Poly Line Labels - Why Did Chief Bother to Add this Feature...?


HumbleChief
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...and make it unusable out of the box? Seriously. Why? Can anyone answer that question? Chief? SEVEN decimal places? Seriously? Who made that decision? And why isn't there a clear, easy to understand article on how to round to various, actually usable, decimal places? Truly stumped here.

 

I don't use macros much but need them occasionally for specific projects and tonight I was using them to show the area of Poly Lines for a site plan and add the %area% macro and it resolves to SEVEN decimal places. So, so frustrating. So I scour the forums and the internet to find a clue and of course Joe has some very helpful information that is unfortunately unfathomable to the every day user.

 

So I've wasted an hour trying to figure out how to get a simple poly line label to resolve to 0 decimal places - with absolutely no help from Chief help files or on line articles.

 

So what was the reason to include this 'feature' when it is completely unusable without re-writing the macro?

 

Anyone?

 

EDIT: And why seven decimal places? Genuinely curious. Why not 12? 15? Or a usable 2 and let the macro guys get to 7 if need be but where in Chief, anywhere, for any reason would you need seven decimal place accuracy? Just a really strange mind set that I simply don't understand.

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You need a Ruby "User" macro.

 

Here's one for you - name it PolyArea

 

referenced ? obj=referenced : obj=owner

obj.area.round(0)

 

- or-

 

owner.area.round(0)

 

That's all there is to it.

I knew you'd have some useful help Joe and I appreciate it greatly but why should I need anyone's help for such a simple task?

 

What do you think they were thinking when they included this 'feature'? Did you ever talk to Dermot about such things? It's just so bizarre to me. Do you have a theory?

 

And thanks again.

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I knew you'd have some useful help Joe and I appreciate it greatly but why should I need anyone's help for such a simple task?

 

What do you think they were thinking when they included this 'feature'? Did you ever talk to Dermot about such things? It's just so bizarre to me. Do you have a theory?

 

And thanks again.

I don't know why they bothered to provide the "Object Specific" name value pairs for Polyline Labels.  There were several of us that requested Labels for Polylines and I have a complete macro package available for Site Area Analysis using them.  I sell that package for $25.00

 

I can say that CA doesn't seem to want to do anything more to make Ruby more useful - even though it shouldn't take much time to do so.  If they would open the doors to the model data I could create macros that would allow complete annotation of Elevations and Sections including all the materials and finishes.

 

BTW, It's not the "feature" that is a problem.  It's that they tried to provide a "shortcut" custom label and didn't think about the number of decimal places that would be appropriate for Imperial and/or Metric users.  In addition, the %area% macro they provided is in Sq.Ft. for Imperial Units but there might be cases where you would need it in Sq.In. or Sq.Yds or even Acres.  There is no way to perform any direct calculations on the output of %area%

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I don't know why they bothered to provide the "Object Specific" name value pairs for Polyline Labels.  There were several of us that requested Labels for Polylines and I have a complete macro package available for Site Area Analysis using them.  I sell that package for $25.00

 

I can say that CA doesn't seem to want to do anything more to make Ruby more useful - even though it shouldn't take much time to do so.  If they would open the doors to the model data I could create macros that would allow complete annotation of Elevations and Sections including all the materials and finishes.

 

BTW, It's not the "feature" that is a problem.  It's that they tried to provide a "shortcut" custom label and didn't think about the number of decimal places that would be appropriate for Imperial and/or Metric users.  In addition, the %area% macro they provided is in Sq.Ft. for Imperial Units but there might be cases where you would need it in Sq.In. or Sq.Yds or even Acres.  There is no way to perform any direct calculations on the output of %area%

I don't doubt your analysis is correct Joe. I use macros so seldom that I don't seem to need them but when I do I think your package would be worth many times the amount you charge. I'm posting a video showing my ineptness even with the simple macro solutions you gave me.

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Larry,

 

Go back into that macro and check it to "Evaluate"

Otherwise it just returns the text that you typed.

Got the short one to work the other showed an evaluation error. Tried Eric's dbx. but still wouldn't evaluate.

 

Really Chief why did you bother with this? And set your users up for failure? Still curious.

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I'm sorry Larry,

 

It's a tool - a programming tool - and for those who learn the Ruby Scripting Language it works.  I know there are users who just want it to be exactly what they want OOB.  CA has unfortunately seldom listened intently to requests from us.  It's like the Framing Schedule where they give us 2"x4" instead of 2x4 in the Nominal Size Column.  They've been told it's wrong but they haven't fixed it.

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Perry,

 

Can you post a pic of the macro (in Text Macro Management) ?

 

There must be something wrong in the script.  I just copy/pasted it in a new macro and checked "Evaluate" and it works perfectly.

here it is

post-113-0-34045000-1460047370_thumb.png

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I know nothing about Ruby, but I futzed around with Joe's macro and was able to make it work to output acres:

 

referenced ? obj=referenced : obj=owner

(obj.area / 43560).round(2)

 

But it seems that my user-defined macros are saved with the plan file, so I have to export/import them to share them among plans and users. I'm also curious why they export as a .json file instead of as a Ruby script. I've saved the .json files in my default Ruby directory, but they don't automatically load when I open Chief (shouldn't they?).

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Robert,

 

.json is Chief's Export/Import format - and yes, they need to be imported into each Plan (or the Default Plan Template) in order to be available.

 

There are ways to make some commonly used extended Ruby scripts available but that's another subject entirely.

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