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Most organizations define some type of CAD standard and expect drafters using CAD software such as AutoCAD and IntelliCAD to abide by that standard, and inter alia, use 'approved' layer names, text styles, linetype styles, block names, view names, dimension styles and as drawings are created.
Considerable frustration occurs where drafters don't follow standards. This is especially true when electronic drawings are provided to the organization by outside contractors and these need to be modified by other drafters at a later time. If the drawings have not been checked thoroughly, much time can be lost while the drawings are brought 'up to scratch' at considerable expense. Since CAD files may remain in the archives for many years before they need to be worked on again, the original bill may have been paid and the organization providing the contract drafting service may well have moved on.
There is clearly a need for a system enabling the electronic checking of CAD drawings.
The solution - VERIFY.
Design Cad has developed 'VERIFY' - software which enables rapid, electronic checking of drawings against a CAD standard. CAD standards Verify cannot work effectively unless you have developed a CAD standard.
Quality control The checking and analysis of drawings greatly assists in improving quality control in organizations, but performing a check of CAD drawings 'by hand' is a very tedious process indeed. There has to be an easier way. We thought that if lists of approved names (layers, text styles, blocks etc.) were available, it would be possible to have the computer check drawings against these lists. Program design Since AutoCAD and IntelliCAD support various programming languages, we thought it might be possible to develop a software tool to do this checking for us. The figure below shows the 'high level' design for the program. We wanted a system that would enable us receive a drawing and quickly 'electronically' check it.
Programming language We chose to write VERIFY in the simplest of AutoCAD and IntelliCAD's programming languages, namely AutoLISP. Programs written in AutoLISP can be loaded into any copy of AutoCAD or IntelliCAD and can be run from the command line.
Operation and output from VERIFY VERIFY interrogates the drawing database and produces a comprehensive report, listing the current status of the drawing and flags instances where the drawing being analyzed fails to meet the expected drawing standard. Click the icon below to learn more about VERIFY.
Versions of Verify There have been several versions of VERIFY, each new version incorporating user requests. The current version is Verify 1.3 and was released in July, 2002
Please email info@designcad.com.au if you have requests for improvements/changes to VERIFY.
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If you would like more information on developing a CAD drafting standard,
click 
AutoLISP programs
require
the full version of AutoCAD or IntelliCAD. AutoLISP is not available in AutoCAD LT.
