Richard_Morrison

The keyboard is optional. But with it, you are essentially getting a new laptop. For about 1/2 the price of a new Chief license. In the overall scheme of things, with the time you can save, it's cheap. I love Apple. (And I'm a Windows guy.) EDIT: If you are dead set against Apple iOS, you could get a Microsoft Surface Pro with Windows 10. A low end model might set you back about $700 and then you could get Bluebeam Revu for PDF redlining. (about $350). I have a Surface Pro, too, and it's a nice machine, and you can run Chief on it (except for rendering, which is really slow without a dedicated graphics card) but Morpholio Trace might bring back the fun of architecture. That's worth a few hundred bucks, eh?

Yeah, that old puck with the crosshairs and the tablet menu was amazing for AutoCAD. I've tried to implement a Wacom Intuos Pro tablet without success, but maybe I didn't give it enough time. I found it difficult to be precise with the point entry as a tap, and the lack of additional buttons on the pen slowed me down without the keyboard shortcuts. However, even though my main desktop is Windows, I have an iPad Pro with both Morpholio Trace and Procreate. An iPad with an Apple Pencil and these apps is AWESOME, and worth the money for these apps alone, not to mention having the LiDAR on the iPad Pro. I have no problem going back and forth between the iPad and Windows. The key to making this work is having a "paper-like" screen protector that makes using the pencil feel more like a paper experience. It also works really well with note-taking apps like Notability. I frankly wouldn't mind doing everything on the iPad Pro (recommend the 12.9 inch model), except keeping the desktop mostly for Chief. The iPad is great for taking to jobsites or meetings where you then have a camera as well as handwriting. In Notability for example, you can do a punch list that includes photographs of the issues, and email to everyone directly from the jobsite when you're finished.

Of course, they vary. But these details were supposedly developed for a U.S. market. I don't know of any geographic areas that don't have any wind loads, at least, that still would require shear transfer detailing.

The problem with this library, and frankly, many of the details in Chief Architect's own detail library, is that they assume no shear transfer and no uplift forces. If you put shear blocking between the rafters to account for shear transfer from roof to top plate, for example, you defeat the whole ventilation scheme in the detail. The waterproofing aspects are also a little sketchy. The concern, of course, is that someone who doesn't understand engineering and standard building practice may use these details unwittingly as-is.

You might try going to Amazon books and searching under "Architectural Working Drawings". There are a number of classics, like the ones by Wakita, Liebing, Spence, and others. Not cheap, but no professional education is.

I like this phrasing, and it's probably very accurate.

You can rent the current version for $200/mo. Couldn't you explain that due to inflation your fees are now higher years later? This might cover the extra expense of the software rental.

Why? Because people who need to draw walls like this are not Chief's target market, and never were. (And likely will never be.)

Hi Tom, Just saw this. I'm not here as often as I used to be. But, some general thoughts are below. First, for interior slabs, I certainly wouldn't use less than 5" and 6" would be better. 4" is a pretty chintzy garage slab, and likely to crack. I'd use #3 rebar, say at 12" E.W., rather than WWF. If walls are not loadbearlng or designed for shear, they don't need thickened footings beneath them, and don't need preset anchors or drilled expansion bolts. Powder-driven pins would be the typical way to secure these to the slab. In a nutshell, I highly recommend getting your structure fully engineered based on actual soil conditions and local seismic/wind values. HTH...

Really nice sketch!! I think clients respond well to these sketches since it looks like they're working with an artistic/creative type. (And they are!) Good point about the screen protector. I use that, too. No fun drawing on glass.

I have lately become highly impressed with the Morpholio Trace app on an iPad. The pro version is, I think, $20/yr. You can bring a set of PDFs to the jobsite and mark them up, also using as many layers of tracing paper as you need if you want to discuss anything with a contractor or client. The UI is amazing, and includes all sorts of drawing aids and tools. It's brought the fun back into sketching ideas by hand.

Chief Architect is not available for iPad because it is a different OS for mobile devices. (Although I guess a laptop is still fairly mobile. ) The iPad Pro uses a similar operating system to the iPhone. You can use the Chief Viewer, but that's about it. iPad Pro is a wonderful device, but it won't run Chief.

I would trust the T-24 calc's more than this calculator.

While there is some good information on this website, I would not be willing to use this calculator. It does not account for insulation or glazing area, so it provides only a rough approximation. If you have a highly insulated house, and carefully designed glazing with a high-efficiency AC unit, using this calculator will probably lead to the AC unit being oversized and therefore cycling too often, with a resulting loss of efficiency.

A JADU is not a separate dwelling unit. An ADU is. Therefore, fire separation requirements between a JADU and the rest of the house probably don't apply. As an example: https://www.cityofcalabasas.com/home/showdocument?id=490 But worth checking with the City, rather than here.

So, apparently they do it by guessing based on information provided by someone who doesn't know what they are doing. These drawings might be okay for starting a discussion with a client, but it would scare the heck out of me to design anything for a permit based on these non-educated guesses. The drawings have a very deceptive appearance of precision. Personally, I would look at Magicplan.app, used with an iPad Pro (with LiDAR). You can scan a single room in under a minute with all door/window openings shown reasonably accurately. It draws everything in 3D and draws all this automatically for you with dimensions, from which you can then export a DXF file to import into Chief. If you want even more accuracy (which isn't that bad with LiDAR), you can use this in conjunction with a Bluetooth laser measuring device. AND take integrated photos with notes.

The only problem with this system is that if you have to rotate and move the house, it's more difficult since you're going to be rotating and dragging the entire site around, rather than the house. Sure, you can block it, but I still think it's a little counter-intuitive. Plan Footprint let's you just drag and rotate a single polyline around.

Personally, I would keep the 2D site plan in a CAD Detail, and use the Plan Footprint to rotate the building in the 2D Detail so you don't waste the work you've done. If you need 3D of the entire house with a 3D site, then a separate 3D file could work using a 3D symbol of the house.

Magicplan.app You can use it with Bluetooth laser or iPad Pro with LiDAR. It works with normal iPhone or iPad, but not nearly as accurate.

We've always had layer sets. (I believe.) Then Annotation (now called Default) Sets were introduced, which was a game changer. You could set all of the defaults for layers PLUS annotation types (dimensions, text, callouts, etc.) for a specific plan type -- all at one drop-down. Think of Plan Views simply as Annotation Sets on steroids. You get the layers AND annotations you had before, PLUS a saved floor and zoomed view, PLUS associated reference layers -- all through one drop down menu. AND as a bonus, you get to display multiple plan views side by side, if you wish. Why wouldn't you want that convenience? However, you can still use Layer Sets, Default Sets, and Plan Views independently. It's just that you can control more at one time with Plan Views. As you use these, the distinctions will become clear.

Yes, you will need to check all CAD Details and Cross Sections, as well the plans

Before I submit this as a suggestion, have I missed a way to automatically have walls frame to the bottom of lookouts? Currently, there is a full depth rafter put at the exterior face of framing and lookouts are notched into this. Generally, I would prefer that the top plates be at the bottom of the lookouts and omit the last notched rafter. I can futz around and get this, but hoping there's an easier way.

You may be happier with a single wall trimmed by an invisible wall at an angle, with the shorter "wall" created by a polyline solid.

Why do you laugh? It's used in countries outside of the U.S. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Building_Code

It could be a corrupted symbol, too.