Expert: Bill DeShawn - 4/26/2010

Question
High Bill:
I´m a school teacher and  when I receive  by e-mail .dwg's files (same exercise for all) from student's homework, I need to be sure that no one copied each other the homework.
Is there is some tool in autocad to "mark" or make the file unique to identify it?
I'll appreciate your orientation

Answer
No way in AutoCAD.  In fact as many steps as you take to prevent cheating, somebody is bound to figure out a way.  Plot Stamps, RTEXT, fields, can all be erased or edited.  However, your CAD lab can be configured by your IT people in the school so that everyone that attends there must log in to their computer, nobody to have access to anybody else's computer, no USB ports available, no floppy drives, no CD burning software.  Everybody's work is saved on their own Windows profile and the whole system is backed up every evening right after the closing of the lab.  All the drawings would be on a server and backed up to an online backup like CARBONITE.  It would be elaborate and expensive, but it could work and prevent most cheating.  The PCs in the classroom would connect to the same server so that students can access his same drawings from either location.  Each student would be assigned his seat, and he would not sit anywhere else in class, ever.  The first class would be dedicated to logging in as an administrator and creating a user.  That day the administrator profile would have a temporary password that would be common to everyone and that everyone will have access to.  They create their Windows profile on that PC.  I believe Windows allows up to 10 users per PC.  After the users are entered into the PCs the administrator passwords will have to be changed to one unknown to the students.  Then you should be set for the rest of the year.  This also means that to be fair, the lab must be big enough and have enough PCs to allow everybody to do their work before it is due.  Classrooms can be opened up to students when class is not in session.  School budget restraints may prevent this.  Student versions of AutoCAD sold at the book store will be useless for doing homework at home.  Password protection on the drawings isn't going to do anything, because passwords can be shared if the students want to cheat.  Costly, but because the DWG format is meant to be emailed, saved, copied, "saved as", etc. I believe its the only way.
Also:
Disable Internet Explorer (access to FTP sites, personal web pages)
You can undefine the SAVEAS command, but you can't undefine the .SAVEAS command.

In my opinion, if the students work together and do their assignments, sharing the method(s) used, that is a good thing which enables one student to help another and is not cheating.  So, talking in the lab about CAD is a learning experience for all the students.  It's good for one student to watch the other as he does his work.

CADLOCK.com offers some safeguards, but I'm not sure how practical they would be in a educational venue.  

I would be interested in knowing what you eventually decided to do.
Please keep me posted.

Bill DeShawn
http://my.sterling.net/~bdeshawn