Renerabbitt

ahh okay, ha, I was just getting teased in another thread by our resident jokester so I thought you were stacking on all in good fun anyway, and thank you

I cant tell if this is teasing or not!? ha, I actually hate my office, I can't wait til the other house projects are done so I can do something about it

250609 (3).mp4

we can kind've do this already, some info might be missing such as spacing etc. see video: @tundra_dwellersee video for callout maybe? 250609 (2).mp4

https://www.rabbittdesign.net/rabbitt-blog/onedrive

heres the video, keep in mind we can obviously partition the Project name such as a Project Name: Jerry Dr - Design A and then put this in a polyline: %splitter="%project.name%"; parts=splitter.split(" - "); $project_name=parts[0]; $version_name=parts[1]% and in the same polyline: %$client_name="%client.name%"% and then in your file lookup: $dir="C:/Users/rener/Dropbox/Projects" path = "#{$dir}#{$client_name}/#{$project_name}/#{$version_name}/Client Info.csv" See vid: 250606 low.mp4

This is just a short video I had to get out for my clients but maybe it helps someone else out. Ill be making a more comprehensive video when final release comes out "#ChiefArchitect users, I made about as short a video as I could manage on the X17 Beta #projectbrowser, please go check it out, hopefully it helps you figure out how to share to other users, inter-office, to the cloud, and backup and understand how the system works and some of the benefits of the system:"

I've brought this up before in other threads where you mention this and I haven't seen a response.. I know its not perfect but it does work if you give a static main projects directory and then search for your project by project name. I am able to find my csv files from the project and plan name nvp's in that way automatically so long as I give a static master projects directory

Joe I am curious, I keep giving a method for this, I am able to read..I have never checked write, and I am using PM. My main gripe is no NVP for the folder tags

I disagree, updating a template has never been easier. dragging and dropping is a dream. duplicating a complexed linked layout template is super easy. navigating to my projects is faster...like way faster. versioning is faster. On the flip side, team collab is way more convoluted in project management inadvertently yes. Huge number of support calls on broken links from people who do not understand where texture files are stored and search for and why renaming a file breaks a linked layout

So I want to admit that I have been deeply confused about this request from the start, so it's hard for me to understand the focus really. I do think we could use some additional backup function but regarding your specific request, I just don't understand your process. You seem to have a need for backing up projects on a daily basis, that part I get, but what I don't get is why the backup does not suffice, and the reason I don't understand that aspect of it is that what you have stated previously is that this is for the case when you have a failure, meaning a backup is required. SO you are doing a ton of complex manual work to get your daily project file into its appropriate place, but the thing I don't personally get, is that I have only had 2 computers fail in the last 15 years. Even if that number was 4, the amount of work you are doing to keep an organized daily project file backup can't possible equate to the amount of time it takes to find the file in the automatic backup file and import it into chief and relink the layout...if we crashed 4 times in 15 years, that's maybe 4 minutes of importing a layout and plan and relinking it..or relinking from the previous save archive. I just grabbed a plan from the backup and restored it and relinked it and it only took 30 seconds. ..sure I get that you have this preference and far be it for me to stand in the way of a preference, but this specific preference can cause chief a large number of support calls when you consider how others might unintentionally abuse such a system. I want to keep adding in more knowledge for you to consider your request. Most offices that I work with on a regular basis keep versioning in terms of design version and iteration. They need a design review A-D with versions 4-5 for different collaborative team based designs. This means keeping upwards of 8 files in any given conceptual design phase. Then through that, that might keep a history based on date as progress sets, potentially compounding on several design versions that are set to be further developed so now they may have 12 active versions of the file. Then they may keep these versions through progress cycles while more work is done and they typically wanted to keep previous dated files, as well as keeping files separate based on design technician.... so you might have now 24 active file sets for example: This is very very common in many offices. Now consider that my template file, completely blank, with nothing drawn, saved as a caproject file is 270mb. A finished project may be 350mb then...this means im keeping one project active through its design development phase to the tune of 8gb and if we have an office going though 10 projects at 6 office seats, I just feel like somewhere in there is some problems, transferring 80gb of data across 6 machines constantly. Ever wait for a client to download a 280mb file on their terrible ISP during a meeting? .its excruciating. Add in that I keep all versions from all projects for 7 years before deleting older copies...this is an incredibly huge data store now. It's not that I would use this method, its that someone could without knowing why a caproject file is so large. I think the request just needs more consideration. I also think that this triggers more questions than it solves for. Most of the people I run chief training and tech support for on a daily basis have trouble even finding their "extract all" button on a zip file. I could almost guarantee that people are not going to understand that when they export a caproject file that this is a DUMB copy. I think they should be prompted to delete the copy in the project browser if their intent is to share with a colleague to work on, since their is now no linked correlation between the exported copy and the original. I swear this will become an issue without proper guidance. ..I'm still a big advocate for having an entirely separate half of this software disabled until you hit an advanced button in preferences for users like yourself who understand complex actions. Give someone an automatic caproject file export where they did one of the most common design based things ever...importing a gigantic sketchup warehouse file and wondering why their hard drive ran out of space on their machine because they dont know that a caproject file is storing all of the images for their project every time it runs even if all they did was 5 minutes of work. I am certain you can see the issue here? I personally would love it if we could export a linked project as a separate file from the linked assets of that file and chief could figure out how to make the two work in unison, and then we could have the option to export a project with or without the assets. I know I keep getting a reputation for trying to railroad suggestions...and I suppose I don't full understand why I am compelled to get into it. I think a big part of it is that I just get passionate about creating things that are scalable and function for all users on the whole. One of the biggest problems to me with Chief is every consideration runs through a major bottleneck..which is "How will this effect the volume of support calls?" It is the thing above all things because its one of the largest selling points of this software and every single suggestion must force its way through that sliver of a funnel...and in its current state, this request has the potential of increasing support calls...so what can we do to help narrow its focus and understand your core need. Dermot said something to me one late night after their dinner event and I am paraphrasing to the best of my recollection..help me out here @KTransue..."Don't tell me your solutions, don't tell me your problems, just tell me what your goal is and maybe I can build something that will work for you" from my understanding and simply stated: Your end goal is to have a daily automated backup of your linked layout and associated plan files that you can sync to your own independent cloud.

Draw out a segment of your deck railing and make the necessary modifications for it to look like a door then with the railing selected use the convert selected to symbol tool to convert it to the symbol category of door

you're right, I was wrong on that part

If you set it up that way then yes it can archive based on your previous save" I'm still not sure why it being a caproject file matters to you in the context of what you are doing. Restoring an archived layout for instance will bring in the associated plan files and anything else that was sent to view as shown here...All I did was restore the layout in archive: No it wont bring in a pdf that wasn't sent to anything but that's a static object that could just be imported back in. Since it doesn't seem to me as if you are adding textures that you are worried about losing...you would need to be building a lot of materials everyday from assets not already in your system for it to truly matter, unless I am missing something? More than likely you're not adding more than a handful of materials every week so a weekly backup would cover that. If you must have a caproject file, I might think about switching to carbonite, which backs up your entire system and then you could just restore your managed files if you truly had a crash or more accurate, you would just restore your entire system if you had a crash. So no need to do this daily export since carbonite would handle that. If you're currently writing these caproject files to your main nvme, your pumping the read/write up pretty high and shortening the lifespan on an nvme...I don't know if you are or not but hopefully youre saving to a secondary non-system drive instead as your first save point. Aside from carbonite, you could just use task scheduler or a symlink to backup the core managed files. Either one of these would save you from needing to manually export your caproject files every day. A project file for me is 270mb so thats a ton of redundant data being written. Anyways just giving more info in case some of it is new to you

Do you have your auto archive folder set to your backup system? You would only lose the work up to the point of your archive.

For which aspect specifically? Which step of creating an elevation is hanging you up? I don't think there is an all encompassing elevation video though I haven't looked in a while

which stair issues? maybe I have answers Which? maybe I have answers We did get some new ones yes This is one of the most requested things for the last decade..to specifically address the issue of broken links and missing files across machines and inter-office sharing It's also Chief's number 1 support call I believe...and though its not perfect..its a big step in the right direction . Also there are a ton of bread and butter things. just the 3d temp dimensions are HUGE productivity time saver.

Going to help you out, most of this info is incorrect....which should make you happy It is spread out around a number of different folders, and careful with the wording, this almost implies all layouts and plans get stored in a caproject file. A .caproject file only exists outside of your machine if you export one, and then and only then does it become a project file and it includes whatever plans and layouts and other documents were chose to be exported with the project as well as any assets such as material texture files. This is not true if you import a layout file only and chief asks if you would like to import the associated plan files, the links will be retained. Also the links will be retained for a caproject file if they existed. If you are seeing otherwise then please report it as that shouldn't be the case and you might want to double check that before you exported a caproject file It gave me a warning if I tried to rename to the same name and it gave me a warning if I tried to drag and drop into the project with a file of the same name as another that exists in that project: A team cannot work on a project file within your version of the software. It's currently not possible, so I am not sure what kind of a risk this proposes. For someone to work on a file, you would need to export it, which is very very similar to the process that it was before. Thus producing the meta data. In bried, exporting a caproject file replaces hitting save at the end of a session...and in a team workflow, the caproject file should be deleted from the project browser upon export which you can do by clicking delete, which will give you the export and delete option. We can do exactly this in the export project option, picking and choosing which files to export: This is really up to you and the team for what your standards are. If its a collaborative team, then there should be an export at the end of each drafting session. Also their is an automatic backup system as well as the archive system, both of which could be pointed to a team cloud and accessed there as well. This is really no different than it was before, since before if a team member didn't save their work or didn't have their cloud updating you'd be running into the same issue. The different is very slight. you export a caproject folder to your teams cloud..then do as you normally would. I would also suggest that if a project is being exported, it should at the same time be deleted from that machine's project manager, as now it is the obsolete version in the project browser We have this its just called folder...which is abhorrently obnoxious, since we call other things "Folders" but it works lag tags do, such as a project being tagged with multiple folders Also have this in the time tracker or revision tool We have this see above Double check this, it works on my end automatic backup is your friend here, you can also point the archive to a shared folder so automatic archive backs up plan and layout

Will update later, but 3d dimension text is no longer effected by the rendering technique like in past when you had a low sample rate in raytrace rendering the text was barely legible

you can simply import a plan file. it doesnt need to be a caproject file

Hope you don't mind, sharing back this much much newer version. I dindt understand the issue you were having. maybe its fixed in this version:

The are stored as encrypted files. Instead save a backup and back that up routinely instead, or save a backup and extract the files to backup routinely

not just objects. text size for instance, number height on dimensions, , basically many input you had in inches will be wrong, some do convert correclty..it really is a ton of work

Pretty sure the unit conversions make 4" into 4mm upon import. It's a nightmare truly. I've tried many times to create my templates in imperial with every workaround I can think of. It's a ton of work

Want to learn Macros, go to these two guys above. I have it built into my Pro Plan templates that it pulls this info from a CSV FIle so its easier for an assistant to plug in for me if I choose. it falls back to the default tools/designer\client information in the case that it doesnt see a CSV. You can always use Fax input field as well They could also teach you how to do this for yourself. I run into Joe in Idaho at Chief's events, an awesome person, and I plan on meeting Mike one of these days up in Alaska, invaluable resources in the community