Frequent tipster Leonid Nemirovsky shares a tip about using the Align command in AutoCAD to rescale and rotate an object.

"Rescaling a block or selected entities is easy with the Scale command and the Reference option — everybody remembers that. But if the Align command is used, you can change the rotation angle and rescale your selection at the same time.

"First, determine whether you have an entity with a known dimension (inside the block or just among a group of entities) that needs to be rescaled and rotated. Then draw a line that length at the needed angle near the block or group of entities. Next, use the command Align and follow the prompts. This will work in 3D as well — you can use the 3Dalign command."

Notes from Cadalyst Tip Patrol: Align is one of my favorite commands in AutoCAD. There are two ways to use it: with 3 points or with 2 points. To move and rotate your selected object based on 3 defined points, start the command, select your objects, and pick a reference point on your objects. Then pick the point you want your reference point to go to. Repeat this two more times. The Align command will move and rotate your objects until it aligns the reference points as best it can, averaging out any discrepancies. The second method is to do this with two points; it works the exact same way, except there are two points instead of three. After defining your second point, press Enter again. AutoCAD will give you a prompt asking if you want to scale your objects so that they are moved, rotated, and scaled to these two reference points. You can always respond No if you don't want to scale. Not only can Align do two things, it can do three things at once.