide or roll-up/roll-out the palette windows in Autodesk® AutoCAD®.

You can see the effect with palettes like Properties, Quickcalc, External References, Sheet Set Manager, Markup Set Manager, Shared Views and Visual Styles Manager set to auto-hide.

EstimaxPro – Estimation from 2D CAD Drawings

From the Autodesk App Store:

In preparing an estimate, the quantities of different items of work are calculated by a simple mensuration method and from these quantities, the cost is calculated. The manual method of estimation is time consuming with respect to the quantity estimation. Existing estimation software needs to be input with quantities which can be only calculated manually from 2D drawings.

This is a major weakness of the system. By adding a scanning method to calculate the quantity automatically from drawings. Estimax attempts to reduce the time for estimation drastically. Rate Analysis can be easily done with the sub functions like Rate Master, Work Sub Group. Reports can be easily prepared.

Advantages:

• Estimation in minutes by scanning the Autodesk® AutoCAD® Drawing.
• Scan objects like windows, doors, columns etc. from AutoCAD drawing.
• Derive work items from AutoCAD drawing through scanning. 
• Prepares detailed and abstract Estimate Reports.
• Provision for changing Rates and Specifications for each Project.
• Flexibility in adding new works. 
• Gives detailed Estimate with dimensions of each work in a project.
• Steel Quantity preparation.
• Calculates Material, Labour and Machinery requirements for each work and its rate. 
• Works with standard specifications

Free Webinar Every Other Thursday From Feb 14 – UNIFI CORE Demo and Q&A

From the registration website:

Join us for a live demo of UNIFI CORE every other Thursday at 12:30 pm PST/3:30 EST

• Feb 14
• Feb 28
• Mar 7
• Mar 21
• Apr 4
• Apr 18
• May 2
• May 16

If it’s your first time checking out UNIFI or if you’re a current customer looking for a regular opportunity for some casual UNIFI CORE QnA, these regular demos can help.

The first 15 minutes of the demo is a general overview of UNIFI CORE with the last 15 minutes reserved for QnA.

Register now!

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Register for the webinar here »

Free Align Text to Curve

From the Autodesk App Store:

The program enables the user to dynamically align a new or existing Text or MText object to a selected curve, with intuitive placement controls available at the command-line.

The program may be used to align an existing text object in the drawing, or the user may create a new text object by specifying the text content.

Multiple copies of a text object may be aligned to the selected curve if the 'Multiple Text Mode' is enabled in the Settings menu.

Text is dynamically aligned in real-time, with the text offset & rotation relative to the curve controllable by the user.

With the 'Readability' setting enabled, text is automatically rotated to preserve readability and will never appear upside-down.

SSMPropEditor

From the Autodesk App Store:

Edit properties on multiple sheets belonging to Autodesk® AutoCAD® Sheet Set Manager (SSM) or Autodesk® AutoCAD® Architecture Project Navigator (PN) Sheet Set View with ease. If you want to change properties like a revision, date or name on two or more sheets at the same time SSMPropEditor is for you. Your productivity will increase and you will save time avoiding a lot of manual work.

Sheet Set Properties, Sheet Set Custom Properties, Sheet Properties and Sheet Custom Properties can be edited.

Copy Sheet Properties from one sheet to one or multiple other sheets.

Copy Sheet Set Properties from one Sheet Set to another.

Increment revisions quickly on multiple sheets.

Paste the total sheet count to any property.

Optionally rename the actual drawing file associated with the sheet.

Export all Sheet Properties information to a file that can be opened with Excel.

Import back the exported file after manual changes have been made. Search or Find and replace can be used for example in Notepad or Excel.

Free ECW Plugin – For Fast and Convenient Use of Raster Images and Catalogs

From the Autodesk App Store:

No more performance problems with big raster files and huge projects. Convenient usage with every workstation, everywhere, up to TeraByte size.

The ECW Plugin for Autodesk® AutoCAD® is a useful extension which enables the user to:

• Access high compressed ECW v3 and JPEG2000 files stored locally.
• Stream high resolution imagery from ERDAS APOLLO and M.App Chest services. (Distributed access with low bandwidth and client resource consumption) 

Both workflows can be inserted as raster layer(s) into any AutoCAD drawing.

Usage of compressed ECW files

CADstudio DwgText

From the Autodesk App Store:

DwgText (a descendant to Excellink) exports selected drawing texts and their properties. Exported data can be modified in Excel (or in a text file) and then you can re-import it back into the Autodesk® AutoCAD® DWG drawing. You can use DwgText for creating BOMs, text schedules, or for batch editing of drawing texts and their visual properties.

DwgText supports Texts, MTexts, Block references (attributes, incl.dynamic), Multileaders, Tables, Attribute definitions and Document properties (including custom properties) plus all their visual properties.

DwgText export options

Dynamic Block Remover

From the Autodesk App Store:

Good dynamic block makes you steps ahead beyond your competitor. We know that you had spent times and money to have powerful dynamic blocks. Sending them without necessary out of your organization may reduce your strength. This tool will help you keep your advantage by convert all dynamic block in the drawing to be ordinary static block and also purge them to be totally clean. After that, it is safe to give your drawing away.

Completely NEW and more powerfull method (version 3.x): 

• Version 1.x, app just converts each dynamic block to be new unique static block.
• Version 2.x, app come with more flexible settings to get a lot more optimized drawing size. But it turn to be too complicate to use.
• Version 3.x, app had been rewritten from the ground up. Can not be easier, just one click and wait to get result which even more optimized than ver.2.x, more clean and more detail report.

New version, new method, can't be easier, just one click and wait.

Free Change Block Base Point

From the Autodesk App Store:

The program allows the user to change the position of the block base point for all references of a block definition in a drawing.

The program offers two commands:

CBP: Change Base Point

This command allows the user to change the position of the block base point whilst retaining the insertion point coordinates for all references of the selected block. Hence usually, the block components will be moved around the insertion point when the base point is changed.

CBPR: Change Base Point retain Reference position

This command also allows the user to alter the position of the block base point, but will retain the visual position of each reference of the selected block. That is, the position of the block reference geometry will remain unchanged, and the insertion point for each block reference will be repositioned.

The program will perform successfully with rotated & scaled block references, constructed in any UCS plane.

Drill – Create Many Holes in Many 3D-Solids

From the Autodesk App Store:

Plugin radically accelerates works all who design 3D furniture, woodworking or other products with a lot of holes.

Standard command "Subtract" requires to select each item individually and destroys subtracted solid. Because of this work unbearably long. Now you can select all the details and holes one frame, press button Drill and wait quietly until the program will do all the work itself. Program itself find details,  find hole-solids (it must be on a special layer “Holes”) and subtract every hole. One hole can penetrate a lot of detail; you do not need to make copies of the subtracted solid. Details are not glued together (as does command Subtract).

If you are uncomfortable sharing the solid in layers, then in this case the program contains the command "Gap". It operates similarly to the conventional subtraction and requests two groups of solids.

In addition, the program can:

• make the gap between the parts for easy docking.
• subtract the hole-solid from blocks and nested blocks.
• keep subtrahend solid.
• use pre-selected objects.
• show the progress bar and display statistics to the console.
• you can configure which layer will be used for the hole.
• program can query to select hole layer on each Drill command.

Free ConstructionLines – Create Construction Lines of Infinite Length

From the Autodesk App Store:

Creates a construction line of infinite length.

A "block" and "xref" are selectable, too.

• CL_horizontal (CLH)
• CL_vertical (CLV)
• CL_cross (CLC)
• CL_2points (CLA)
• CL_E-parallel (CLEP)
• CL_E-perpendicular (CLEV)
• CL_2P-parallel (CL2P)
• CL_2P-perpendicular (CL2V)
• CL_dis-bisects (CL2D)
• CL_dis-division (CLND)
• CL_ang-bisects (CL2A)
• CL_ang-division CLNA)
• CL_offset (CLOF)

Free comsCountIt!

From the Autodesk App Store:

This plug-in allow you to search multiple drawings for blocks or texts, grouping and counting them based on their attributes, and report the results in a grid that can be sorted and rearranged.

When you are satisfied with your selection you can both insert a table on a drawing or export the results as a XLS workbook, even without MS Excel installed.

It's much faster and easier to use than the built-in Data Extraction.

The plug-in comes also with three handy tools for table management: Table Sort, Table Merge with add-up capabilities, and Table Paste to paste Excel data directly as an Autodesk® AutoCAD® table.

Second panel: objects selection and grouping

Free comsLayerIt! – Automatically Assign New Entities to Specific Layers Based on Their Type

From the Autodesk App Store:

This plug-in allows to automatically dispatch new entities to specific layers based on their type.

Have you ever wanted that Autodesk® AutoCAD® Mechanical® trick that move automatically dims and hatches to specific layers? Now you can even with plain vanilla Autodesk® AutoCAD®.

The plugin is really easy to use, just open the options form and define which layer should get a newly inserted entity.

The settings are user-based, so you have to do this only once and it will work on every drawing you'll work on. Simple and very functional, you'll forget it's activated and wonder why it's not a basic feature of AutoCAD.

There are six entity categories recognized:

• Dimensions (linear, aligned, radius, diameter and angle dimensions);
• Hatches
• Viewports
• Texts (MText and single line)
• Leaders (MLeaders and simple leaders)
• Tables

Settings form

OsnapPalette – Includes Custom Object Snaps

From the Autodesk App Store:

GILE_OSNAPPALETTE command shows the Onsap Palette which combines the OSNAP dialog toggles to set running Object Snap modes (possibly 'on the fly') and the Object Snap Menu to specify a command modifier (object snap, point filter, mtp) at a command prompt for a point.

The Onsap Palette also provides some custom Object Snap modes to snap on the Third, the Quarter or any other specified Fraction of curve lengths (arc, circle, ellipse, line, polyline segment) and on the Centroid of arcs, polylines, regions and 3d solids. These Custom Object Snaps also can be specified as a running mode via the _OSNAP command, by entering the object snap name at a prompt for a point, or with the osnap AutoLISP function.

A system variable (GILE_CUSTOSMODE) defines the running Custom Object Snap modes. Another one (GILE_COMODEFRACDEN) defines the fraction denominator for the FRC object snap. These system variables values can also be specified by entering their names, using the _SETVAR command, or, from AutoLISP, with the getvar and setvar functions.

Lay – Lay 3D-Solids to XY Plane. Group and Sort Details, Make FlatShots for CNC

From the Autodesk App Store:

Using this plugin you can quickly lay out the details of a complex assembly in the XY plane. This is useful when you are designing products made from sheet materials (furniture, woodworking), and when you need to do detailing, arranges every detail drawings. The plugin allows you to put selected solids in the XY plane of the world coordinate system, regardless of how they were arranged in space.

In a single click the plugin can do copy and a few turns of solids. Moreover, you can immediately select all solids components in an assembly, rather than to lay out solid by solid. As a result you get a neat column of details sorted from highest to lowest with text title.

In addition the plugin can:

• Write the header of each detail with its size and any description.
• Find the same detail in an assembly and to group them and to writing in a title number.
• Sort details by layer, color, depth. When the sorting ON layer/color/depth written in the detail title.
• Make you own title format rather default.
• Find simple rectangular details as not lay it (if you want).
• Do FlatShot. Use it to make curves for CNC.
• On/Off its settings without dialog window directly from Autodesk® AutoCAD® console. Thus you can make you own buttons and macros to use different variants of Lay command.
• Interact with plugin Names to get the names of solids, to measure the number of mirror parts and rotate solids market as Texture Across.
• Mark texture on detail.
• Find mirrored details

BlackBox Right Click Rename – Contextually Rename Entity-Specific Properties

From the Autodesk App Store:

Right Click Rename for AutoCAD® allows a user to select a single Entity, and contextually rename its Entity-specific properties, as supported by the RENAME, or -RENAME Commands, from the context (right click) menu.

So there's no more need to use the RENAME dialog, and hunt down multiple item(s), etc... Simply select the desired Entity (i.e., a Block, Dimension, Polyline, Table, etc.), and Right Click Rename that Entity's Block Name, Layer, Dimension Style, or Table Style, etc. The Entity's existing property name is supplied for you at the command line, so you need only type the new property name. Lemon squeezy.

Please note that default items such as "0" (zero), and "Defpoints" layers, "ByLayer" Material, etc. cannot be renamed.

This plug-in is only accessible from the context (right click) menu, when a single entity is selected, and supports AutoCAD-based products 2010-2014. This plug-in is automagically loaded for you in 2012 and newer versions which support Autoloader. To load this plug-in for 2010-2011 versions, simply NETLOAD the appropriate assembly located within the ./Contents/Support/ folder.