Programming webcast: .NET for LISP Programmers

Another webcast you might be interested in:

Free AutoCAD programming webcast: .NET for LISP Programmers

As mentioned in this previous post, my team delivers regular webcasts on programming with Autodesk technologies.

Assuming you're reading this while the metaphorical ink's still damp, it's still not too late to register for a class being held on Thursday October 16th at 8am Pacific, 5pm CET: AutoCAD: .NET for LISP Programmers.

Otherwise you should be able to find a recording of the webcast on this page within a few weeks of the session being delivered. In fact, here's the recording of the last time this session was delivered (although it may well have been updated slightly, as the session will also be delivered at AU 2008).

Here's a brief synopsis of the topic covered by this webcast:

You know that .NET is a modern and powerful programming environment. But, no matter how much you might want to start using it, you can't abandon all your old LISP code. We’ll show you how to write .NET code that can interoperate with your existing LISP code, with a special emphasis on user interface components.

AutoCAD LT Webcast: Making the Most of Annotation

Update: this webcast was recorded, and should be posted in about a week to:

www.autodesk.com/autocadltwebcasts

via Autodesk:

AutoCAD LT Webcast: Annotation Unlimited: Making the Most of Annotation Tools in AutoCAD LT
Date & Time: Thursday, October 2, 2008 10:00 - 11:30 a.m. PDT

Annotating drawings is something that everybody has to do. No matter how clearly a plan or detail is drawn, it almost always needs some text inserted to convey all the information it should. With AutoCAD® LT, however, that task is easier than ever. In this webcast, AutoCAD LT Technical marketing manager Kate Morrical will explain and demonstrate how built-in tools make adding annotations a snap, whether they’re simple text objects, intelligent dimensions, or detailed tables. She’ll also cover newer features, such as fields and annotation scaling.

REGISTER HERE: http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/oc/offer/form?siteID=123112&id=11808649

Reminder: St. Louis Metro BIM/CAD meeting tonight!

Just a reminder...

The Gateway Autodesk User's Group is meeting tonight at the Masonry Institute on Big Bend. From 6-7:30.

Local BIM guru and educational advocate Tomislav Zigo will be presenting on Interoperability and Building Performance tools.

We'll be giving away a pass to Autodesk University (must be 21 and over, and able to cover own transportation costs), among other prizes.

What else: If you are a GAUG member and if you are present at the meeting, you might win a pass to Autodesk University 2008. ($ 1,845 value).
You can RSVP here to make yourself eligible for this AU draw by joining GAUG!!!!

As always, there will be food and drink, thanks to sponsor, Seiler Instrument.
There's also a new reseller in town, and I believe they'll have at least one rep in attendance if you'd like to meet them.



As an aside, world-renowned CADD Manager, Mark Kiker (current President of AUGI) has just started a BIM Manager's group. If you want to share your opinions and gather feedback from other's, pop over and sign up.

AUGI Local Events this Week

I love the calendar reminders on the AUGI forum site.

I can easily see there are a few LUG's/Local Chapters/SIG's with events this week (I also see by the calendar page itself that there are six more events the following week).

September 9th, 2008 -
- San Francisco Revit Structure Special Interest Group
- Redwood Empire Revit User Group

September 10th, 2008 -
- STRUG-SD
- Sacramento MEP User Group
- GAUG (St. Louis Metro Area) CAD/BIM Meeting
- North Bay Civil GIS User Group

September 11th, 2008 -
- Denver Revit Users Group
- San Francisco MEP User Group
- Bend Revit User Group

St. Louis CAD/BIM Meeting on September 10th

There is another meeting of the Gateway AUG coming up. This is for anyone interested in design tools who is in the St. Louis Metro Area. Our meetings are always free, and you don't *have* to RSVP. Feel free to show up and bring a friend. Not only do you hear from some local experts about their fields, you can also network and hang out with some really cool folks. Hope to see you there! P.S. Please note, our Fall Quarterly meeting was supposed to be the night before the CAD Camp, but, it looks like that event has been canceled. We'll miss the instructors and the chance for some good classes, but, that's all the more reason to try to show up to some Gateway AUG meetings. If you've got an idea for a topic you'd like to see (or present), please feel free to contact any one of us. (PLEASE NOTE: the below is a copy of an email sent out to all GAUG members, if you did NOT get this email, please contact nicholas to make sure he has your correct email address)

Everyone,

Here are the details of our next Gateway Autodesk User Group meeting

When: 10th of September - Wednesday - from 6 to 7:30 pm

Where: Masonry Institute, 1429 S Big Bend Blvd, St Louis, MO (google map).

What: "Interoperability between BIM and Building Performance modeling applications like Eco-tect and Green building studio" by Tomislav Zigo

What else: If you are a GAUG member and if you are present at the meeting, you might win a pass to Autodesk University 2008. ($ 1,845 value).

You can RSVP here to make yourself eligible for this AU draw by joining GAUG!!!!

I hope to see you there!

IMMANUEL NICHOLAS IYADURAI, LEED AP

President - Gateway Autodesk User Group

CAD Manager Survey 2008

Now that I've asked you to take part in the AUGI Annual Salary Survey (for all job titles and all disciplines) and you've given such a great response, I'm going to encourage you to take part in Robert Green's CAD Manager 2008 Survey (if applicable).

He does a great job with this every year, and his results are one of the multiple resources that I keep handy to analyze how competitive my pay is.

The results of my Salary Survey come out in the September/October edition of AUGIWorld Magazine, and the results of Robert's CAD Manager Survey will be in the November issue of CADalyst Magazine (You can find additional results respectively on the AUGI Survey Channel and in the October and November issues of the CAD Manager's newsletter).

From the CAD Manager's Newsletter:

Thanks to all the readers who sent in their comments regarding the survey. I've incorporated a number of questions into this year's survey to reflect reader concerns!

Now the fun begins: Participate in the survey! Forward this newsletter to everyone you know who functions as a CAD manager and ask them to participate. I'm especially interested in getting responses from Canada, European Union countries, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand because these markets haven't been analyzed as completely as I'd like.

To take the survey, just click on this link: http://www.cad-manager.com/survey

Results will be published in the November issue of Cadalyst magazine, and more detailed analysis will be included in CAD Manager's Newsletter in October and November, so be sure to check back!

Color me Happy, my new Dell is here!

Well, contrary to the cautionary tale from our friend over at Dell, it wasn't held up for two weeks, and my DH has just taken receipt of a brand spanking new 17" Dell Studio for me.

I plan on posting a review on the Tech-Tea blog within the next few days (as soon as I have time), complete with pictures and comparisons to the Dell Inspiron that I had been using.

I'll be happy to be up and running on a fully running machine after all of these weeks banging my head against the wall.


Other tiny updates... the next Gateway AUG meeting is tentatively scheduled for Wednesday, September 10th, the AUGIWorld staff is currently working on prettying up the results and article I've given them for the 7th Annual Salary Survey (my 5th as Manager), my first offspring is about to start kindergarten, I'll return to school myself the following week and my second offspring is trying to kick a hole in my abdomen to make sure I really enjoy the remaining 85 days (or so) of his gestation.

Oh, and in case you hadn't heard about it yet:
AUGI Changes Management Companies
Big changes ahead for some of the AUGI programs but the Board of Directors and the Volunteers hope to make it as painless a transition as possible.

The official announcement is here:
http://augi.typepad.com/augi_news/2008/08/augi-news.html

Current volunteering opportunities are listed here:
http://www.augi.com/volunteering/default.asp?page=33

To offer your services for anything else, contact the Volunteering Manager (currently Jennifer Loftfield volunteering@augi.com ).

Two More Weeks?

Looks like it could be two more weeks before my computer woes are fully resolved. ~sigh~ I'm a little twitchy and feeling technologically crippled.

Please bear with me. :-)

I miss my Dell computer

I've been having some problems with my home computer (a sweet 'little' 17.1" widescreen Inspiron 9400/E1705 laptop). It's something related to the graphics card and driver.

I've been propping it along for the past 6-8 months with some hacked versions of the drivers (something about Dell only having propriety stuff, but, stuff that won't work correctly).

We've finally had to give up on that route, as it's no longer good enough and he has been dueling with the Tech Support personnel for a five weeks now.

He's gamely walked through every 'script' they have, and he's also had techs remote into the pc and get the same results he's been getting.

So, they sent out a tech who also couldn't get it to work properly.

They finally sent out a box via DHL, and he packed up the machine and had it sent off with their assurances that we'd get back a working machine, one way or the other.

Well, we got it back quite quickly... that was nice.

Um, what was not so nice? The note inside. Assuring us that they'd tested it six ways to Sunday and found NOTHING WRONG!?!?! Also in the note, claims that they tried to contact us for further information but were unable to do so (which is just BS, because I have no emails from them, and he's had no calls from them, so I don't know if they sent carrier pigeons or what). There was another note that they'd checked the support ticket history for further information and found nothing... and finally ended with the notation to call Dell Tech support for assistance in installing the driver.

:-/ Um. Yeah.

When he called back to complain about them having returned a broken computer to us, he was immediately bumped up the chain of command and the supervisor that he talked to did apologize PROFUSELY and after checking the ticket himself could NOT understand why it was sent back when the problems were clearly documented. He is sending out ANOTHER box for us to send the computer back.

We're happy with his response, but, obviously, we're more than ticked off at the tech who did not make every effort to fix or replace my computer.

I didn't intend for this to be a rant on the Dell service center, but, the point is... I miss my computer. I've been without it for a few weeks now.

I've got work to do.
I've got finals next week and I have papers to prepare.
I need my personal email!!!
I miss having the world at my fingertips while I'm preparing dinner.

It's painful, it really, really is. I twitch at the iTouch commercials where folks are browsing the web and getting maps and telephone numbers so quickly.

~sniff~

Now, I have been contacted by a Dell employee who saw some tweets about my issue. So, we'll see if that helps.

Hopefully I'll be back up and running soon, very soon.

Autodesk University 2008 Course Listing

Looks like the AU 2008 class listing is now available!

Of the over 600 classes available across every discipline, there will also be six 'Power Tracks'.
AutoCAD, C3D, Geospatial, Industrial Design, Inventor and Revit

There is also some further breakdown in the Mechanical classes, I think there are five different categories. Customization & Programming and Development are now in two different categories as well.

There are nine Facilities Management/CAFM/BIM classes this year (to check out the class handouts from some of the past courses offered at AU, refer to post “Free Facilities Management Class Handouts”).

FM100-1 - Space Management on a Shoestring Budget: Using Autodesk® FMDesktop™
James Niles - Virginia Commonwealth University - Autodesk FMDesktop
FM210-1 - BIM for FM and Beyond
Bob Fahlin - Autodesk - Autodesk FMDesktop
FM214-1 - Autodesk® Facility Manager: Beyond the Basics
Stephen Komisarek - Autodesk - Autodesk FMDesktop
FM300-1 - It's Official! Autodesk® FMDesktop™ can Make your Practice More Profitable!
Shaun Bryant - CADFMconsultants - Autodesk FMDesktop
FM304-1 - Blue Line to Bottom Line with Autodesk® FMDesktop™: The Real World
Matt Davoren - CADD Microsystems, Inc.- Autodesk FMDesktop
FM310-1L - Autodesk® Revit® and Facilities Management: What's in Your Toolbox?
Clyne Curtis - Brigham Young University - AutoCAD Revit Architecture Suite
FM314-1 - Revit®, AutoCAD® Architectural, and AutoCAD® Drawings to DWF™ for FMDesktop™
Arthur Franz - Simple Solutions FM - Autodesk FMDesktop
FM318-1 - NCS Version 4.0: Revisions You Need to Know About
Charles Green - Wilson & Company - AutoCAD Revit Architecture Suite
FM500-1 - Facility Management: Down to the Nuts and Bolts
Jon Luby - Raptor Software - Autodesk FMDesktop

Some pretty interesting stuff there with some good instructors. I'll really miss not attending these classes this year (as well as classes for MEP and CAD Management), especially since we FINALLY GET A LAB. I've been waiting for that and asking for that for a few years now. I'd love to hear some reports from those who do attend and participate in this track (either just a personal email for my own information, or a nice writeup that I can post here with proper credit given back to the writer).

Do check out the spreadsheet on the referenced blAUg post for a complete listing of courses and teachers to see what you might find valuable in your industry and discipline.