I.D.E.A. HIGH SCHOOL DRAFTING AND CAD
SAMPLE PROBLEM

The Internet has become an indispensable communications tool for drafters and designers who are now using this tool to exchange drawing data more rapidly globally. If you have the Autodesk® DWF Viewer™or Volo View™ browser plug-ins, you may click on the drawing problem below with your right mouse button for a shortcut menu of special viewer command capabilities outlined at the bottom of this page. If you lack this browser plug-in, please read the following:
 
 
Below here is an IDEA introductory problem in Autodesk® DWF™ file format.
 
 
PROBLEM: Draw the given object FULL size in a .75 (3/4) scale CAD drawing to the exact sizes shown. Some GEOMETRIC CONSTRUCTION is required. After completion of the problem, answer the following questions. Give all answers to three decimal places of accuracy.
  1. What is the length of the line at letter "B"?
  2. What is the length of the arc at letter "C"?
  3. What is the distance from the corner at letter "D" to the corner at letter "E"?
  4. What is the distance from the bottom center of the slot at letter "F" to the bottom center of the slot at letter "G"?
  5. What is the length of the line at letter "H"?
  6. What is the distance from the center of the octagon at letter "K" to the center of the .750 diameter hole at letter "M"?
  7. What is the perpendicular distance from the center of the .500 diameter hole at the letter "L" to the center of the line from letter "K" to letter "A"?
  8. Copy the entire object 8 inches horizontally to the right and scale the copy .75 (3/4) original size.
  9. Now, on the copy, solve for the distance between the corner at letter "D" to the corner at letter "E".
  10. Finally, write down the name of the CAD software you used to perform this problem as well as its release or edition.
You must have written permission of the I.D.E.A. before making any use (other than classroom) of the materials presented herein.
 

Autodesk's DWF Viewer Key Features

From your browser in the Autodesk DWF Viewer window, click the right mouse button to view a menu of Autodesk DWF Viewer commands. The Autodesk DWF Viewer right click menu enables you to select from various modes of operation. The following section describes the right click menu commands available for Autodesk DWF Viewer.

Pan

By default Autodesk DWF Viewer is in Pan mode and the mouse pointer is a hand icon. To pan, press and hold the left mouse button and drag. The hand grabs the screen as you pan the DWF. Alternatively, you can use the arrow keys as keyboard shortcuts for pan.

Zoom

If you choose Zoom, the pointer changes to a magnifying glass. To zoom, press and hold the left mouse button and drag up and down in the window to zoom in and out, respectively. Alternatively, you can use the Pg Up and Pg Dn keys as keyboard shortcuts for zooming in and out.

Zoom Rectangle

If you right click and choose Zoom Rectangle, the pointer changes to a cross. To Zoom Rectangle, press and hold the left mouse button, then drag a rectangle over the area you want to zoom. When you release the button, the view zooms to the selected area. You must zoom to an area of at least 5 pixels.

Fit To Window

If you right click and choose Fit to Window, the view is zoomed in or out so that the drawing fills the available Autodesk DWF Viewer window. Alternatively, you can use the Home key as a keyboard shortcut for Fit to Window.

Layers

Using Autodesk DWF Viewer, if you right click and choose Layers, the Layers dialog opens from which you can turn layers on and off. The Layers dialog works like most Explorer dialog boxes in that you can select one or more layers and click the light bulb icon to turn on or off all of the selected layers. Layers are toggled based on the state of the light bulb icon when you click it. Pressing the space bar is the same as clicking the light bulb icon.

From within the Layers dialog, right click to access the Layers submenu. Layers submenu commands are On, Off, Toggle, Select All, and Clear All.

Named Views

Some DWG files have named views for use with AutoCAD. When a DWF is generated from such a DWG file, the named views are maintained within the DWF. As a result, when viewing a DWF file you can right click and choose Named Views to open the Named Views dialog. From the Named Views dialog you can select in the DWF file a named view previously defined in the source DWG. To position your browser to a view, double-click the named view, or select a named view and then click OK to select that view and dismiss the dialog. The right click menu Named Views command is available only when a DWF file contains at least one named view.

Location

If you right click and choose Location, the Current Location dialog opens displaying the current location of the mouse with respect to the DWF file. The coordinates displayed in the dialog reflect the original DWG file coordinates, not the coordinates of the DWF file.

Full View

When you right click and choose Full View, the browser navigates to an URL that contains only the DWF file. The DWF fills the available browser window. To undo this operation, use the browser's Back button or Go menu Back command.

Highlight URLs

Right click, then check or clear the Highlight URLs menu command. If the command is checked, WHIP! identifies all of the URLs in the DWF by highlighting each URL region. This enables you to see where URLs are before navigating. To avoid matching the color of the background or geometry in the DWF file, the highlighting is drawn in alternating light-gray/dark-gray/clear colors. Rendering in the clear color provides an instance where you can see the geometry underneath the URL text box.

If the command is not checked, URLs are not highlighted.

As a shortcut for the right click menu command, hold down the shift key. Release the Shift key to turn off Highlight URLs.

The right click menu Highlight URLs command is available only when a DWF file contains at least one URL.

Copy

To copy the current view of the DWF file, choose Copy from the right-click menu, or press CTRL+C. The current view is copied as an Enhanced Windows Metafile (EMF) and placed in the Windows Clipboard. You can paste the Clipboard contents into any EMF compliant application by choosing that application's Paste command, or in most cases by pressing CTRL+V. Note that images copied and pasted from WHIP! into other applications may lose some precision since EMF format files do not have the same amount of detail as DWF files.

Note that the Copy command shortcut (CTRL+C) does not work in Netscape Navigator. Netscape Navigator users must use the right-click menu Copy command to copy the current viewer view.

Print

To print a DWF, right click and choose Print. The view that is currently visible in the viewer window is printed using the standard system print controls. Using the right click menu Print command prints only the DWF file. Otherwise, to print the entire HTML page including the current view of the DWF in the Autodesk DWF Viewer window, use the browser's Print button or File menu Print command. If you print using the browser Print command, the Print dialog appears from which you have the option to force the background color of the DWF to white and the color of the geometry to black. (These settings are on by default.) For more information on printing, see Printing DWF Files.

Save As

To save the DWF to your local drive, right click and choose Save As. You can choose to save the DWF file in three formats: DWF, DWG, or Windows Bitmap (BMP).

If you select to save the file as a DWG, Autodesk DWF Viewer copies the DWG file used to generate the DWF, provided that the DWG file is available. When looking for a DWG file, Autodesk DWF Viewer looks in the directory where the DWF file is stored. Note that the DWF file and DWG file must reside in the same directory for drag and drop to work.

If you do not want to publish the DWG file, but want to publish only the DWF, do not place the DWG file in the DWF directory. In this case, when you attempt to save as DWG, an error message is generated that indicates that the DWG file is not available and the Save As fails.

The right click menu Save As command is available once the streaming of the DWF file completes.

About Autodesk DWF Viewer

When you right click and choose About Autodesk DWF Viewer..., the About Autodesk DWF Viewer dialog opens. The About Autodesk DWF Viewer dialog displays information about Autodesk DWF Viewer and the current DWF.

Regarding the DWF, you can view information on the following attributes (assuming they were supplied when the file was created): data version (revision of DWF), description, author, creator, copyright, keywords, source filename, creation time, modification time, source creation time, source modification time, current view left, current view right, current view bottom, and current view top.

The coordinates depicted in the current view are useful when used with view="left+right+bottom+top" targets.

Forward

Forward is equivalent to the browser Forward button. The right click menu Forward command is useful when working with frames. Use it so that the browser only advances forward for the frame containing the DWF file.

Back

Back is equivalent to the browser Back button. The Autodesk DWF Viewer Back menu item is useful when working with frames. Use it so that the browser only advances backward for the frame containing the DWF file.

 



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