AutoCAD Electrical software ships with powerful tools, but many teams struggle to move beyond the out‑of‑the‑box configuration into a setup that truly supports their design standards, workflows, and project scale. This class will focus on how to configure AutoCAD Electrical so it becomes a reliable production tool instead of a constant source of rework and work-arounds. Rather than focusing on schematic drafting basics, this class will emphasize configuration strategy, governance, and best practices that scale across teams and projects. You'll leave with a clear understanding of what to configure, why it matters, and how to maintain a healthy AutoCAD Electrical environment over time.

This session will demonstrate how to connect AutoCAD Electrical electromechanical workflows, AutoCAD Mechanical linked with Inventor software, and factory design workflows for seamless data exchange. Learn how to integrate layouts and models across tools, enabling accurate coordination from schematics to 3D design. Discover how cloud-based solutions like Desktop Connector and Autodesk Forma improve collaboration, maintain data continuity, and reduce rework. Through practical examples, see how connected workflows enhance efficiency and accelerate project delivery.

Curious about how to link your schematics in AutoCAD Electrical software to your models in Inventor software? Get an understanding of the functionality that links these two programs together. This session will cover the key elements you'll need to know to bridge your design between AutoCAD Electrical and Inventor.

This session will present the many changes we've made to our Vault and Inventor systems in order to accommodate the different requirements of a product-based design and manufacturing environment as opposed to a project-based one. Making this change has seen a reduction in the engineering support the manufacturing team requires, which in turn allows the engineering team to come up with new ideas for more products. Increased reuse of assemblies and reconfiguration of systems have led to new opportunities for sales while building on the established experience base. The ways in which we have moved to simplify procedures, reuse models, manage our data, and track OEM use are definitely scalable both up and down, therefore allowing everyone to take advantage of the changes we've made. This was a long process for us, and we'd like to share our experience and potentially help you prevent some of the headaches we encountered along the way.

Ensuring accuracy in a large set of construction documents can be complicated. Spelling errors, missed annotation, and multiple users on a project can still waste a project's budget time when they don't need to. Automating the keynote creating and editing process can help eliminate these time wasters, saving considerable time and money for some of our most basic needs. This lesson will cover a feature in AutoCAD software that will use an Excel file as one source of truth for keynotes on construction documents. We'll create a table that will be dynamically populated with keynotes as they are used in a drawing, allowing for concise tables that, along with the Excel file, can be updated together to match for the duration of project design. Any engineering discipline using AutoCAD will be able to use this workflow.

In this class, you will learn how to customize substation design using a utility company standard philosophy with AutoCAD® Electrical and Autodesk® Inventor® software. We will cover in depth standard techniques to configure each module (Structural, Electrical, and Site Development) as a utility platform. You will improve your drawing efficiency, accuracy, coordination, and overall productivity. The use of consistent utility standards will give you the ability to validate data very quickly. Use this utility standard philosophy to create a fully integrated utility library that is applicable for new and existing projects. With minimal manual data input, you will be able to generate and retrieve documentation such as bills of materials, single line, three line, elementary/schematic, wiring diagram, panel, cable lists, structural analysis, station layout, grading plans, and asset information. Attendees should have general Inventor and AutoCAD Electrical knowledge.

What are your favorite features in AutoCAD software? These are a few of my favorite things. Over the years of teaching AutoCAD software I've built an extensive list of my favorite features and tips. We'll explore features from the beginning of AutoCAD software up to AutoCAD 2015 software. This session is all about me sharing my love and passion for AutoCAD software with you.

Meet with electric utility industry peers to discuss the intricacies of substation design. Find out how other utilities are using design resources. Compare workflows. Share successes, failures and challenges. Benefit from others' experience. Share ideas for improving processes. The more knowledge we have, the better we can design substations.

One AutoCAD software became available to AutoCAD subscription customers when AutoCAD 2019 software became available in March 2018. AutoCAD subscription customers can now work faster with specialized AutoCAD toolsets, which include industry-specific features and libraries for architecture, mechanical design, electrical design, and more. A subscription to One AutoCAD enables automation of floor plans, sections, elevations, and other drawings; accurate design of piping, plumbing, and ducting for faster design with mechanical tools; and design of ductwork, electrical conduit, and circuiting for HVAC, plumbing, and electrical with MEP. Shaun Bryant, AutoCAD guru and AutoCAD Influencer, will take you through the benefits of the One AutoCAD subscription, demonstrating how to utilize the toolsets and make them available to your AutoCAD design team, regardless of discipline and industry.

Do you find yourself behind on design projects? Do you want to better familiarize yourself with AutoCAD software to improve your efficiency? In this class, we’ll discuss how to manipulate settings and options to improve speed. We’ll discuss how to set up drawings using Xrefs and utilizing paper space and model space. We’ll also look at how layer commands and object display settings can reduce clutter in your drawings to make it easier to manipulate drawing components. This class will help you become more familiar with some of the options in AutoCAD, and help you take that next step in your career using the many tools AutoCAD has to offer.

Customization is a key feature in AutoCAD software that makes it different from any other CAD tool on the market. Configuring user interface, modifying the files within AutoCAD software can greatly improve productivity when using AutoCAD software. By customizing AutoCAD software, a user can streamline different product workflows and enable creation of new ones that can improve the company works. The workflows might range from importing styles and layers into AutoCAD software to extracting information from AutoCAD software into a database. If you created blocks in AutoCAD software, chances are that you have already understood some of the customization features in AutoCAD software. However, we will cover some intermediate and advanced customization techniques in AutoCAD software that can greatly impact your productivity and enable you as a power AutoCAD software user in customization space. When you start your next project, chances are that you will tend to customize AutoCAD software and enhance your design or drafting workflow.

As more importance is being placed on Building Information Modeling (BIM) models and 3D deliverables and the lifecycle management of project data, there is still the need to present the 2D representations of the model in a clear and concise format that utilizes time-tested effective practices for drawing and drafting standards. In most cases our deliverables are still the 2D plan sets. How many of your engineers, designers, and architects utilize software design packages but have not been instructed in effective drafting practices that help to tell the story on the construction documents that are going to the contractor? In this round-table session we will discuss what organizations are doing to preserve the craft of drafting, and we'll cover how to handle moving between the 3D models to a 2D plan set deliverable.

In this class, we will walk you through the procedures using specialized toolsets to design from start to finish. We will learn how to use standard content in AutoCAD Architecture software and AutoCAD MEP software. Then we’ll learn how to use Bill of Materials from AutoCAD Mechanical software, along with wiring diagrams and reporting from AutoCAD Electrical software, to simplify and accelerate your design process. We will show you how to transition between different toolsets to achieve optimal design.

Each release of AutoCAD software translates to bigger and better features, but some old tools have never changed. Scripting is one of these tools. It's still just as powerful today as it was when introduced into AutoCAD software back in the late ‘90s. If you can key in commands at the command line, you can script. If you're not familiar with the Action Recorder, you’ll learn in this class how to create some easy macros to use for increased speed of design. Regardless of your knowledge of scripting or the Action Recorder, you'll go from zero to hero in 60 minutes in this class.

Why should you be using Dynamic Blocks? Quite simply, Dynamic Blocks can greatly reduce the number of blocks in your library, improving your efficiency. While it does take a little more time up front to create a dynamic block, the timesavings on the back end are well worth the effort! Even better news: if you are a proficient user of AutoCAD software, you should have no problem converting those boring, static blocks into shiny, new, Dynamic Blocks.

Multiple cultures in today’s business world often require both published applications and in-house applications to be easily usable by anyone. Globalization is designing and developing applications for users in multiple cultures, and localization is the process of customizing data and resources for specific cultures for applications. In this class, we’ll talk about and demonstrate building an AutoCAD plug-in that is localized for multiple cultures. We’ll create resource files adding strings that are displayed in the application; have commands that are culture aware; and set up the user interface, including dialogs that handle different cultures. Although we’ll focus on AutoCAD applications, most of what we’ll cover applies to any .NET development.

Writing AutoLISP code is one thing; troubleshooting it and restoring the system "back to normal" when crashes occur while troubleshooting can be a headache. Take this class and take away your headaches. Learn how to quickly get things back to normal. Learn how to use lists to your advantage-I mean, LISP does stand for List Processing! Learn how to create your own error routine to set things back the way they were before your fancy new program crashed and burned. Crashing and burning is part of the process of getting a new timesaving routine off the ground-this class will make those crashes less painful. This session will feature AutoCAD software and is AIA approved.

AutoLISP® is an easy-to-learn programming language for the non-programmer. Programming is simply intelligently obtaining and using or reusing data. This hands-on lab shows you how to recognize the type of data that you need, get that data, and then use it. This “basics” class focuses on the terminology and syntax (the format and the functions that your programs need to follow) used in AutoLISP. You create a simple program or 2 using math and numeric data types. This course lays down all the groundwork you need to start using AutoLISP to streamline your working environment.

Tired of clicking through the same paths several times a day just to get to default directories? Do you want to help yourself and others store files in the proper directories? Then this class is for you. We will discuss the WD.ENV and WD_M files used to initiate the AutoCAD Electrical software environment and provide default paths for various commands. We will also touch on templates and shared environments.