REVIEW OF COMPUTER AIDED DESIGN, ITS STATUS

AND FUTURE IN STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING

Er Kailash chaudhary
May 15 2019 ,

CONTENT
1 INTRODUCTION
2 ORIGIN OF CADS/CAM
3 COMPONENTS OF CAD SYSTEM
4 TASK OF CAD SYSTEM
5 ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANDAGES
6 DISCUSSION

1 Introduction
distribution system automation is built on 5 pillars which are computer programming, computer
aided design & drafting (CADD), system supervisory & data acquisition systems (SCADA), local
networks including LAN & WAN and geographic information systems (GIS) including global
positioning system (GPS) software & receivers. In this article an introduction to CAD systems will be
presented. The CAD packages are the tools used to automate the drafting/designing/engineering
processes in almost all industries & technical operations. The CAD program was 1 of the first tools to
be used to automate the technical offices of any organization. Such CAD packages have been in use
(commercially) for over 20 years in consulting firms, industrial plants, refineries, petrochemical
plants, utilities and other sectors of the industry. They produce drawings of every type: electrical,
mechanical, civil, architecture, process, instrumentation,....etc. Depending on the user field of
interest, the CAD system can tie in with other automating/analysis/production packages, for example
CAM (computer aided manufacturing) & GIS (Geographic information systems). Over the recent few
years a lot of development took place with respect to CAD systems. The interface between the user
and software is becoming easier & similar to other off-the-shelf general software packages. The
drawings can be checked against specified standards. The drawings can be sent over the internet for
viewing or marking

& checking. The attributes (fields) of the drawn objects (entities) can be accessed via other non-CAD
software packages. The drawing can be fed into another program for analysis or displaying detailed
information.
2 THE ORIGINS OF CAD/CAM

CAD had its origins in three separate sources, which also serve to highlight the basic
operations that CAD systems provide. The first source of CAD resulted from attempts to
automate the drafting process. These developments were pioneered by the General Motors
Research Laboratories in the early 1960s. One of the important time-saving advantages of
computer modeling over traditional drafting methods is that the former can be quickly
corrected or manipulated by changing a model's parameters. The second source of CAD was
in the testing of designs by simulation. The use of computer modeling to test products was
pioneered by high-tech industries like aerospace and semiconductors. The third source of
CAD development resulted from efforts to facilitate the flow from the design process to the
manufacturing process using numerical control (NC) technologies, which enjoyed
widespread use in many applications by the mid-1960s. It was this source that resulted in
the linkage between CAD and CAM. One of the most important trends in CAD/CAM
technologies is the ever-tighter integration between the design and manufacturing stages of
CAD/CAM-based production processes.

The development of CAD and CAM and particularly the linkage between the two overcame
traditional NC shortcomings in expense, ease of use, and speed by enabling the design and
manufacture of a part to be undertaken using the same system of encoding geometrical
data. This innovation greatly shortened the period between design and manufacture and
greatly expanded the scope of production processes for which automated machinery could
be economically used. Just as important, CAD/CAM gave the designer much more direct
control over the production process, creating the possibility of completely integrated design
and manufacturing processes.

The rapid growth in the use of CAD/CAM technologies after the early 1970s was made
possible by the development of mass-produced silicon chips and the microprocessor,
resulting in more readily affordable computers. As the price of computers continued to
decline and their processing power improved, the use of CAD/CAM broadened from large
firms using large-scale mass production techniques to firms of all sizes. The scope of
operations to which CAD/CAM was applied broadened as well. In addition to parts-shaping
by traditional machine tool processes such as stamping, drilling, milling, and grinding,
CAD/CAM has come to be used by firms involved in producing consumer electronics,
electronic components, molded plastics, and a host of other products. Computers are also
used to control a number of manufacturing processes (such as chemical processing) that are
not strictly defined as CAM because the control data are not based on geometrical
parameters.

Using CAD, it is possible to simulate in three dimensions the movement of a part through a
production process. This process can simulate feed rates, angles and speeds of machine
tools, the position of part-holding clamps, as well as range and other constraints limiting the
operations of a machine. The continuing development of the simulation of various
manufacturing processes is one of the key means by which CAD and CAM systems are
becoming increasingly integrated. CAD/CAM systems also facilitate communication among
those involved in design, manufacturing, and other processes. This is of particular
importance when one firm contracts another to either design or produce a component.

3 Components of a CAD system:

they can be classified broadly into the software and the hardware. The software being the program
that the user will interact with to draw, modify, store & plot his/her work. The hardware contains
the workstations (or personal computers), the plotter & the server (for networked systems).

The software: it provides the user with all the necessary tools to draw/sketch, modify, add
dimensions, cross hatch, send & plot his/her drawing. These tools are displayed on the monitor's
screen. The program will allow more than 1 approach for entering the commands or performing the
required functions. The screen may be divided into the following sections: menu bar (or sometimes
called pull-

down menus), standard tool bar, ribbon bar (or object properties tool bar), drawing window with
cursor,

draw (quick) tool bar, modify tool bar, coordinate system icon, model & layout tab, command window
with command line, status line with toggle buttons and feature (history) tree. In general, when a tool
bar icon is clicked 1 of 3 actions will take place: a dialog box will be displayed, a function (sub-tool) bar

will be displayed having additional functions that relate to the clicked tool bar icon or a specific action

occurs.

The hardware: The personal computer will be a Pentium or compatible microprocessor with
adequate amount of RAM (64 MB or more preferred), compatible operating system, SVGA (or VGA)
monitor card, hard drive with sufficient space (capacity) to install the software package, mouse,
parallel communication port, serial communication port and modem to connect to the Internet. The
plotter connected to the network can be classified into either vector or raster devices. The first
receives the information (to be plotted) sent by CAD programs (as vectors (lines based on
mathematical coordinate
data) and handles it directly (as is-vectors). The latter handles the information received indirectly i.
e. translating the vector data to form an image composed of dots (raster). An example for a vector
device

is the pen plotter. Any of the following is a raster devices: dot matrix (impact) printers, thermal, laser &

electrostatic printers/plotters.

How does a CAD system work? Vectors are used to describe specific objects (entities) defining their
size, position & geometry. The image seen on screen in a CAD application is only a visual
representation of the vector file. The vector information in a CAD file is mathematical (it is not stored
as an image). All CAD software packages uses vector objects instead of raster. The primary benefits is
the ability to precisely describe, create, scale & manipulate individual entities. All graphics objects
are

modeled in relation to a fixed world coordination systems with global origin at the bottom left corner
of the drawing area (X-axis pointing to the right, Y-axis pointing upward). At any time the user can set
up

a temporary user coordinate system by moving the origin and/or rotating the axis. All data is entered
relative to that temporary axis system (but is converted automatically & stored in world coordinates).
An entity is the smallest object that can be placed on the screen, for example Line, Circle, Arc, Text,
Polylines. The entities are stored & referenced in the drawing database. Each entity has a detailed
description in the CAD database. For example the single line may contain the following attributes
(equivalent to column heading or field in a database): entity name, entity type, layer upon which the
line is drawn, colour of line, beginning XY coordinate, ending XY coordinate, line type plus other data
that is needed to fully describe the entity. An entity list for a circle may contain entity name (which is
a hexadecimal number, it changes every time a drawing is opened, it is never saved), entity type (in
DXF group code it is 0, text string -fixed- eg. "CIRCLE", :LINE",..), colour (in DXF group code is 62),
primary point (10, the center of a circle as in this case or the start point of a line or text entity),
floating point values (40, radius of a circle or text height) & layer name (8, eg. "0", "LAYER1",..). The
CAD database objects include both geometrical objects such as circles, lines, polylines, ...etc and non-
geometrical objects as symbol tables & dictionaries.

The CGMs (computer graphics metafile) are created to become the final output that end users will
look at, the IGES (initial graphic exchange specification) files are used for engineering data interchange
between different CAD systems. To publish engineering drawings to the Internet, the completed CAD
drawing (.dwg or .dxf files) is rasterized (convert to a raster file format) that can be viewed by a Web
browser. The rasterized format can be for example PNG, JPEG, GIF. These can be published using IMG
tag in HTML. Certain plug-ins to the browsers can allow the user to view DXF, DWG, HPGL or DWF
(hybrid format) without the need to rasterize such drawings. It also allows him/her to modify the
drawing prior to saving it to a local drive.

XML (extensible markup language) is a markup language designed to describe data rather than
displaying them. HTML is used for the latter purpose. XML tags are not defined. It is used with DTD
(document type definition) to describe the data. For web-based (enabled) CAD software, it is
considered ideal as it allows for the definition of any number of information tags. It allows an
unlimited definition of tags that describe the data. The schema (dictionary) has to be stored at a
known location

on the Internet. The schema for a CAD system has to answer the following question: how lines, text,
arcs and other entities are presented in XML? Any application that requires these tags to process
them, looks them up at that Internet location. HTML specifies how data is displayed in a browser,
XML defines the content (data) of the page. XML can be used in conjunction with HTML/Javascript,
CSS (cascading style sheet) or XSL (extensible stylesheet language) to provide the data to the user in
the required format and expected details.

4 Tasks of a CAD system:

The facilities and provisions that a CAD system has to provide to the user, today, differ a lot than only
a few years ago. Before, the main purpose of a CAD system was to assist in producing & plotting
(obtaining a hard copy of) drawings like layout, assembly, single line, detailed and production (shop)
drawings. The plotter may be connected to the local network and found on the local site or at a
remote one. The design and the necessary drawings can be done at 1 location. The server

that is connected to a leased telephone line or a dial up one can be used to send the drawings to
another city (where the shop or site is located) or even another country to make hard copies
available, where they are needed. The drawings produced had to be reviewed manually to verify that
they adhere to the organization standards and drawn per customer specifications. For consistency
purpose, a symbols library is built and included in the CAD software, thus it can be used to present
the different devices and equipment that will be shown on the different drawings. The organization
manual may include a copy of such symbols, how to access them, on which layer (level) each symbol
has to be inserted as

well as each other object or block of objects is to be located and the necessary information regarding

the style of the different lines, text & dimensioning standards. A simple programming language (or
scripting language) and a development environment was also included with the CAD program. They
are used to customize the CAD environment (menus, tool bars & dialog boxes) as well as automating
the repetitive CAD operations. This was then but nowadays the intelligent CAD systems offer much
more tools to the users as well as CAD & standards managers. Some of these new facilities are: the
drawings can be sent over the Internet to obtain approvals or get reviewed, marked up & sent back
(all electronically), the designs produced by such software can be found on the Internet available for
modification and other diagrams/sketches can be added to them, the drawings can be compared
with the company's and / or standards organization's and/or customer standards and the
discrepancies reported in more than 1 way, more control on the entities attributes & properties,
improved & easier dimensioning, ease of text objects scaling, a programming environment that
allows building applications that communicate faster with the core CAD program, adding run time
functions to the existing CAD classes & data acquisition provision.

Going back to the basics, the fundamental functionality of a CAD program would include:

1) Creating or accessing files as drawings, plots, merge.

2) Editing functions as undo, redo, cut/copy, paste, mode.

3) 2D viewing functions as zoom, pan, show, hide.

4) Drawing facilities which create objects (entities) such as lines, circles, arcs, polylines.

5) Dimension functions.

6) Selecting & unselecting functions.

7) Modifying functions as transform, fillet, modifying text.

8) Query functions which inquire about objects as measure.

9) Tools functions as symbols, attributes, preferences.

Some of these functions are accessed from the drop down menus other from the tool bars and some
are available to be run from menus as well as tool bars. Certain commands are only available from the
command line.

The programming environment can be as simple as a text editor, where the commands
(statements), keywords & instructions are entered in a blank document. It is then saved to the
disk with the appropriate file extension, as text document. The programming (interpreted)
language provides the following functionality:

1) The entry point to the function, the file can contain more than 1 function.

2) The user input related statements which cover picking a point on the screen, entering a real number

to the program, entering a second point on the screen, entering a string of text, entering a distance
(using the keyboard or by picking a second point on the screen), entering an angle in radians (using
the keyboard or the mouse).

3) The assignment operator or command.

4) The print statements which allow the program to simply print a message on the command line
(a prompt) or to print & return an expression.

5) The arithmetic operations which includes the addition, subtraction, multiplication, division,
increment and decrement.

6) The line entity operations like the calculation of the distance between 2 points, the second point in
a line given the first point & an angle, obtaining the intersection of 2 lines, returning an angle
between 2 points.

7) The execution of the core CAD functions like drawing lines, polylines, circles, dimensioning and

other commands executed through the drop-down menu or tool bars.

8) The list operations like displaying the values in the list variable, taking a list apart & displaying only

certain values found in the list variable, joining 2 or more lists together, returning the number of
elements in a list, looks for a duplicate returning the duplicate plus all the other member from it to the
end of the list, looking for an element in a list variable from a group of list variables returning the list
with the indicated variable, constructing a new list with an indicated element placed at the beginning
of the list.

9) The data type conversions which convert a real number into an integer, convert an integer to a real
 number, return a string from a real number, convert a real number into a string convert a string into
an integer, convert an integer into a string.

10) Conditionals (decision making), looping & iterations like testing for equality, the equivalent to the
standard if-the-else, for-next & loop-while/until loops.

11) Operations on entities like selecting entities, obtaining the entity name, extracting the entity
list, substituting 1 aspect for another in a group of lists, returning the length (number of
selections), modifing the entity list & writing it back to the drawing database.

12) Operations on text like changing text height and distance (space) between text lines.

13) String manipulation functions like

converting the string of text from lower to
upper case, concatenating 2 strings into 1,
returning the number of characters in a
string, returning part of a string from a
specified position within the string

14) Miscellaneous functions like returning as ASCII code for a character, returning the character for the
indicated ASCII code, changing the selected entity or object layer, erasing the screen, moving from the
graphics screen to the text one and vice versa.

5 ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES

Modeling with CAD systems offers a number of advantages over traditional drafting
methods that use rulers, squares, and compasses. For example, designs can be altered
without erasing and redrawing. CAD systems also offer "zoom" features analogous to a
camera lens, whereby a designer can magnify certain elements of a model to facilitate
inspection. Computer models are typically three dimensional and can be rotated on any axis,
much as one could rotate an actual three dimensional model in one's hand, enabling the
designer to gain a fuller sense of the object. CAD systems also lend themselves to modeling
cutaway drawings, in which the internal shape of a part is revealed, and to illustrating the
spatial relationships among a system of parts.

To understand CAD it is also useful to understand what CAD cannot do. CAD systems have no
means of comprehending real-world concepts, such as the nature of the object being
designed or the function that object will serve. CAD systems function by their capacity to
codify geometrical concepts. Thus the design process using CAD involves transferring a
designer's idea into a formal geometrical model. Efforts to develop computer-based
"artificial intelligence" (AI) have not yet succeeded in penetrating beyond the mechanical—
represented by geometrical (rule-based) modeling.
Other limitations to CAD are being addressed by research and development in the field of
expert systems. This field is derived from research done in AI. One example of an expert
system involves incorporating information about the nature of materials—their weight,
tensile strength, flexibility, and so on—into CAD software. By including this and other
information, the CAD system could then "know" what an expert engineer knows when that
engineer creates a design. The system could then mimic the engineer's thought pattern and
actually "create" more of the design. Expert systems might involve the implementation of
more abstract principles, such as the nature of gravity and friction, or the function and
relation of commonly used parts, such as levers or nuts and bolts. Expert systems might also
come to change the way data are stored and retrieved in CAD/CAM systems, supplanting the
hierarchical system with one that offers greater flexibility. Such futuristic concepts, however,
are all highly dependent on our abilities to analyze human decision processes and to
translate these into mechanical equivalents if possible.

One of the key areas of development in CAD technologies is the simulation of performance.
Among the most common types of simulation are testing for response to stress and
modeling the process by which a part might be manufactured or the dynamic relationships
among a system of parts. In stress tests, model surfaces are shown by a grid or mesh, that
distort as the part comes under simulated physical or thermal stress. Dynamics tests
function as a complement or substitute for building working prototypes. The ease with
which a part's specifications can be changed facilitates the development of optimal dynamic
efficiencies, both as regards the functioning of a system of parts and the manufacture of any
given part. Simulation is also used in electronic design automation, in which simulated flow
of current through a circuit enables the rapid testing of various component configurations.

The processes of design and manufacture are, in some sense, conceptually separable. Yet
the design process must be undertaken with an understanding of the nature of the
production process. It is necessary, for example, for a designer to know the properties of the
materials with which the part might be built, the various techniques by which the part might
be shaped, and the scale of production that is economically viable. The conceptual overlap
between design and manufacture is suggestive of the potential benefits of CAD and CAM
and the reason they are generally considered together as a system.

Recent technical developments have fundamentally impacted the utility of CAD/CAM

systems. For example, the ever-increasing processing power of personal computers has
given them viability as a vehicle for CAD/CAM application. Another important trend is
toward the establishment of a single CAD-CAM standard, so that different data packages can
be exchanged without manufacturing and delivery delays, unnecessary design revisions, and
other problems that continue to bedevil some CAD-CAM initiatives. Finally, CAD-CAM
software continues to evolve in such realms as visual representation and integration of
modeling and testing applications.

THE CASE FOR CAS AND CAS/CAM

A conceptually and functionally parallel development to CAD/CAM is CAS or CASE,

computer-aided software engineering. As defined by SearchSMB.com in its article on "CASE,"
"CASE '¦ is the use of a computer-assisted method to organize and control the development
of software, especially on large, complex projects involving many software components and
people." CASE dates back to the 1970s when computer companies began to apply concepts
from the CAD/CAM experience to introduce more discipline into the software development
process.

Another abbreviation inspired by the ubiquitous presence of CAD/CAM in the manufacturing

sector is CAS/CAM. This phrase stands for Computer-Aided Selling/Computer-Aided
Marketing software. In the case of CASE as well as CAS/CAM, the core of such technologies is
integration of work flows and application of proven rules to a repeating process.

6 DISCUSSION

Today cad has become a integral part in engineering. More or less it has its use in every topics of study.
The use of cad has made easy in handling the complex projects and saving time. Moreover people
today have challenged themselves to improve the field to the next level. Some challenges are shape
control, inter operability, design exploration, reversing engineering etc. The next wave in CAD will
come about largely through the cumulative effect of the introduction of a number of small, lightweight
technologies that collectively form a synergistic mosaic, rather than due to the introduction of some
monolithic new technology. There will be changes in how we do things, and these will significantly
affect the nature of CAD systems and how they function.
BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ames, Benjamin B. "How CAD Keeps It Simple." Design News. 19 June 2000.

"CAD Software Works with Symbols from CADDetails.com." Product News Network. 11
January 2006.

"CASE." SearchSMB.com. Available from

http://searchsmb.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,sid44_gci213838,00.html. Retrieved on 27
January 2006.

Christman, Alan. "Technology Trends in CAM Software." Modern Machine Shop. December
2005.

Leondes, Cornelius, ed. "Computer-Aided Design, Engineering, and Manufacturing."

Vol. 5 of The Design of Manufacturing Systems. CRC Press, 2001.

"What Do You Mean?" Mechanical Engineering-CIME. November 2005.