C-ing Your U.I.

Translation: Customizing your user interface.

I've had lotsa questions in the last few days trying to make Civil 3D look a certain way. First I'll answer a question e-mailed right to me:

I'm paraphrasing a lot: What can I get rid of to maximize my drawing area?

First, my favorite thing to get rid of are the scroll bars. With a wheeled mouse doing your panning and zooming, they are not needed. To get rid of them go to OPTIONS (type it in on the command line or right-click pretty much anywhere). Go to the Display tab and uncheck Display Scroll Bars in Drawing Window.










As far as getting rid of things in your Status Bar area, it's possible - but you don't get any additional drawing space out of it. There isn't a way to make the gray bar thingy go completely away.

Another thing I would recommend is creating a tool bar with your favorite basic AutoCAD tools in it. That way you are not stuck with the entire Draw, Modify or Layer tool bar intruding on your space. I'll go into more detail about this in the near future - I promise.

Lastly, when working with the Tool Palettes, squish them up as much as your eyes can stand it.

If you right-click on any tool palette, you can choose View Options.

(Come to think of it, you could also use Auto-Hide, but personally, I find Auto-Hide annoying)


In View Options, crank down the Image Size. Then you can make the palettes smaller.


















Look how cute and petite they are now!