Faith-based BIM

A very interesting opening article by Michael Tardif, Assoc. AIA, Contributing Editor to AIArchitect. He deals with the concern of over hyped tools and how the over marketing and promises often derail progress.

Read it hereHe states… “The greatest danger to the industry is that the growing BIM belief system will raise expectations beyond the ability of the technology to meet them, and that the inevitable resulting disillusionment will cause most players in the industry to ignore truly useful, revolutionary technologies when they finally do become available.”

It is the start of a very good conversation that he will continue for months to come at the site.

A very good read!

This is an old adage, but it is still a good one.You should be out of your office on a regular basis. Walking the floor and talking to people. Get a feeling for what is going on.Get out of your chair and walk around. Most CAD users will not leave their chair. They will figure out a work around to their problem that may not follow standard procedures.

When you are walking say “Hi”. Get their attention. You will get more questions from just being “in the neighborhood”, than waiting for someone to call.

Do not distract them from their work. If they are deeply involved in a design then just drop a quick “Howdy” and move on.

Hold open air meetings. You may want to hold a meeting in an open area so others can overhear your conversations. Don’t always only talk CAD shop in your office. Be sensitive to those who could not care less. But if someone seems interested in the topic, bring them into the conversation. Don’t talk too long. Do not get into long conversations that may be distracting to others in the area. Go ask peoples opinions. Walk over to a CAD users desk and ask them about some issue that you are working through. They will enjoy giving you input and you will need to hear it.Make part of your day interacting with people that are not part of your normal routine. Go to another floor, another building, another office. Or get on the phone and do it virtually.

Gather negative thoughts. When a problem comes up in CAD, go ask someone that is not involved if they are having the same problem. This will bring them into the conversation and may even provide them with an opportunity to give an answer.

Do straw polls. Go around and ask a few quick questions and get feedback. “I am looking into plotting problems. How many plots do usually create in one day? How many of them fail? How do you correct the problem?” Write down the answers. Review your results.

The goal is to get input and comments on issues that effect your management process. Hopefully from people that are not part of your regular pool of coworkers. It will expandresourcesourses and make people feel that they are part of a larger team. It also gets you interacting with your CAD Clients!

I don’t know how long this has been around, but I just stumbled on it.

AutoCAD 2007 Tips and Tricks presented by Lynn Allen. She has created a fantastic online presentation of her tips and such. Like anything Lynn does, it is presented well and very “watchable”.

Take a look

Are you a subscriber?

In this months issue…

Upgrading – Moving too fast or too slow

CAD Standards – My updated list for ADT.

Survey Says – Using Metric?

Go to the October – CADD Manager Journal

Fairly good Overview of Revit from the Autodesk site

ADT Overview from Autodesk

Civil 3D 2007 New Features Workshop

Autodesk Inventor Series Feature Demonstrations – 8 to choose from

Technology just has to be better – not perfect – for people to move forward.

If you are waiting for the perfect CAD tool, you will be waiting a long time. In fact if you have been in the CAD business for a while you are still waiting for a perfect tool.

I have been through many upgrades that have dynamically improved the way we draw and design. There have been leaps forward in the methods and efficiencies in the tools we use. But there is still that hope of the perfect tool.

Most often those who have found the perfect tool have actually shaped there process around the tool of choice to get that last 15-25% of efficiency out of the tools they have. They have created custom routines to fill in the gaps between the release they use and where they need to be.

Perfect environments are created by blending the out of the box content with custom tools that were developed by each team or user. They work so well because you built them yourself. As the releases progressed we saw the software “catch up” with what the industry wanted.

This leads to my point. We should be looking for better software, not perfect software. Incremental upgrades are what is to be expected, not quantum leaps in technology. The leaps may come, but they are seldom understood when first introduced. Take Dynamic Blocks for example. In my opinion – a quantum leap. Now are they embraced and used by everyone – not in the least. It may take some time for them to really catch on. Or maybe they are not even needed as more people migrate to the vertical products like ADT, Revit and Civil 3D.

When you are thinking of upgrading, keep in mind that the large leaps are harder for users to grasp and employ. Smaller, more gentle enhancements are more readily folded into production methods.

Look for ways to increase productivity by either upgrading or customizing the tools you have.

I have not posted all week. I have been very busy working on my AU 2006 outlines and presentations. I have a ways to go, but here is a glimpse at some of the content…

Destination CAD – Creating a Successful Work Environment

Destination CAD pushes the envelope. An environment that would be considered a destination should include some enticing characteristics. Destination CAD would be a place where experimentation is not ruled out. It is actually encouraged. It would encourage experimentation (but not on production files). When new people join the team you would ask them about the firm they came from and how they did things. It would take good ideas from any direction and put the best ones in practice.

It would seek out new ways of doing things and when a better way is discovered – it would be implemented. Old ways are good if they are still productive. New ways are better only when they improve on production.

This month…

Customizing AutoCAD – Do you do it? If so- How?

Take the survey at caddmanager.com

Don’t be afraid to try creating a LISP routine. It is the easiest first step into getting AutoCAD to do those little things that you hate to do. Those repetitive tasks that can easily be strung together in a routine. Those items that creation is becoming a chore. Draw them in LISP.

Here are some good places to start your education in AutoLISP.

Basic LISP from the Lazy Drafter

LISP Primer – by Colin Allen and Maneesh Dhagat

AutoLISP Tutorials – by acadsolutions

Introduction to AutoLISP Programming by Ralph Grabowski

Basic AutoLisp Programming by David Hoeksta – old but fairly good for beginners