This proven, uniquely practical text provides your students with a thorough guide to reading, understanding, and working with construction drawings. Now updated to reflect the 2015 International Building Code (R) and 2015 International Residential Code (R), the Seventh Edition includes accurate, up-to-date information on current materials, practices, and standards to prepare students for career success in modern building trades. The text is designed from start to finish for real-world relevance, with topics organized by actual construction processes, realistic construction drawings integrated into chapter content, hundreds of practical questions and activities, and full-size residential and commercial construction prints. The author covers fundamental concepts including views, lines, basic dimensioning, and symbols, as well as more advanced principles and practices such as orienting and cross-referencing drawings, interpreting complex drawings, and working with commercial construction elements like structural steel, masonry, and reinforced concrete. In addition to updates related to 2015 codes, the text features an all-new unit covering multi-building developments, fire code and sound control measures, and seismic considerations, with new drawings for a four-story, two-family building in an urban, seismic-sensitive area.