JustCad 10.0

JustCad makes CAD drawing easy. Thousands have used it since it was originally launched. Professionals find it convenient for use on their laptops and many hobbyists have become experienced enough at CAD to add it to the skills section on their resumes.

The free 2D CAD software provides all the features needed to meet drafting requirements. Downloaded and installed, the program can be opened to an interface designed for simplicity.

Your workspace occupies most of the screen and at the right top. You'll find line color and style options, drawing tools and object selection options. Layers are displayed below these. The menu bar at the top has tabs to quickly access everything you need:

• You open, close, save and print drawings from the File tab. You can also save selected objects and save drawings as a bitmap image, and open or save a DXF file. Easily toggle between loading or saving with or without dimensions and adjusting for text aspects of the current font.
• Distance, area and angles measurement is available from the Utilities tab with entries being displayed in the Entry Display box underneath the menu bar. There are feet and inches and Metric modes. Settings are also available for the interface color scheme and degree places for the angular display. Functions on this tab include Total length selected, Match Selected Properties and the Paper Wizard which guides you through the selection of large format paper dimensions and the scale for the drawing.
• Multiple line sets, hatch patterns, and Associates (small drawings that can be incorporated into your drafting project) are stored in the next three tabs.
• Dimensions, Text, Layers, Line Width, and Line Style tabs provide the tools for creating and shaping objects and text. Undo and Redo tabs are also available on the menu bar as is the Help tab which provides instructional support for each item on the interface.

Alongside the Entry Display box, you'll find input boxes for the drawing angle, text, associate and hatch rotation, and the Snap percentage.

Snap option buttons are on the next toolbar along with the zoom buttons and buttons for turning Blank and Ortho, which constrains cursor movement, on and off.

JustCad is easy to use - drawing an object requires simply clicking on the screen and moving your cursor in the direction you want to draw. You can set the properties and dimensions and use the drawing tools to create lines, circles, arc, curves, ellipses or polygons, draw tangents and insert text.

Conveniently available tools in the right-hand panel are LI - line, 2C - 2pt. circle, 3C - 3pt. circle, A2 - 2pt. arc, A3 - 3pt. arc, CV - curve, EL - ellipse, PT - point, PO - polygon, DTL - line tangent, TP - text place, TE - text edit, DO - linear dimension, DR - radial dimension, DA - angular dimension, and DL - leader (arrow).

Click on an object to edit it. Edit functions - break, trim, copy, etc. - are accessed from a pop-up window. Undo or redo at any point.

All the required CAD features are included in JustCAD free 2D CAD software making it a great way to learn CAD.

System requirements are simple - Windows XP to 10, Pentium 433 and 64 MB RAM. PDFs featuring a set of JustCad created home plans can be downloaded from the developer's website to provide you with examples of the CAD drawing with the free 2D CAD software. There are also examples of drawings saved as a bitmap image and DXF file respectively as well as ZIP files containing Associates, Hatches and Multiple Line sets.