Room Dimension Macro Question

[Rosco2017]

I've never used the macros before and thought I'd give it a try. I went to the "Text" tool and clicked on "Rich Text" after the specification box opened, I typed in "Study" and then inserted a macro under that by clicking "macro>global>room info>room dimension" it gives me the dimensions from drywall to drywall. Not stud to stud which is how I normally do it. Is there a way to have is give me the dimensions from stud to stud rather than drywall to drywall?

[Joe_Carrick]

Hi Ross,

 

Currently there's really no easy way to do this.  The "Room" macros are hard coded in Chief and User macros don't work for Rooms except if directly placed in the Default Room Label.  In addition, the Room itself doesn't know what the wall materials are so calculating the exact dimensions to framing is not possible.

 

CA could provide additional "Room Macros" or they could provide a "Room" context for "User Macros" so that Text Boxes placed in a Room would know that the User Macros were to get the data from the Room.

 

I prefer the second option because it allows a lot more flexibility - but for your purposes the first would work.

[dshall]

......gives me the dimensions from drywall to drywall. Not stud to stud which is how I normally do it.......

 

 

If I had to choose either or,  the way it is set up makes more sense to me because my clients would get the actual clear dimensions.  But I hear your issue...  I,     like Joe do not know of a solution to get what you want.

[Rosco2017]

Thank you both for taking the time to answer my question. I create all my labels manually. I watched a video on Macros and thought I'd give it a try. It doesn't bother me to create the labels manually because I've been doing it for years. I figured it could save me a step. Lol Thanks again!

[Alaskan_Son]

Thank you both for taking the time to answer my question. I create all my labels manually. I watched a video on Macros and thought I'd give it a try. It doesn't bother me to create the labels manually because I've been doing it for years. I figured it could save me a step. Lol Thanks again!

Like the guys above said, I don't know of any way to get what you're looking for automatically. For that we would need Chief to give us access to some additional attributes. Having said that, there may still be a better way for you than creating the labels manually...

What you'll need is an object that has a width and depth attribute. There are a handful of such objects you could use such as cabinets or shelves, but you could basically use any symbol. You could also use a CAD Box (or similar) which has a width and height attribute but the one problem with those is that they don't have labels so you would have to use a "referenced" macro instead of an "owner" macro. The owner context macros are just a little more stable. One major benefit of referenced macros though is the ability to control the label display on an item by item basis (a capability I keep hoping Chief will add to any and all labels ).

Anyway, once you decide which object you want to use, you can create a custom macro (either referenced or owner context) using the width and depth (or height) attributes and place that into the label or text box with arrow.

You can then simply place that object along with its label into any room, resize as necessary and your dimensions will update accordingly. At least that way you don't have to enter the dimensions manually and if you decide to modify the room size all you have to do is resize your object.

You'll obviously have to play around with the various options to see what works best for you, but a few more quick notes before I sign out for the day...

-I'm not at my computer to test but you should be able to place other global room macros into the label for that object so you can have all you labels in one box if you want them that way. I'm not sure whether or not a global macro placed into a text box with arrow will work the same way or not but I suspect it does.

-I would probably place that object on a unique layer. If you're going to use your custom macro in the label, the object will need to be displayed so I would probably use the blank line style for that layer and give the object a transparent fill. You could always use a visible line style for another layer set so that you could switch to that layer set when resizing your objects.

-If you use a referenced macro and a text box with an arrow, I believe you can actually turn the object's layer off so you could avoid the transparent fill and blank line style step.

-You'll probably need to work on a fairly custom macro to get the dimensions to display in your desired format which is a different discussion entirely that I don't want to get into but hopefully the above ideas can at least get you started.

[Rosco2017]

Michael, I will look into that. Thank you! Hope all is well!