1. Use the Insert menu or right click to choose Insert ->Field.

2. Select “AF Excel Cell” in the left panel of the Field dialog.

3. Open an Excel file and select the cell you want to import.

4. Click “Get Active Cell” to get the active cell address.

5. If you want to use the relative path, please choose “Relative Path”.

6. Click OK to insert a field.

Method #1: Import PDF to AutoCAD as image

1. Download GSview and Ghostscript, install them.
2. Open the pdf document with GSview.
3. Go to the “File” menu, select “Convert…”.
4. Select an image format in the “Device” list.
5. Select a resolution you want. I recommend you select the highest resolution.
6. Click the “OK” button to save the PDF document to an image file.
7. Use the “imageattach” command of AutoCAD to insert the image file.

Method #2: Import PDF to AutoCAD as dwf underlay (this method is only for AutoCAD 2007 or later)

1. Download Autodesk DWF writer and install it.
2. Open the PDF file with the free Adobe Reader.
3. Go to the “File” menu, select “Print…”.
4. Select “Autodesk DWF Writer for 2D” and click the “OK” button.

   

5. Launch AutoCAD, and go to the “Insert” menu, Select “DWF underlay…”.

Method #3: Import PDF to AutoCAD as DXF

1. Download GSview and Ghostscript, install them.
2. Download pstoedit plugin for GSview and copy the plugins.dll to the same directory where you install the GSview (for example, C:\Program Files\Ghostgum\pstoedit\).
3. Go to the “Edit” menu, select “Convert to vector format…”.
4. Select “dxf: CAD exchange format” in the format list of the “PS to Edit” dialog, and click OK button to export the PDF file to a dxf file.
5. Launch AutoCAD, and insert the DXF file.

Method #4: AutoCAD 2009 – Bonus Pack 2 – PDF Attach

Autodesk releases two PDF enhancements in “Bonus Pack 2″. One of the PDF enhancements is “PDF Attach”. The command is PDFATTACH. And If you attach a vector PDF, you can use object snaps to snap to geometry in the PDF file.

But the enhancements is only available for AutoCAD 2009, AutoCAD Revit Architecture Suite 2009, and AutoCAD Revit Structure Suite 2009. You can log in to the subscription center of autodesk to download it.

You can calculate the length of a single AutoCAD object (Line, Circle, Polyline etc.) with AutoCAD Object Field. But you can’t calculate the length of multiple AutoCAD objects. AutoField provides an additional field to do it.

1. Use the Insert menu or right click to choose Insert ->Field.

2. Select “AF Objects Length” in the left panel of the Field dialog.

3. Select the objects (supports LINE, POLYLINE, CIRCLE, ARC) to calculate.

4. Click OK to insert the field to the drawing.

You can calculate the area of a single AutoCAD object (Circle, Polyline etc.) with AutoCAD Object Field. But you can’t calculate the area of multiple AutoCAD objects. AutoField provide an additional field to do it.

1. Use the Insert menu or right click to choose Insert ->Field.

2. Select “AF Objects Area” in the left panel of the Field dialog.

3. Select the objects (supports POLYLINE, CIRCLE, ARC) to calculate.

4. Click OK to insert the field to the drawing.

AutoField provides some useful additional AutoCAD fields. Let’s see how to insert the count of the specific INSERT (block reference) as a Field. Then the text of the count will be updated automatically after the block references were deleted or added.

1. Use the Insert menu or right click to choose Insert ->Field.

2. Select “AF Block Count” in the left panel of the Field dialog.

3. Select the block name you want to count. You can select multiple blocks to count their block references.

4. Click OK to insert the field.