The nitty-gritty of design is drawing and, today, it is largely CAD based, even though you may start with some preliminary hand-drawn work.
One of the worst things that can happen in CAD is not knowing how to do something really simple, like changing a line!
When I selected CAD software initially in my practice, I chose VectorWorks (then called something else). Amazingly, that is nearly twenty years ago now but upgrades can be challenging, not to mention unexpected changes in your drawing.
The big advantage of CAD drawings is that you can edit and re-edit ad infinitum, and file properties and machine capacities have improved dramatically in the period with there being few limitations today.
However, the bugbear of drawing is sometimes it won't work! This is SO FRUSTRATING and sometimes you never find the answer but have to do something another, usually more laborious, way.
I had a problem on this drawing which has been in use on a project since 2007, so 9 years of revisions. A couple years ago, yes, a couple years ago, I found I couldn't edit the lines. Try as I might, read up in the manual, searched the internet, I couldn't find an answer.
Today, I did! Hallelujah! One button to click that I never noticed before and that was that! FIXED. I hope I never forget but if I do, I keep a file of CAD fixes I discover for the problems I forget how to fix.
If you're using VectorWorks pay attention to this little button if your lines won't edit; it will restore the object handles et, voila! Drawing fixed. Sorry the drawings are so small.
See page 37 of the manual for this fundamental:
By the way, VectorWorks is gaining ground, in the UK anyway, on the industry standard AutoCAD which was decades behind VectorWorks when it came to graphics and a WYSIWYG environment.
http://gfxspeak.com/2015/05/12/report-vectorworks-software/
