bernie

thanks I'll give it a go. wading my way thru ruby at the mo. have done other languages... B

Gerry & Joe, keen to see how to read data from a text file into chief.... any code to help me out?

37.7833° S, 175.2833° E now we getting somewhere...

aww crap. silly me. cheers for that. im sure it was working in the past. that'll explain why.

hi all, can anyone confirm the sun angles work for the southern hemisphere? I've entered correct data but chief x7 build 17.1.1.3x64 like the rest is just plain wrong in where it thinks the sun is coming from at this time of day. I end up kludging the time of day to make it work... 43.2500° N, 79.8667° W GMT+12 say 1pm see attached. the sun angle should be rotated anticlockwise by about 4-5 hrs. over here the sun rises in the east, heads north anticlockwise, and sets in the west. cheers, B

here here, or is that hear hear??

that appears so, you can convert normal to rich text, but not back. we need a tool to convert back to normal text so i can make all my current text in my particular layers in my .plan files be controlled by layer rather than custom .... i was hoping to find a tool to multiple select and convert back but no such luck...

FIL or not dont give out the .plan file if at all possible. a pdf is sufficient. if you are "forced" to give out the low level .plan file, charge a small fee for it. $300. that will hopefully shed some light on what the real motivation for the .plan file is for... on the other hand, if the design is good, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. well done

hi hi, what method are you all using for your boiler template notes and general text notes for each layer (bracing, plumbing, foundation, roof etc) under x6? using rich text or text boxes? if using rich text, is there any way to revert a rich text box back to a normal text box? and how do you make a rich text box 'use layer for text style" like normal text box? cheers, Bernie, NZ

anyone got a template successfully working for a mixed model . e.g. with mono slab floor (garage) connected to a raised pile floor with piles around perimeter (not stem wall around perimeter)? both floors at same height so yes there is a digout or ground sloping to accomodate the crawl space / ventilation requirements etc.

16.4.1.20 will also show ceiling break lines sparodically for items that you have blocked together- all to do with your layers that make a layerset not being clean and being imported from a prior version to x6 eg x5,x4,x3,x2 best bet is to go thru your layer items and "clean" it up - may fix the issue. eg delete unused layers. make sure you havnt imported an old old layerset if you have then try and remember which layers you have deleted / changed some layer items to only affect few layersets but not all of them then these will be the culprits ...the internal database table that links all the layers/layersets is slightly a.w.o.l. and 16.4.1.20 reads it differently to prior versions. go thru and rename each suspect problem layer with the tick box "all layers" selected. should fix it. well it did for me.

the question is does windows support dual processor? the answer is no. you are better off with single processor more cores. apple, not sure.

the GUI for framing /room setup for mixed framing models (concrete, trusses, rafters, split level, 2 story, midfloor trusses, ground floor subfloor, basements) leaves a lot to be desired. can be done for conventional USA houses, but my experience is once you get slightly off the beaten track for other parts of the world where I live, (piles with no perimeter foundations, garage slab connected to subfloor, it just doesnt lend itself well and modelling framing semi-accurately (which is a core functionality for me seeing as I do remodels extensively) to take proper backclipped cross sections is a challenge...best resolved I have found by modelling the framing in several .plan files then 'joined together' in final layout file. A new gui for framing object setup on a per room basis would help and give more tighter control instead of a per floor basis which is what we currently got. put the bunnies onto the new GUI put the gurus onto fixing chiefs framing / modelling capabilities so you can set framing/foundation attributes on a (grouped) per room object basis instead of a per .plan basis. put the super gurus onto macro improvements eg area measurement for closed polylines when working out site coverage calcs and least we not forget auto updateable elevations (or some indicator that tells us they need updating manually)

as Doug said........."...Room heights, ceilings, and the whole interaction with multiple floors has proven to be very hard to make easy to understand. Partly because it is hard to visualize in 3D what everything does and partly because what Chief does is far more complex than even experienced users of the program usually understand so the simple solutions that have been proposed break down for various reasons. We have from time to time discussed creating a "story pole" interface for solving this, but so far the ideas that we and others have come up with don't appear to make the problem of communicating the complex interaction of multiple rooms on multiple floors all with various potential heights and platform levels above and below work out to an interface that is easy to understand. To some extent I think this is mainy related to not making platforms an editable entity, but there is probably more to it than that......." so my 1 wish would be for a "story pole" that works intuitively from the ground up (not top down) also for split level homes whereby I can select each item on the pole and define its attributes. some sort of graphic that shows you what you are adjusting and the graphic adjusts in real time would be useful. example for 2 story: first floor foundation - either mono slab or subfloor - a new type of subfloor created to handle floor joists sitting on timber piles with no perimeter wall. piles are at perimeter. very common. first floor framing height to top plate. either 1 or 2 member top plate. first floor midfloor joists of either floor joists or parallel chord trusses, plus floor thickness (the ply etc). 2nd floor framing height to top plate level. 2nd floor roof framing of either rafters or trusses. either sloping or flat ceilings. best if the tool worked by grouping platforms into group numbers - so it would be easy to define each platform group and handle split level and also handle platforms connected to (garage) slab that you want at same finished floor level as the garage. eg garage attached to house is 1 platform group room next to garage and the 2nd floor above is 2nd platform group. just an idea.

once rooms and platforms are defined and set up a master dbx (framing) user interface to select each platforms object(s) in logical sequence (ie foundations, joists, bearers, floor, walls, midfloor framing, midfloor floor, 1st floor walls, top plate(s), rafters, trusses, purlins, etc) to set each objects (framing) attributes thereby allowing a closer-to-the-real-world backclipped cross section to be developed. all to be set up on a room group by room group basis to handle split level etc.

scott I mean walls are 36mm thick (no framing in them) high density walls or roughly 1.25 inch thick in your lingo so that is why there is no wall framing displayed doing backclipped cross sections on walls like this doesnt show anything - hence why I have "walls, normal" turned on so when I do a backclipped cross section Ive got something that shows the wall outline. ok see picture. 1 last issue to resolve... see the 2 end roof planes, where they overlap the middle roof, the top chords. how do i get the top chords to extend out to where they should be, out to the fascia? they are stopping short - shouldnt. im using energy heel trusses slightly raised off bottom plate and have drawn the middle roof trusses first to force the 2 end roof plane trusses to stop short.

cheers guys will digest... ahh energy heel..i remember now glenn. cheers scott. still need to send you a pavlova

hi, trying to draw my roof framing properly all in trusses (not rafters) when manually putting a single truss on the left hand roof, chief is drawing the truss all the way across over the middle roof plane. suspect it is something to do with my attic wall settings? separating the 2 roof plane regions? what are the correct chief settings to put on the wall(s) objects, roof groups, room settings, so when I manually draw a truss on the 3 roof planes, they 'behave' and draw as they should? notes: 1. when I build my roof framing in rafters, all is sweet 2. yes, I set the sides = high shed, end = full gable 3. running latest x6. could be an x5 file. shouldnt matter. attached is my .plan file cut down and some screen capture showing the issues - there are several truss issues - what are the correct chief model settings?. cheers, bernie NZ ps: scott this would be a good video to show how to do trusses in the 'real world'.... 1460_x6_henessey11cutdown.zip

ok. send you some pavlova scott, (you know what that is right?) the solution is to first go around perimeter of house and make sure ALL the walls are set to wall structure dbx set to ticked "default wall top height". then all is well and they redraw correctly. I know as a rule its not a good idea to manually adjust them...lesson learnt. im also thinking I might not label rooms anymore with a true room label, leave them as 'unknown', with a text room label, as if properly label them with a room label that tends to change their properties in ways that chief has never fully documented... eg foundations below take on strange properties at times... oh the inner workings of chief...one day...

nah graeme that does not work. draw yourself a little test house. add a roof, monopitch. make the sides 'high shed'. make the end 'full gable' in wall dbx. now in 3d change your end walls manually (drag them up or down) now change your roof pitch. now try and show me the setting to make the walls behave correctly and draw up to the roofline as they should automatically, before you manually fiddled with them after half an hour of trial and error, I cant find the setting or sequence. ive tried redrawing the walls ive tried redrawing the roof. the problem I have is the model of the house is fairly well advanced (90% full construction drawings) and the roof has gone from internal gutters with parapets (I manually drawgged the walls up to eyeball them) to external gutters monopitch (high shed). but, chief is still stuck on not automatically redrawing the exterior wall to the correct height. i did a test case square house off to one side of the main house, and it works sweet. proving to me the .plan file is behaving. just the model of the house is not. I will keep digging to find an answer. reluctantly, I DONT want to redraw the exterior walls, as that will mean fully redimensioning an already dimensioned plan anyone else have a solution? GlennW? scott?

is there a quick method to undo manual editing of exterior wall polylines that have been dragged up to match the slope of underside of monopitch roof, so that when the 3D model is changed, the walls auto generate correctly?. is there a setting in the wall dbx to reset/revert them back to the 'way they were' before the user intervened? ( yes yes I know, from now on make the side walls 'high shed' in wall roof tab dbx ) but I just need to undo my manual fiddlings... cheers, Bernie

anyone got ruby to open and read a text file into a global variable?

yeah I know. uses too many brain cells working out what to print. my method faster. just print pages 1-20. the spares go 21 onwards. and I also got the scale 1:100 working by using the .plan macro %scale% embedded in a text string in text on floorplan, and that shows correctly once sent to layout. so now the only thing left to do is learn ruby to primarily read an external file with parameters and secondly to automate chief as much as poss. to increase efficiencies. Bernie

ok what I ended up doing for x6 was shifting 'up' to the 'back' all the layout pages you dont need for particular set of plans working on. ie still keep unwanted layout pages, just shift them manually to the end of the set you want to print. (say pages 1..20) so shift all unused to 21..onwards. in this manner can keep 1 main template layout file for all projects. yes, it is possible to leave them in sequence, not turn on the page number, not have anything on that layout page, and selectively print only the final layout pages you want for the plan set, but what a p.i.t.a. that is in the real production world. now, one last question: what is the macro to show the .plan scale sent to/showing on the .layout page ? (I want to put in the .layout file page 0, header, the macro to show on that particular layout page, the scale of the .plan file sent/showing) eg page 1 shows 1:100 (plan sent is 1:100), page 2 shows 1:50 (plan sent is 1:50), page 3 shows 1:200 (plan sent is 1:200) etc OR do I have to resort to putting the %scale% in/on the .plan file page/layer, that is showing on the layout page (ie cant go on page 0, layout macro cant detect macro from the .plan file on its page?) )

I want 1 layout template file, for single and 2 story projects. ie a 2 story house has 2 levels, so there are a few more pages. eg demo plan ground floor demo plan first floor existing ground floor existing first floor proposed ground floor proposed first floor. a single story layout sheet index I dont want to show the first floor layout pages , (but I still want them in the layout file and a quick way to turn those pages on and off for my 2 story projects.......) if u look at the time you actually spend mucking around in the layout file (instead of being production in the .plan file) it is a lot of inefficient use of time. the other cool thing I will try and get up and running is 1 layout file set up for 2-3 different sheet sizes. and by using anno sets, can automagically scale them correctly for the chosen sheet sizes. eg could have a site plan at 1:100 for A2, 1:200 for A4, 1:50 for A1, all set up, without user intervention. eg layout pages 1-50 could be A2, 100-150 could be A4, 200-250 could be A1. something like that. scott will chime in soon. hes doin it....................