Would anyone know if there are any trainers lurking in my neck of the woods or within easy driving distance from Bass Harbor, Maine? I'm about 4 hours north of Portland, which is the equivalent to living in Siberia,,,
Hi George,
I have been using DC for a year now and with no help I have asked many questions here on the forum and it is amazing how quick you get a response.
I would suggest spending many hours browsing through this forum to get most of your ?'s answered, then keep asking ?'s. It took me 3 months to feel comfortable.
If you are trying to start 3d, then good luck. I try to spend some time with it but as of now I'm stuck on 3d roofs. One more thing, look into the High school systems, They like to use DC.
Im only 5 hours south of siberia (central VT), No training around.
Good luck, Rob
Like Rob I have only been using DataCAD for around a year. Most of it was self taught, and some from my co-workers. If you've had any CAD experience at all in the past, you should be able to pick it up pretty quickly.
Took me about 2 months, maybe 3 to get quite confortable with it.
I happen to come from the dinosaur ages of DataCAD. I started with it with version 2.5 or something back in 1986. That was also when computers were just becoming less than the cost of a Mercedes and were slower than a one speed bicycle. But, I need not date myself. Even "way back then," I kept the computer at home and installed DataCAD. There was no internet or e-mail to help me out. The support was a phone call to DataCAD or the manual. I put my mind to spending just one hour per night on teaching myself DataCAD. I had no other CAD training before that but lots and lots of manual drafting experience. I kept at the one hour per night and I focussed on self-teaching myself one DataCAD function at a time. I would use the Copy command and try everything with it I could figure out how to do (trial and error and referring back to the manual). I would then move onto another command until I conquered that. And so on. After about a month of that and a lot of frustration, I felt confident enough to start actually designing a building with DataCAD and in completing the construction drawings. From that point onward, the program got easier and easier. For anyone who I have trained in DataCAD, I also recommend exhausting all self-help techniques and sources to figure out as much of the program as possible. Make a list of questions that you cannot figure out. Then, search this Message board or the archives of Cheap Tricks. Most likely, your questions have all been previously answered.
So, this way, you will be able to stay in Siberia AND learn DataCAD at the same time. I, on the other hand, will remain in sunny, 77-degrees south Florida where I am too busy to even get out on the 100's of golf courses that surround me. Somebody's got to make the donuts.
