builtright3

 Well, I have been using Chief for 15-16 years, and there are times I cant figure out what is happening in a plan from a picture.   It takes opening the DBX's, sorting out floor definitions, looking for anomalies like missed wall connections, or automatic wall that somehow get connected to a manual one and you have odd room definitions with 'no locate' walls mixing in.   Or you can have default floor values different than ones in plan and they are mixing on floor below.....or you can have 2 rooms with 2 differeing ceiling heights below.....or...

Well.....yea you are right....you can tell all that just from a picture.

Srs dude....no one wants your designs.   And no one wants to spend the better part of their day speculating at what might be wrong with your plan from a picture.   However there are a lot of GREAT people on here who will take time out of their busy days to try to help out others if you make it easy on them by posting the plan.   Otherwise you are asking them to waste even more time and start a q&a session of all the possible things it could be.    No thank you.

 

And funny.....you think people want your plans.   You insult the people who are actually trying to help you.   THAT is my frustration coming out. 

Ouch! Brutally honest but true.

My property lines are always a cad box in the live plot plan, with line length turned on--no problem, I turn off the terrain perimeter in plot plan view

My new knick name for you is: "Keep IT Live Perry"

I like it and I follow it!

My 2 cents if you want it;

Been in the construction business as a general contractor for 27 years now. I'm not afraid to share with other professionals the way I do things. I even help my local competitors when they need it. Their is enough work for everyone to share. No reason to be paranoid about someone steeling your Ideas. If anything I think it has help me more then I have helped them at times. The way I look at it the people that steel and are dishonest aren't goanna make it anyway and are really not a competitor. Your lies always catch up with you in the end. Also if the person helping you see's one thing in your plan that helps him to improve his wouldn't you want to help that person anyway that is helping you. You can also choose to send your plan directly to a specific person if the forum if you don't want everyone to see it.

Respectfully

I use cheap a cheap mouse that came with the computer and never had an issue.

Ok, thank you

Just think Joey,

 

Someday (In a Galaxy Far, Far Away) we might have fully automatic annotation of Elevations, Sections, Wall Details, etc.  The computer will be plugged into a jack at the back of our head and will read our minds.  Then the 3D printer will build our design using the latest materials.

 

I would just like the automatic annotation by X9 but I'm not going to hold my breath.

You just lived up to your posted picture

Go to the chief video;

Drawing a Walk-In Shower

Thanks, Perry, for the video reference. I have been doing a similar work flow to yours with many of my text notes already in the plan template (like Joey was asking about). Haven't gotten very far with the macros but I will now as this would be a tremendous time saver. Can't tell you how many times I have printed a layout set and found a stray note or two I failed to delete that were left over from the template.

 

Mike

Last 4 weeks I have been making everything live, adding annotation sets and learning macros. A lot of work but worth the effort. I actually enjoy drawing now because I'm not doing things over and over again. Automatic is the way to go!

Lots of thanks to all on this forum.

Maybe we just need the option to pin DBX specifications to the screen. Then we would only have to single click an item and the specs would show. Photoshop has this type of pinning, you can have any number of them up on the screen in any position.

 

Graham

I don't think CA has any pinning? Maybe this would be a nice feature for a lot of things?

Guy's,

If he goes to the layers set dialog box can he look to the what's + out in the "Used" column to see what might be affecting it? 

I check these when I'm cleaning up a floor plan to save as template

Also, maybe their is something on sheet zero of the layout page

These symbols are typical. Can this be done automatically in section views or do I have to alter the blocking?

And one more point because I am in a giving mood.

 

Guess who I get to visit Saturday?  Yes,  that is correct,  Jim "I Fought the Lawes" Lawes.  He is going to take us golfing up in Michigan.  I am so excited.  Now if Jim was going to take us out for two days,  I just might give you two points.

I grew up in Michigan. Great place to be from! Tell I loaded up the truck an move to Beverly's.

I agree, would love to be able to change layers from that dbx. Maybe those who know more will chime in with an answer.

 

http://www.screencast.com/t/a0DtByX8faO

I would personally not want to be able to change the layer just by clicking on another layer because I would be afraid of just doing that accidently. A right click and a drop down box might work well though.

Is that what you guys are saying?

Oh my goodness that is so frigging simple!

Thank you again Perry!

Heck,  I will give you a point.

This would be I first one.

Thank you Scott!

What I do for that is

I have most of my section, foundation, and elevation notes in  simple text macro's  I created in Ruby.  The good thing about that is when you need to make a change to the note, you just change the ruby note and every instance of that note will change automatically in all plans, like code change references or material changes-- very handy.  You can copy your existing notes in ruby-- no re-typing necessary.

I tried to find video on macros and Ruby and have been unsuccessful thus far. If anyone can help me to find a video to explain what Perry is doing here it would help me much. I'm a visual person and sometimes written instruction is hard to figure things out. I do eventually but I'm just slow.

Thank you Perry

This is where you edit that.

Do I get a point?

I was right and had the post in before you.

In the layer set under window label. I pretty sure

Perry,

I love what you did with leaving the sections on the template. Good Idea!

Joe & Graham,

Both of your ideas worked nicely!!!

Also Perry,

Thanks for helping me out with my section. Attached is the result of your help. My sections go on the architectural sets. The engineer puts all the specs on structural drawing.

Question:

In this section I have a lot of text with arrows. I was thinking of blocking the text and putting it in the library and bring it out when I do new sections and then just move around the text where I need it. Also add, delete or change as needed. Is that a dumb idea or is there a better way to save time with this?

As I take sections and elevations I have been changing them to a call out so they are always live. Typically I don't need a callout or camera to direct me to the exterior elevations. I don't know if anyone does that?

My question would be:

What is the best way to handle the section cameras and the elevation cameras as far them not showing up in the plan? If you turn camera display off then they all go off and I want the section camera display to stay on. Do you think the best way would be to put the section cameras on its own layer?

Another question is:

What would be your suggestion as far as labeling the elevations (automatic or manual)? I want them to have the scale and the direction. Not left, right, front or back.

Got it all figured!!!

Looks clean now

Thank You!!!!     :)            

Ya I figured out that I can move the block after I asked you.

The section is looking pretty good then I noticed the patio double slab and the way it penetrates the footing. Any thoughts their?

Thanks for your time Perry

I would like the block on top of the wall as the picture is so the stucco can continue to the roof sheeting but this is close enough. Might be asking for to much.

Thank You

Please help with the attached section view.

Got it!

Thank You Perry