Tipster Carol McKeough shares two favorite ways to make AutoCAD more personal, by changing the display features for drawing tabs and pop-up balloon behavior.

"I'm all for giving new functionality a fair trial. However, after that fair trial, I really wanted two things to work my way. For one, I wanted the old-style Model and Layout tabs back. The new QuickView option left me feeling lost in space, and I swear it took more clicks. To get the old-style tabs back, select Options, click on the Display tab, check the 'Display Layout and Model tabs' option the Layout Elements section of this tab, and then click Apply and OK.

"Secondly, I wanted to be free of the Plot and Publish balloon pop-up. After all, we are all using Page Setups, right? Plotting is no mystery to us pros! For this little beauty, right-click in the status bar area where the balloon originates. Uncheck the 'Enable Balloon Notification' option, and celebrate your new freedom!"

Notes from Cadalyst Tip Reviewer Brian Benton: One of AutoCAD's best features is its ability to be customized. Somewhere along the line, Autodesk added the QuickView Layouts feature. With a mouse-over, AutoCAD will display a thumbnail view of the tabs in your current file. That's great, but it can take what feels like forever to open and display the views. You can use QuickView Layouts whenever you want, but you can also just click on the layout tabs to activate any specific tab. But if they aren't displayed, this will be difficult. Type Options on the Command line and follow this tipster's instructions.

Pop-up balloons can be annoying — you know you printed, and you know the print is finished because you have it in your hand. If you don't want AutoCAD to inform you of your printing progress, simply tell it not to. Use AutoCAD in the way that you prefer.