Alaskan_Son

To get otherwise inaccessible snaps, I use CAD Detail From View. Copy a line from that newly created CAD Detail and then Paste Hold Position back into your Elevation View.

Those look like Arc Centers and Ends. Toggle them off.

One of the most fundamental pieces of the puzzle is this: You can USE your global variables in as many macros as you wish but you need to make sure you only DEFINE the global variable in a single location. Also, in order to use the global variable, the macro that defines the variable needs to be executed somewhere in your view (it can either return a blank value or it can be dragged off to the side).

For this one, you just need to use the escape character (backslash) like this... ”24\”” Don’t have time to answer the second part right now.

There's a reason I didn't list any of the reasons and its because they're all over the board and many are too complicated and seemingly random to describe. Something as simple as building a new floor will do it though.

Nice outside the box thinking! I've used that method in the past myself but I stopped suggesting it because it's just too finnicky. You can just put a filled poly-line (invisible line style) to mask the unwanted portion or add a bunch of carriage returns to push the unwanted text out of view, but that only solves the most minor problem. The real problem is that you'll lose your work anytime the Living Area label gets re-generated. There are a number of operations that will cause it to regenrate, but when it happens, its going to annoy you. Just beware.

Long explanation short: Unlike many other object attributes or name:value pairs, living.area (along with most of Chief's built in "Global" macros) is not something Chief has created a Ruby method for. Text macros (onscreen string substitution) using the %name% approach is a Chief construct . Ruby is something different. It can be used in text macros but it doesn't have to be and commonly isn't. Chief knows what living.area means and replaces it with the appropriate text string but Ruby has no idea what living.area means so in your example above, you're essentially trying to divide nonsense by 2 which results in an error so Chief just doesn't do it.

Took me a few minutes to figure this one out, but it can be changed. Long story short, the material for those Parametric (non-library symbol or "smart") Door Styles seems to be sort of hard coded but you can trick Chief into changing the referenced material. Here's how... Open the desired Door Default and take note of the door style being used. If a parametric door style is already being used all you need to do is click on the Material tab and change your material there. You're done. If you're using a Library door though... Change the Door Style to one of the parametric door style (other than Glass Slab). Click on the Material tab and change the Door (Interior) and/or Door (Exterior) color to what you want the default to be and click Okay. Click Okay again to close out your Door Default. Open the Door Default right back up and change your Door Style back to the proper door (you should have taken note of which one it was earlier so you can quickly search the library to find it). Click Okay. Now you can drop one of those doors into your plan and whenever you change from the default library door to one of the parametric door styles, it should use those new material settings. Please note that you need to do this for each and every one of your Door Defaults though.

I think the goal is to understand the hierarchy for more efficient control. Regarding door trim for Interior doors for example: -The General Material Defaults for Exterior Trim and Room Moldings control the Interior Door Defaults (assuming you have Materials set to Use Default). -If the Interior Door is set to Use Separate Trim (bottom of General panel) then the Room Moldings material is used on the Interior side of the door and the Exterior Trim material is used on the Exterior side of the door. Otherwise, Room Molding material is used on both sides -You can optionally bipass the overriding General Material Defaults by setting the materials right there in the Interior Door Defaults (not set to Use Default) but then you lose the benefits that come with using a single overriding default.

You can completely skip the library by just blocking your CAD before creating the copy.

That attitude is not going to get you far. In truth their responses were perfectly valid and would be helpful if you would take them to heart. You can't (or at least shouldn't) expect people to regurgitate information/lessons on complex fundamentals. If you needed quick clarification on a specific bullet point that's one thing, but your question is on a complicated subject that requires YOU do a lot more digging on your own using the proper resources. Sure someone might come along and make you a custom video or take an hour or 2 out of their day to repeat information that Chief has already provided, but doing so is just silly if the information is already out there. The guys above were right and gave you some very good and accurate information. I would also add that in addition to the items they mentioned (Layer Sets, Default Sets, and Saved Plan Views), I would also strongly suggest you read up on Multiple Saved Defaults and Active Defaults. You can do so in any order you wish and using any number of available resources, but my personal suggestion is to start with the latter 2 and to use the Help Files to do so.

This doesn’t really affect me one way or another, so it’s just a curiousity/observation... I noticed while poking around to see what has changed in the new forum setup and I noticed that I seem to have lost about 20 Followers. Are they possibly just users that are no longer active? Anyone else notice the same thing or know why this might be happening? @Dan_Park?

You might not be working on the roof but that doesn’t mean you weren’t either purposely or accidentally selecting roof planes. Just clicking on the roof planes will start placing those Intersection Points.

Sort of. A few things to consider: Are you actually going to need to annotate every single view type for 3 different scales? That's hard to believe. Are you actually going to use every single annotation object (text, dimension, callout, etc, in every single view type? Again, hard to believe. Even if you are going to annotate every view for 3 different scales with every single annotation object, that doesn't mean you need a new Saved Default for each and every view. In many cases all you have to do is set Text to be controlled by Layer in which case one single annotation can be used in multiple Layer Sets and result in a different (and suitable) text style for each scale. Do you really need a Section View specific Default Set? Any annotations you add to a camera view will only exist in that camera view so you should be able to simply reuse one of your other Saved Defaults for those. For example, you can simply use the generic 1/4" Defaults for both your standard Floor Plans and your Section Views. I personally usually use the same Default Set for both my foundations and my floor plans. To me there's no reason the foundation needs its own in most scenarios. Its not like I'm usually creating both a floor plan and a foundation plan on my foundation level. I guess my point is that you really only need to create the defaults you actually need. Take your time and just add what you need when you start to need it. Don't overdo it right off the bat. I've seen to many guys do that and you end up overwhelmed and shooting yourself in the foot. Not only are you doing extra work setting up unnecessary extra defaults, but you're also setting yourself up for placing more dimensions than you really need to. I mean if you actually find it necessary to create 12 different sets of defaults for every view at every scale, then you're also saying that you'll be placing dimensions 36 times, text 36 times, callouts 36 times, rich text 36 times, etc. etc. Its just not necessary.

While I do agree with the general premise of your gripe, I'd say you're probably exaggerating a bit. For MOST people, I think a single Saved Plan View is tied to a single Layout view and if its not it could at least be reused for other floors meaning conservatively speaking, on average 1 Saved Plan View = 1 Default Set or 12 total Default Sets. That could still easily mean 8 Saved Defaults x 12 Saved Plan Views for a total of 96 Saved Defaults though. If layer control were pulled out though and added as its own independent setting as some of us have suggested, then we could potentially stick with the original 8 Saved Defaults. Would be a big time saver for even the most conservative estimates. Yes. This is what most power users eventually do. New users just fumble with settings using an array of different messy methods until they finally figure it out and bite the bullet. Yes, once you set it up its done and you shouldn't need to mess with it again for a while, but I still think its an unnecessarily complex and convoluted system...having to set up a ton of extra Saved Defaults for the sole purpose of placing them onto different layers. By the way, even after you do set them all up, its equally as time consuming to make adjustments if/when you start drawing for another builder who likes to see things different or if/when you decide to adjust something about your system. I'm holding out hope that Chief will eventually change this. I know how it works and I still hate it.

Looks like some kids were just playing a game of jacks on your plans. No. They’re Temporary Points like the guys above already said.

I usually just copy and paste myself so it's not something I typically have to deal with, but I can tell you that the export results with regard to hidden cells varies a bit depending on which columns you have displayed and on how many columns you have displayed.

Short of running a custom script, no. I think this is just a bug in Chief's export.

I think you probably just need to scroll to the left and you'll find that it does indeed do what you're looking for. P.S. It may be that you're not selecting anything. Select All before unhiding.

No. There isn't. Me and others have requested this in the past. It would help if you would send in a request as well. Bottom Line: It sure would be nice if we could simply change the desired Layer for the annotation object to be placed on without creating a whole new Default...much like we can with Current CAD Layer except we would need Current Dimension Layer, Current Text Layer, Current Point Layer, etc. etc. This is from a request submitted over 5 years ago back before Saved Plan Views, but it illustrates the same basic idea. It would be great to have some additional settings like these....

@Katy_DDR, Depending on the specifics of the situation, you can also turn off the railing entirely and use a manually placed railing wall set to Follow Stairs... ...this has challenges of its own but can serve as a very good way to refine newel placement for many situations. Don't have time to elaborate on all of them, but here are a few more tips as well: You can use Invisible walls to define your decks, rooms, or platforms and No Room Definition railing walls for your rails You can place wall breaks to force a newel to generate at that location. Stop wall from rejoining by either alternating wall types or flipping the new wall section. You can refine wall break locations by using a small perpendicular Room Divider wall. Place a break at that room divider and then drag the Room Divider to control the break location. You can use molding polylines for railing components You can use Polyline Distribution Paths for railing components You don't have to approximate locations. Create a CAD Detail From View of your Plan View and then Cut/Copy snaps from that view and Paste Hold Position back into your Plan View. This way you can place objects with precision.

OR.... Edit>Preferences>General>File Management>Associate Files With This Program

Just a wild stab in the dark here, but this sounds like it could be a textbook case of working with a laptop, a 3D mouse, and a regular mouse over in the passenger seat during a 12 hour road trip across the country. I’ve seen it too many times to count.

For me, this would depend on how I charged for the first set of plans. If it was billed using a standard square footage rate and the client was difficult to work for or the plan took longer than expected...same price as first time. If it was billed using a standard footage rate and the client was super easy to deal with or job was super profitable... I might give it to them for half price. If I had charged by the hour? Again, it depends on the specifics. If I spent 200 hours with the builder hammering out every tiny little detail to perfect the design for future use, then I might charge no more then a minimal base fee plus whatever time it took for the new site plan. Also depends on how much I like the client, how much work I do for them, how much work they give me, how much new liability (either actual or implied) I’m taking on, whether or not I personally want the same house built twice, etc. etc. Definitely no one size fits all answer from me.