Exercise 1.3: Explore the Model with the Prospector tab

 In this exercise you will use the Prospector tab of the Toolspace to explore the model.

1. Launch Civil 3D 2023, and open the file named User Interface.dwg.

2. If the Toolspace is not already open, click Toolspace on the Home tab of the ribbon.

3. Click the Prospector tab of the Toolspace to bring it to the forefront.

4. Explore the tree structure of Prospector by clicking the plus signs to expand the different

branches.

5. Expand Alignments ➢ Centreline Alignments ➢ Main Road A ➢Profiles. This hierarchical

arrangement provides effective organization and suggests a relationship between the alignment

and its profiles.

6. Click within the left viewport to activate it. Then, on the Prospector tab, right-click Side Road

B, and select Zoom To. Notice how Prospector knows the location of the alignment named Side

Road B, even if you don’t.

7. Keep this drawing open for the next exercise.

You can watch video for this exercise here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGmjW_Hvai0&list=PLUfG0g2DwpSsd1NJo4cMmvSazkW5DKUkA&index=5

Working with the toolspace:

 Think of the Toolspace as the Civil 3D “command centre” where all Civil 3D data and settings

are laid out in a nice, orderly arrangement. It has several main functions that are represented by

the different tabs it can contain. Altogether, the Toolspace can house four tabs: Prospector,

Settings, Survey, and Toolbox.

Prospector tab

Prospector is arguably the most important part of the Civil 3D user interface. As you build your design,

Prospector arranges the different components of your design in a tree structure (see Figure 1.7). Why a

tree structure and not just a list of items? Later in this book, you’ll study how Civil 3D creates

relationships between different parts of your design. In some ways, this tree structure helps represent

some of those relationships as a hierarchy. Another, more practical

reason for a tree structure is that it’s an efficient way to show a long list of items in a relatively small

area—the branches of the tree can be collapsed to make room to expand other branches.

F i G u R E 1 . 7 The Prospector

tab showing a portion of the tree

structure.

Chapter-1| Exercise 1.2: use the Ribbon to launch Commands

 In this exercise, you will familiarize yourself with the ribbon’s tabs and panels.

1. Launch Civil 3D 2023, and open the file named User Interface.dwg.

2. Click the Home tab of the ribbon to bring it to the forefront (it may be there already).

3. Click the downward-pointing white triangle at the bottom of the Create Design panel and

note how it expands down.

4. Click the Insert tab of the ribbon. Here, you see words like insert, import, and attach, which

are all ways of bringing information into the drawing.

5. Click the other tabs of the ribbon, and see whether you can relate some of the words you see

in the commands to the title of each ribbon tab.

6. Place your cursor in the left viewport, and roll the mouse wheel forward to zoom in to the

drawing. Keep zooming in until you can clearly see the road centrelines labelled with stationing

numbers (these are Civil 3D alignments). Click one of the road centrelines, and note that the

ribbon displays a contextual tab to make alignment commands accessible (see Figure 1.6).

7. Keep this drawing open for the next exercise.

Because nothing changes in this drawing file as a result of the exercise steps, no User

Interface – Complete file is necessary.

FREE DOWNLOAD PRACTICE FILE HERE:

https://apkadmin.com/vjv5y76rtpua/User_Interface.dwg.html

You can Watch this Exercise Video here:

Exercise #2 (Video):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0an4QpCiN2I&list=PLUfG0g2DwpSsd1NJo4cMmvSazkW5DKUkA&index=4

Working with the Ribbon

 The ribbon is located at the top of your screen, and it is the launching pad for most of your Civil

3D commands. The commands that it contains are organized into groups through the use of tabs

and panels. The ribbon itself is divided into a series of tabs that include Home, Insert, Annotate,

and so on, as illustrated in Figure 1.3.

Each tab is divided into panels. For instance, the Home tab shown in Figure 1.4 includes the

Palettes, Create Ground Data, Create Design, Profile & Section Views, and Draw panels.

Because Civil 3D groups the commands in this way, you never have to choose from

more than a handful of commands once you’ve taken your best guess at the correct

tab and panel. Also, you’ll find that the more you use Civil 3D, the better you will get at

knowing the location of the commands. It’s not so much memorizing their positions as

it is learning how Civil 3D “thinks”—that is, the way in which it relates commands to

one another and categorizes them into tabs and panels.

Exercise 1.1: use the Application Menu to open a File

 In this exercise, you will use the application menu to open a file.

1. Launch Civil 3D by double-clicking the Civil 3D 2023 Imperial (Metric) icon on the desktop

of your computer.

2. Click the application menu icon.

3. On the application menu, click Open.

4. Browse to the Chapter 01 class data folder, and open User Interface.dwg.

5. Open the application menu once more, and investigate the commands that are listed there.

You’ll notice that most of them have to do with creating, opening, saving, and printing drawing

files.

6. Keep this drawing open for the next exercise.

Because nothing changes in this drawing file as a result of the exercise steps, no User Interface

Complete file is necessary.

Exercise #1 (Video):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aRPpjcP3vcw&list=PLUfG0g2DwpSsd1NJo4cMmvSazkW5DKUkA&index=2

Getting to Know the Civil 3D user interface

 To begin learning about the Civil 3D environment, let’s take our airplane analogy

down a notch and think about this as learning to drive an automobile. When

your parents first sat you down at the wheel and talked about the car’s controls,

they probably didn’t mention the air conditioning or the radio. Those, of course,

are important parts of the driving experience, but I’m betting they started with

the most important parts, such as the steering wheel, the gas pedal, and, most

important of all, the brake pedal. We’re going to approach your first experience

with “driving” Civil 3D in much the same manner.

There are many, many parts to the Civil 3D user interface. For the purpose of this

book, I’ll cover just the ones that will be most important in enabling you to navigate

the software effectively. Figure 1.1 shows the major components of the user interface.

●

Application Menu: The place where you can find everyday file-handling

commands that enable you to do things like open, save, and print your drawings.

●

Ribbon: The place where most Civil 3D commands are launched.

●

Toolspace: The Civil 3D “command centre” where all the data and settings are

laid out in an organized fashion.

●

Drawing Area: The place where the drawing is created.

●

Command line: The “chat window” where you and Civil 3D talk to one another

Panorama A multipurpose window where you can view and/or edit drawing

information and properties

●

Inquiry tool: A tool with many smaller tools within it that enable you to get

information about your design.

●

Transparent Commands: Toolbar A toolbar with special commands that allow

drafting and geometric construction to be done in the way that civil engineers and

surveyors do it.

Working with the Application Menu:

The application menu (see Figure 1.2) expands out from the

square AutoCAD Civil 3D icon located at the top left of your

screen. Here, you’ll find commands for creating, opening, 

saving, and printing your drawing files.

CHAPTER 1-Navigating the user interface

 If you’re new to the AutoCAD® Civil 3D® software environment, then your first experience has

probably been a lot like staring at the instrument panel of an airplane. Civil 3D can be quite

intimidating, with lots of buttons, strange shapes, and unusual icons—all packed into a relatively

small area. In addition, you may be even more intimidated by the feeling that there is a lot of power

under the hood.

This leads us to our main objective for this chapter, which is to alleviate that feeling of intimidation

and make you feel much more at ease within the Civil 3D environment. Let me start you down that

path by saying that there’s a big difference between an airplane and Civil 3D. In Civil 3D, if you

really mess up, you can simply close the drawing file without saving. When piloting an airplane, it’s

a little more difficult to undo your mistakes.

After completing this chapter, you will have achieved a greater comfort level within the Civil 3D

environment by being able to identify the main user interface components and utilize them for

basic functions. You will also be able to use two specific features that will serve you well throughout

the program: the Transparent Commands toolbar and the Inquiry Tool.

In this chapter, you’ll learn to:

▶ Navigate the Civil 3d user interface

●

▶ Launch general commands through the application menu

●

▶ Launch key software commands and functions using the ribbon

●

▶ navigate the design contents using the toolspace

●

▶ navigate the model using the drawing area

●

▶ Communicate with Civil 3d using the command line

●

▶ Access and modify design information using panorama

●

▶ Access specialized commands using the transparent Commands toolbar

●

▶ Get information about your design using the inquiry tool