mthd97

Ironing out problems, is my illustration of fixing them, the small ones take one pass, the bigger ones, take several or more passes to iron them out. As to rewriting parts of the program CA have done that in the past and will do it again if necessary. We need to show the team trust and the more we show the more response we get.

Jonnoxx, I have had many of my specific requests applied in latter versions of CA and that is why I am still here. If you could specify clearly the problems you have with using Chief in the right section of the forum, and if they are legitimate they will get listened to and applied. I think you need to have more respect for the CEO and the work the programmer's put into Chief with the resources they have. Perfection is not possible in this world but we all aim to do our best with what we have. I don't regret having Chief in my tool box for my work since V6.0 1999. No problems no upgrades.

Get the full version demo for free off the website and try it out first. I use ArchiCAD as well but CA is a very fast modeling solution for all American style houses. If you want slanted walls and the like and a very high level of customisation then look elsewhere. If your main customer base is contemporary American style houses then having a license of Chief is worth it if you got time to learn it. Those main problems with the program will be ironed out eventually in time but Chief will not be used for extreme homes anytime soon.

Archicad made this easier with Cinarender.

Thanks Chopsaw for doing this video for us in CA. It shows what we can do in a 3d view as I don't use the 3d window for drawing walls in CA. It is nice to know the the scaffolding is there to improve it with dimensions and a 3d grid etc. I wasn't challenging you, I was asking you to show us. I also looked for a video first but couldn't find one. Here is a challenge, who knows from what version we were able to extrude a wall in a 3d view like Chopsaw just did ?

Yes true, some things are overly complicated in CA and every CAD app has it's long winded way's of doing things too. I think we could show that SP does have some very good things about it that we can improve in CA. I agree with the parkwest list, especially the ML point but CA is better for Designers and SP is better for Builder quantity surveyors IMO. A merger or takeover would be worth it for me. I really like SP SL add on.

http://softplan.com/?page_id=1284 Chopsaw can you show me your video of you drawing walls from scratch in the 3d window with Chief Architect please ?

We might not be moving as fast a the big BIMs but we are more advanced than SP in many ways. I do like how you can draw and edit walls in a 3d overview with SP once we get this along with a few more features we will have fully surpassed them. It's good to have healthy competition in the same league as it helps advance the residential apps we use.

This is what I was concerned about in my above post. Quote: "Chief's roof tool is the most versatile and creates the most stable areas of a drawing (roof doesn't automatically change hgts when you move walls or adjust floor hgts etc.). I wish they would stabilize or provide floor platform thickness and floor elevation locks so that a floor platform remains as drawn when moving interior partitions." Yes, this is very important and urgent. Has X9b fixed this ? If not then, can we please make serious progress in XX thanks. Like we can lock a roof plane, we should also be able to lock room heghts etc when making any changes to the 3d model to overide automactic rebuild updates that throw the modeled room shapes out of place. I would say, that this is the biggest of all problems with Chief Architect, If we can fix this in XX we would have landed on the moon with XX. A giant step forward for Chief Architect and small step forward for the programmers of this app.

Have you found more stability with X8 or X9B ?

MSS3 works ok with X8 and X9 Beta but I need to test it out more with the new touch screen functions added to X9. I am not happy with the down time on Windows tablets for them to update, as this stalls the internet browser.

Thanks, Richard & Chopsaw. Yes I have to ask support about getting into the other part of the forum. I think it should be ok to discuss basics now as they have been revealed in the sneak peak. Yeah I can see it being a help with set outs and even templates too. I will have to do some testing with stairs and split level housing in X9b.

RE: "Custom Room Definitions", Can anyone tell me what the advantage of this new feature is ? We have been able for a long time to change the room definition to what we we choose. Even if we are not using the room for what it is set out to be in the room definition parameters as we can create our own custom room label. So I would like to know what the purpose is for this tool ? By the look of it we can create other room types with thier own specific room characteristics that differ from the room default list itself ? Correct me if I am wrong, since I have not been able to set up my X9 Beta Discussions forum to see what other testers are saying and doing with this tool yet.

Thanks mate, will those short ceilings and room default changes help you out ?

Where can I found out more about Join Me, sounds like a very clever idea to me ?

People do allot of silly things out of ignorance and that is why it is good to be well informed about how things work and how to use them properly. In Archicad there are many ways to do things but most don't require laborious work arounds or major fix ups for simpler and more complicated housing. Extreme home design is another story.

The more I see of X9 the more I like It. Drop Ceilings just great, stem wall ledges great too !

Compliance parameters are needed in stairs and balustrades but does this show up now after doing a plan check in X9B ? Great discussion and we should not be afraid of showing and asking CA what we need for stairs to be up to scratch for even relatively simple and common stair cases used.

A.S. and Yusuf that is mind bending, thanks, many will appreciate these example of what we can do in CA with work arounds if we have the time. Beleive it or not we were able to create curved roof sheet verandahs in V6 by using the method of attaching a custom molding and changing the material from wood to corrugated roof sheet to a shrunk down counter top base.

Yusuf has some great work arounds for difficult custom stairs and I remember seeing a multi story spiral stair case he designed using CA.

BTW what I wrote above was in another post but it is more applicable to this post thanks.

I am going to coin a new term, "APE" for how and why CA works fast with relatively simple house designing of rooms, stairs and other building 3D components. "A" is for Automatic, "P" is for Parameter and "E" for Extraction. We use Chief for its productivity and speed in producing run of the mill housing with relatively minor customization and features. I not sure if any of you have heard the saying "Going Ape" in the US ? Stairs in CA automatically extract thier parameters from where they are placed in the 3D CA Model hence the new stair types including the existing stair types in the drop down menu or child buttons. The problem has been that the room type that the stairs are placed in will affect the stair parameter data extraction and how they build. That's why we build a floor opening that is enclosed and room labeled open below so the stairs will supposedly build correctly every time. Specific room types also have their own destinct parameters and will affect how the stair builds. I have not tested this in X9 yet to see how this works with the new and existing stair types so if anyone has, please tell us when the NDA period is over what problems you found if any ?

RE: Scott Halls last post. I have seen his fancy stair library file that he has produced in one of his videos. What a great Idea for building customized stiar cases and storing them for latter use as a template file. I still hope we have an option in the future that let's us build and set our own stair parameters and marking the dbx to stop the stairs from inheriting parameters from its surrounding room. If this does happen we can call this feature "Frozen Stair Cases" if this occurs we can share customized stair cases with each other and modify them accordingly for our own home design project by setting our own parameters not from the room we place them in.

I am going to coin a new term, "APE" for how and why CA works fast with relatively simple house designing of rooms, stairs and other building 3D components. "A" is for Automatic, "P" is for Parameter and "E" for Extraction. We use Chief for its productivity and speed in producing run of the mill housing with relatively minor customization and features. I not sure if any of you have heard the saying "Going Ape" in the US ? Stairs in CA automatically extract thier parameters from where they are placed in the 3D CA Model hence the new stair types including the existing stair types in the drop down menu or child buttons. The problem has been that the room type that the stairs are placed in will affect the stair parameter data extraction and how they build. That's why we build a floor opening that is enclosed and room labeled open below so the stairs will supposedly build correctly every time. Specific room types also have their own destinct parameters and will affect how the stair builds. I have not tested this in X9 yet to see how this works with the new and existing stair types so if anyone has, please tell us when the NDA period is over what problems you found if any ?

Stairs when customized by the work of a skilled designer become a building of their own in some respects. In the ArchiCAD forum people are still asking for stair improvements so they can work thier own unique design skills. I think if we could have a stair builder and stair type library that we can deposit our own designs in, that would be good. For that to work though, we would need to be able to have a spot in the dbx that allows us to detach the stair from the model and retain its shape if so desired. Then if we choose to we should be able to insert a saved stair style into the model and then tell the dbx for the stair to adjust to the new model so we can modify it accordingly. More customizable stair components in the dbx would all help the cause. We can only expect CA to provide the most common stair types for homes and not to expect radical designs that require fancy free form apps.