Use the Tables in AutoCAD!

For Pete’s sake, I beg you, use the tables in AutoCAD. I don’t know how long it’s been since they introduced tables in AutoCAD (I want to say since v2004, at least), but you guys have to use them. I mean seriously, how long are you going to continue in your old-school methods and ignorance? There is not one good reason to not use tables. What do you have a problem with? The efficiency? The speed? The increase in productivity? The ease?

Tables are great to use for those of us in this particular industry (I’m talking about 2D, vanilla CAD stuff). Instead of drawing all those lines and text and moving them around and resizing, etc., tables can be used to make life so much easier. Tables are awesome because it makes the table you are drawing a single, connected object. The cells and tables have properties. You can customize the look like any other style (text, leader) using the Table Styles options. Sure, it takes a little effort to set it up and learn it, but it’s worth it. Don’t be lazy. Here are a couple examples that make tables useful:

• Any kind of schedules. HVAC, electrical, equipment, plumbing. Anything. It pains me to watch people stretching lines around and wasting their lives justifying and resizing dozens of text objects. And then you miss a line here or there. Or you have what looks like a single line, but it’s actually several lines all on top of each other. You know what I’m talking about! Just stop it already.
• Notes, General Notes, Abbreviations, Legends. Yes, even those. Use the table to organize everything easily. You can even hide the grid lines so it doesn’t look like a table. And remember, you can stick blocks inside cells if it’s not just text you want to enter. I’ve seen people use tables in a half-ass way, which is terrible. They use the tables for the text, but they put blocks on top of the table (so it’s not actually part of the table, but looks like it). Why do they do this? Laziness, mostly. But like a lot of people, they didn’t know how to do it properly, so instead of spending a few minutes to figure it out, they assume it’s faster to just fake it and move on. Don’t be like that.

Of course, there are many more applications, but those are the common, obvious ones. I know AutoCAD introduces features that are useless sometimes, but every once in a while they’ll introduce a life-saving feature like this. Take advantage of it. There are much more things you can do with tables now, like calculations and linked fields, but that’s not for everyone. This article is for people who don’t even know tables exist or people who stubbornly refuse to use them.

The pictures below show examples of what can be done with tables. The bottom picture is what the printed sheet would look like. Notice how the hidden grid lines don’t print, but the tables help organize the content.