glennw

The Ruby boys may be able to do something for you. The main problem is the materials list is not dynamic and needs to be regenerate after a change in the model. You may get some of the functionality you want by using shedules, but I don't think there is a schedule that will include roof sheeting.

Bob, Now compare the selected diagonal's length and angle with the other diagonal. Also have a look at how the selected diagonal meets the bottom left hand corner of the room - zoom right in.

Ideally your dimensions should be sized appropriately in your plan view. There is one option that you can use to change all the dimensions in a layout view though. Open the dbx for the layout box and go to the Plan View panel, Dimensions. Change the Number Height.

Rotate Plan View is not a friendly tool to use - I would not use it. It only appears to rotate the plan. What it actually does is rotate the "drawing sheet" - this includes rotating things like the co-ordinate system (zero will be at 12 o'clock instead of 3 o'clock). If you have rotated the plan 90deg, the up arrow key will move an object to the left - or top of the "drawing sheet" - not up as expected. You should use Edit Area All Floors and then rotate the drawing.

This could be caused by the fact that you have zoomed or scrolled the camera with Perspective Crop Mode toggled off. Under these conditions, you are actually moving the camera to change the view. Tile a plan and a 3D view and scroll or zoom the 3D view and watch the camera move in the plan view. If you toggle Perspective Crop Mode on and do the same, the camera will not move, but the view will. From the help file: When Perspective Crop Mode is active, panning and zooming do not adjust the position of the camera. As such, using it can result in inconsistencies between a camera’s position and what is actually shown in the view. For this reason, it should only be used to zoom in closely on small objects or details. Perspective Crop Mode is not used when a view is sent to layout. This means that a view on the layout page may not look the same as the original view. See Layout.

Chad, I am not sure how Chopsaw did it, but it's easy to do using a window and a barn door. Same technique as I described above.

Chad, You can place 2 doors in the same location. This is a pair of standard Glass Panel, Hinged doors. I copied them to another part of the wall and changed them to Library door B02, Barn doors. Selected and dragged the barn doors back over the french doors.

Steve, Great video - you have obviously spent a lot of time on this. I am loath to criticise you work so please don't think I am being too picky. But...How is the brickwork on level 3 supported? ie, the brick for the chimneys and the inside skin of the parapet walls. There is nothing, or only stud walls supporting the brick?

Thanks Mick, I usually hesitate to specify a particular tool button because they can be customised, moved, deleted, etc. I usually just go straight to the menu item which can't be edited. I just saves a reply like "I can't find that tool button".

Eric, I think he is referring to Dermot - either trying to be funny, or a spell check error.

I don't get any errors when I work on the plan or generate a 3D view.

If you go to Preferences>Materials List, are all the categories checked? Or, when in a Materials List view, go to Tools>Materials List Display Options and make sure all categories are checked.

One picture showed the light spilling down the wall - you will obviously need a light to get that effect. The other picture (without the light spilling down the wall) could be simulated with just a Molding Polyline with a high Emissive property.

Looks like they are there when I do a Calculate Materials For All Floors.

I would try cranking up the Emissive property of the of the light's material.

Place the outlet on a wall. Select it and Convert Selected To Symbol (on the Edit toolbar). You can now place it anywhere in the plan - it doesn't need to snap to any object.

If you are in a view (2D or 3D) and you create an object with it's layer not displaying, Chief will ask you if you want to display that layer.

Chopsaw, That was pretty close to what I did. I opened Chief this morning, opened and then saved the plan and it is now down to about 2Mb.

More like this? I will attach the plan so that you can deconstruct it. Find the small Room Divider wall running across the screen at the end of the pony wall (same width as the pony wall and drawn in line with your cad line). I stripped this plan down as much as I can, but still can't get it below about 27Mb - not sure why, it should be much smaller. Irvin Whitney GLENN.plan.zip

You should be able to clean up that wall intersection by using the Edit Wall Layer Intersections tool.

What are you trying to say I don't understand these comments. Why isn't what a toggle? What are you trying to toggle?

The drop down toolbars are hard coded and can't be edited.

In your 3D view Layer Set, is the Terrain Perimeter layer checked to Display?

I am not sure of what your problem is because I can't open the .wmv file on my mac. But is there any reason why you have some very short invisible wall sections in your plan?

My guess is that you did not select the wall in the 3D view. I think you selected the room instead, and then deleted the room. Go to Preferences>Architectural and check Select Wall Before Room in 3D. Try selecting one wall. Or you can use the tab ket to swap between the selected room and the wall.