When you think of productivity in AutoCAD, you might not think of the out the box solutions that Autodesk provides.  You might think of add-ins and lisp routines and macros.  Some of these you might have written yourself or maybe someone put it up on the internet (be careful of viruses) or you might have found it on the Autodesk Appstore.

Unlike the apps or routines you might find floating online, you know that they have been vetted and are secure.  Some you do pay for but that is because many hours were spent programming and testing so that you get the best product for the job. Some are also free.

Coming back to my Productivity tools of AutoCAD, what you might not know are all the subcommands that AutoCAD has built-in.  Little shortcuts or system variable (registry setting) that assists you in the way that you think and your workflow.

A system variable that might or might not work is the EDGEMODE setting.  The default for this is 0.  So what happens when you set it to 1.

This setting affects the trim and extend command.  Have you ever had  AutoCAD tell you that the line does not intersect therefore you cannot extend a line to another line?  With the EDGEMODE command that will not happen anymore.  AutoCAD will now start extending the line to the extension of the edge you are trying to reach.

So EDGEMODE = 1 allows you to trim and extend to non-existent edges!  Pretty neat!