DBCooper

Not exactly sure what you are trying to do but these are not "blocks" as in cad blocks. They are just elevation views of the the windows that are in your plan. There are some settings in the schedule dialog that give you some control over the previews but I am not sure how you can change the line weights. As for creating a view like this to use somewhere else, you could create an elevation view of just the window you want and use the cad detail from view tool.

I don't think HD Architectural had the ability to create architectural blocks back in 2017 but I think they added it in at some point. At least according to the latest product comparison chart: https://www.homedesignersoftware.com/products/product-chooser.html My guess is that if you don't have the button, then you have selected an object that can't be put into architectural blocks, such as 2d cad. Try placing two cabinets next to each other, selecting them both, and seeing if the button shows up.

Chief can do slabs just as easy as crawl space foundations. Just check "mono slab" when you build the foundation. There is a rather long video about building foundations here: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/videos/watch/10256/foundations-crawl-basement-slab-mixed.html

You can adjust the rough opening top. Just put in a larger value for "additional height". You can also display the rough opening size in the schedule.

In X15, the material list is live and will automatically update as you add or remove things from the plan. In theory, you should be able to do what you want but I would experiment with a very simple plan until you figure out all of the ins and outs. Keep in mind that your material list will only be accurate if your model is accurate. As for the headers, I think the header sizes in the table in the "build framing" dialog are only used when your default door/window is set to "calculate from width" and the door/window in your plan is set to "use default". Also, there are some tech articles and training videos on material list: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-00510/controlling-the-information-that-s-displayed-in-a-materials-list.html https://www.chiefarchitect.com/videos/playlists/104/material-lists.html

This tech article is about different door styles but you would use the same technique for different drawer styles: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-00040/using-different-door-styles-on-a-single-cabinet.html

Make sure the "layout box borders" layer is turned on. Then just look at every page. If you see a blank layout box, then it is probably referencing one of those missing plans. If you don't find it that way, then you might have a layout box using an invisible line style for the border or the layout box was moved to a different layer. To find it in these cases, you would have to turn on all the layers, go through each page, and try using the marquee select or control-a (select all). Control-a might work best since you could have layout boxes way outside of the page borders. You might also have layout boxes on strange pages that you don't normally use. If you use the project browser, they should show up in the list of pages if they have anything at all on them. BTW, if you select the missing plan in the "reference plan files" , you can always use the browse button to assign it to the plan you want to use.

So you should probably delete your first post since it is just quoting a previous one. As for some of your questions... Wall heights are normally controlled by your room floor/ceiling heights. You can edit walls manually but this is not recommended except for special cases. Ridge heights are then controlled by your roof pitch. Wall/roof insulation could be setup as a "layer" with the wall or roof structure to represent rigid foam. You can also setup your walls to have insulation in between your framing but I don't think there is a way to change it from bats to spray foam unless you want to modify the material list. In either case, it won't really show up in any camera views. There is an "auto detail" feature but I don't think this is what you are asking for. There is actually a fireplace tool that you can find if you customize your toolbars but I don't think it can make a corner unit. There are lots of ways to make fireplaces though using combinations of walls, cabinets, solids, symbols, etc. You might want to check out this support article and training video: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-00058/creating-a-custom-chimney-and-fireplace.html https://www.chiefarchitect.com/videos/watch/249/editing-a-solid-to-create-a-fireplace-and-chimney.html

You can't add a break to a circle but you can add one to an arc. If you want to convert a circle into two arcs, you can first convert it into a slab, and then back to a plain polyline. It will now be two arcs instead of a circle.

Kind of depends on how you built the porch. If your porch walls are not connected, or any of them are marked as "no room def", then you won't have a room defined. If you don't have a room, you won't get a roof automatically. If you do have a room, but it is not setup to have a roof over it, you also won't get a roof automatically. There might be a bunch of other reasons as well but they would be less common. This is why people will always suggest that you post a copy of the plan. It is pretty easy for someone to take a look at what you have done and then tell you why you are not getting a roof. Everything else is just a guessing game. If you are having problems attaching a plan, the first thing to try is making a zip (or compressed archive) file which usually makes it much smaller. If it is still too big, then start deleting things from it that aren't relevant to your questions (like fixtures and furniture). If it is still too big, then you probably need to post it on an online location (like dropbox) so that people can download it.

The quick start training videos: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/videos/playlists/138/quick-start-video-series.html There is also a web page dedicated to getting started here: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/getting-started/

@scottharris I think they are trying to stitch together 4 different elevations at 4 different directions (like N, S, E, W) into one view. Kind of like a panorama view? If you look at the picture, it has a dead on view of the couch and the desk even though they are on opposite walls. No way that I know of to do that with one camera in Chief. I think the best thing to do is send the 4 views to layout and then just line up the layout boxes.

Probably because we don't have "roof plane" defaults. The roof defaults we have are basically the same thing as the "build roofs" dialog and you don't have all of the settings that are in the roof plane dialog (for things like fill style, line style, labels, and what not). So yeah, it sounds like you need to make a suggestion.

I guess the real question is, does this happen in all plans or just with one particular one? I think that if it happens in all plans, then it is probably a vide card problem. If it happens with just one plan, then it is probably something in the plan.

Where are you trying to show the roof materials? If you are talking about a camera view, then it should show up automatically in any view that will show patterns, including elevations. If you are talking about plan views, then no, there is no automatic way to show the material as a fill in a plan view. You can set your own fill style though and the easiest way to do this is use the "edit all roof planes" tool. Doing this turns off auto rebuild though.

Way back in the old days, and I am talking way back, the default line weight in Chief was 1:600 in. If I can remember right, they changed it to 1:100 mm at some point to be more consistent with other cad standards at the time. You used to see old plans with it still set to 1:600 every once in a while but I haven't seen one in years. Never saw one at 1:700 though. Since most people are probably using 1:100 mm, you might have some conversion issues if you download someone's cad details and want to use them in your plans.

The dimensions that show when you click on something are just temp dimensions and are only there to make editing the object easier. If you want dimensions to show up and be part of your construction docs, you need to add them. You can use the manual or automatic dimension tools but you may need to set them up to locate your fixtures/electrical.

They completely replaced their old render engine that used OpenGL with a new one in X13 so a machine that could run X12 just fine might not be able to run any of the newer versions. As far as I can tell, if you could run X14 fine than X15 should run as well. You should verify that it meets the system requirements: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/products/sysreq.html

That looks like a video card issue. I would try this tech article first: https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-00106/troubleshooting-3d-camera-view-display-problems-in-chief-architect.html If that doesn't help you solve your problems, then I would call tech support and ask for help.

I think if you wanted to do this in X14, you could place the light into a blank plan, open a camera view, and use the "adjust lights" tool. Then you would have to save the light back to the library. I did not actually try this but it should work and obviously it would be easier with the improved light dialog in X15.

I think Rob is showing the X14 and older dialog and Robert is showing the new X15 one.

Normally they will, unless you do something to make it so they don't. For example, you can offset the 3D data in any direction so that it appears in a totally different place than the 2D cad block. You can also change the draw order of the cad block so that one thing looks like it is on top of another thing even though it is below it in a camera view. In this case, there is furniture that was placed on both the first floor and on the attic. Both sets of furniture were moved down so that they look like they appear on the floor below in camera views. The cad block will always display on the floor the furniture was placed on, regardless of the height of the actual object. Not really sure how you got into this state but I can see how it was confusing until you figured out what was going on.

The short answer is no. If you change the line style and color for the "door" layer it will change the swing indicator but it will also change the door and the jamb lines. You might want to submit a feature request for that.

I don't think the "gable over door" tool will work when the wall is already a gable wall. I think all it does is build a "gable line" for you automatically and the gable line won't make a gable on a gable wall. You could create a "porch" room using invisible walls or railings and then tell the program to make a gable roof over it. This will give you a slab floor and allow you to control things more automatically through the walls/room definition. You could also just create the gable using two manual roof planes.

You could try building the stone sections out of thick walls instead of solids. You won't be able to get the rounded corners doing this though, at least not easily. There may also be ways to solve the problems with the wall layers when using invisible walls, but you would have to post a plan/picture showing the problem. You might be able to get the look you want using doorways and then placing the blocks into them.