Cad Autocad For Mac

Autodesk has announced its annual updates to AutoCAD for the macOS platform. Dedicated AutoCAD users have had the ability to use their favorite CAD software on Apple’s popular Mac computers since 2011 and each year the releases continue to build on features that match its Windows counterpart. Quite often the Mac version of AutoCAD serves as a testing ground for new user-interface (UI) or user-experience (UX) concepts that then roll into the Windows version.

An AutoCAD for the Uniqueness of Mac

The AutoCAD mobile app is a DWG viewing and editing application, with easy-to-use drawing and drafting tools. View, markup, edit, and create DWG files on your smartphone or tablet - anytime, anywhere. Simplify your client meetings and construction site visits with the most powerful CAD app and do real CAD work on the go.

Few CAD software companies have focused so heavily on dedicating programming resources to exploiting the very latest macOS version features, like the TouchBar in the newest MacBook Pro. Autodesk continues to be one of these developers.

The DWG Compare feature has been improved based on user feedback.

In the new 2020 release Autodesk has expanded its foreign language support, adding Korean language support this year following a successful push to support both German and Japanese last year, in addition to English and French. These five languages help robustly support AutoCAD on Mac in the biggest industrialised economies in the world, including the US, Japan, Germany, UK and now Korea.

AutoCAD 2020 for Mac includes an improved Dark Theme UI, with modern blue interface accents designed to work with recent icon improvements. The new look provides optimum constrast without distracting from the drawing area.

Top New Features in 2020 Releases

Here are top new features:

AutoCAD for Mac now in Korean
New Dark Theme Improvements — new modern blue interface provides optimal contrast without distracting from drawing area where your eyes naturally want to be
Quick Measure — the new tool helps users quickly measure distances, dimensions, and angles by hovering your mouse over the objects in question
New Blocks Palette — the new palette provides a visual gallery of blocks and filter tools for finding what you are looking for quickly. Drag and drop support and double-clicking bring blocks quickly into the drawing area.
Compare Feature — A favorite feature has been enhanced based on user feedback. DWG Compare now allows users to compare two versions of a drawing without having to leave your current window. Any changes you make in the current drawing are dynamically compared and highlighted, and you can import desired changes in real time.
Rollover Tool Tips — rollover tool tips display current values of certain properties when the cursor hovers over objects in the drawing. Object information like color, layer and block name all appear.

To learn more about AutoCAD 2020 for Mac and AutoCAD LT 2020 for Mac, please visit this link here.

Trial versions are available for 30 days. Subscribers to AutoCAD 2020 for Mac gain access to the Windows version, industry tools, AutoCAD mobile app, AutoCAD web app and more.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Last year when we announced the 2019 versions for AutoCAD on the Mac platform we got a lot of reader feedback in our comments below the article. One reader brought up the valid point that without vertical product support (eg: Architectural, MEP, etc) the need to create custom plugins is critical.

Over the years in our discussions with Autodesk we have heard about third-party support coming to the Mac version for years, but it seems the user-base around the Mac version isn’t interested, in need or both to substantially support that third-party support. With over 100 million Macs in use, one would think that the market is plenty big enough to garner third-party plugin support for the Mac version, but the issue isn’t likely Autodesk’s issue as much as Apple’s damaging role in non-existent professional industry marketing and developer encouragement. And it also has not helped that the 2013 Mac Pro was a massive failure. Without a “work horse” Mac ideal for pro markets and economical to support, mass adoption of the Mac in the CAD markets has not taken off despite the clear demand for it—exemplified by the use of Mac portables in the pro markets. With the new 2019 Mac Pro things may change in the new few years, particularly if the Cupertino company can find a way to lower the starting price for that machine. With higher volumes of CAD users choosing to work on the Mac, Autodesk and its third-party developers will have much more incentive to support true parity between the macOS and Windows versions of this stalwart CAD application.

Autodesk this past week introduced the new One AutoCAD strategy as it unveiled its latest AutoCAD 2019 release for the coming year, with numerous adjustments to licensing, new industry toolsets, plus all new mobile and web versions of their most famous software.

One AutoCAD to Rule Them All

With this latest news, gone are the days when you purchased distinct AutoCAD programs, like AutoCAD Architecture or AutoCAD Mechanical. With the One AutoCAD mantra and new licensing structure, your single subscription license gains you access to specific industry toolsets that harness the features and functionality of the distinct AutoCAD programs of the past.

Your new subscription license also gives you the ability to use both the Windows and Mac versions of AutoCAD. However—and this is important—there is no 2019 update to Mac version of AutoCAD yet. Alyson Moses, AutoCAD Public Relations, Autodesk, confirmed that one’s subscription gains you access to AutoCAD for Mac 2018 as part of all the One AutoCAD offerings.

Autodesk has already stated in the past that the Mac version of AutoCAD is timed around Apple and its development cycle. The reason partly being that Autodesk progressively adopts Apple’s latest OS advances.

No Industry Tools for Mac Version

There are no industry tools for the Mac version, and at this time Autodesk doesn’t have plans for creating them. Instead, the company is suggesting that Mac users can access the industry toolsets by using a virtual machine or Boot Camp on macOS to run AutoCAD 2019 on Windows.

In some ways, this makes AutoCAD for the Mac a bit like the new web-based version of AutoCAD. In a communication to Architosh Autodesk wrote, “Features for the web and mobile apps are purpose-built for what we believe users need while on the go.”

In the past, Autodesk has clarified that “AutoCAD for Mac” users are mostly quite different in their needs than traditional AutoCAD users. Therefore, the development focus on the Mac version of AutoCAD has followed its own path. That path does not include the comprehensive development of the industry toolsets.

Some might argue with that strategy saying that in some industries—maybe mechanical CAD—there is little demand for a macOS version of the Mechanical Toolset but that there is solid demand for say the Architectural Toolset. Certainly, AutoCAD’s chief competitors will have much to argue about this limation. Having just visited the offices of Onshape a week ago and hearing and seeing the use of Macs by many of their key customers, particularly Mac mobiles in field settings (e.g.: fab or factory floors, workshops, client settings, and exterior product settings, etc.) one might think the opposite is true.

Two Types of ACAD Users—Shared Mobile and Web

Autodesk’s Mac user base for AutoCAD is a domain of folks that seem connected to traditional AutoCAD users, while this new license will enable the “traditional AutoCAD user” to explore their favorite CAD tool on other platforms—macOS, iOS, Android, web.

A key new development in the Autodesk One AutoCAD strategy is the new web version. We were told that the web version doesn’t have a command line (“yet”). And it is just a 2D version today. It deliberately pairs back features and functionality of AutoCAD on the desktop to focus on what Autodesk feels its users will want when using AutoCAD through the web via a browser interface. Which, by the way, can’t be Apple’s Safari. Mac os terminal. The new AutoCAD for the web app requires Google Chrome. We see this web version advancing to the point where it has near feature parity with the desktop version. It will take years, of course.

The mobile version of AutoCAD is also purpose-built as a subset of AutoCAD functionality. Running on optimized devices, ideally—which are iPhone X, iPad Pro, and Windows Surface—AutoCAD Mobile is designed ideally around the needs of users in the field or away from their desk.

Both the web and mobile versions enable the traditional AutoCAD user to explore design and drafting on different device types and operating systems, pluralizing the AutoCAD experience. This pluralization should only benefit the macOS version down the road so long as Apple delivers compelling Mac hardware that fits the needs of the CAD user.

Architosh Analysis and Commentary

Architosh readers are now getting familiar with the way in which we color-code the analysis segments of our stories. When we get into the world of DWG-based CAD programs, it is typically important to talk broadly about what many still feel is a de-facto industry standard.

Autodesk’s chief competitors with AutoCAD are the rising star in Bricsys in Belgium and the already industrially distributed group of folks and programs in Germany’s Graebert. Both of these companies have seized on Autodesk’s weaker support of the Mac and its weaker flexibility with licensing. On that latter part, the One AutoCAD strategy is a massive improvement.

The real benefits of the One AutoCAD strategy appear to be further down the road and are currently things happening under the hood of AutoCAD development. Kean Walmsley, who works for Autodesk in Switzerland, wrote a blog post, “The Future of AutoCAD,” that is a recommended read. He discusses the multi-year effort code-named “Fabric” which is a project to take the core of AutoCAD cross-platform.

Fabric was preceded by the Big Split, work done when the company decided to make AutoCAD for the Mac, natively. Walmsley emphasizes the importance of Fabric with respect to taking AutoCAD to the web and all future diverse platforms. Today’s new AutoCAD Web runs the same core code base inside both AutoCAD 2019 on Windows and AutoCAD 2018 on Mac. With more emphasis on a common core engine for AutoCAD and projects like Fabric, it means Autodesk will eventually have the option for parity not just between Windows and Mac but between other platforms as well.