What would a building be without doors and windows? Not only do these objects provide access, light, and ventilation, but they also act as design elements in the building composition. In Autodesk® Architectural Desktop Release 3 and 3.3, the Doors, Windows, and Openings objects are totally parametrically controlled and easy to modify. And they are directly related to the software's intelligent Wall Objects. Once placed in a wall, these objects can quickly be moved or modified while maintaining their relationship to the wall. Try the following tutorial to experience using these intelligent AEC objects.

Creating the Wall
1. Create a new drawing using the Walls_Tutorial template.

2. Change to the Work_3D layout tab; activate the top-left viewport (Top View).

3. Right-click to bring up the contextual menu and select Design > Walls > Add Wall, which opens the Add Walls dialog box.

4. At the Add Walls dialog box, add a 15' long, 8' high Standard Style wall. Zoom in all viewports (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Zoom in all viewports to see design changes from all directions.

Placing a Door
1. In the Top View viewport, select the wall and right-click to bring up the contextual menu.

2. Select Insert > Door to bring up the Add Doors dialog box (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Right-click to bring up the contextual menu.
(click image to enlarge)

3. At the Add Doors dialog box, check the Automatic Offset/Center check box, and set the dimension in the dimension box opposite it to 4", and then click on the wall approximatly at its midpoint (see Figure 3).

Figure 3: Most architects keep doors at least 4" away from wall intersections.
(click image to enlarge)

Setting the Automatic Offset/Center check box causes the door, window, or opening to automatically insert at the midpoint of a wall when you click near the middle of the object. In this exercise, we were even more specific and inserted a 4" offset from either end of the wall. No Object Snaps are necessary, and the offset is important because you must maintain a fixed distance from wall intersections to allow for trim and doorknobs.

As you know, exterior doors and doors to rooms such as bathrooms need thresholds, which act as barriers that prevent liquids from entering from the outside of the building, or in the case of bathrooms, to prevent water from exiting the room to the hall. Most interior doors except bathroom doors don't usually have thresholds.

Displaying a Door Threshold and Entity Display
1. Select the door and right-click to bring up the contextual menu.

2. Select Entity Display to bring up the Entity Display dialog box (see Figure 4), and then click the Display Props tab.

Figure 4: Attaching an override to the door affects only that door.

3. Select the check box opposite Door, which attaches an override or modification to this door only from the System Default. From the drop-down list, select Threshold Plan* (see Figure 5).

Figure 5: Select Threshold Plan* from the drop-down list.

4. Press the Edit Display Props button to bring up the Entity Properties dialog box.

5. At this dialog box, select the Other tab. Here you will find the threshold controls.

6. Set all the Threshold Dimensions for 2" (see Figure 6).

Figure 6: Threshold settings are located under the Other tab.

7. Now select the Layer/Color/Linetype tab, where you will see that the two lightbulbs under the Visible heading are grayed out. (By default, the threshold display is turned off.)

8. To activate that display, select the lightbulb next to Threshold A and Threshold B (the lightbulbs turn yellow indicating they are in the "on" state.) (See Figure 7.)

9. Click the OK button to close the dialog box.

Figure 7: A yellow lightbulb indicates the threshold is visible in the drawing.

Thresholds A and B now display in the Threshold Plan View and indicate the front and back lines of the threshold (see Figure 8).

Figure 8: The Threshold Plan* view.

Conclusion
Because Autodesk Architectural Desktop Release 3 and Release 3.3 have made the placing of doors, windows, and openings quick and easy, you can spend your time designing the placement of the objects rather than drawing them. As with all the parametrically controlled AEC objects, changes are just a mouse-click away.