[Vince]

I tend to work with a few combined drawings at a time when measuring groundwork / civil engineering projects.

However, this is mainly due to the fact that I have custom profiles set up for different sections of the work – drainage, foundations, externals, etc..

[David Cutler]

My preference is to work in a multiple page PDF for a couple of reasons:

1. I can quickly jump between plan views and detail pages.

2. I have my complete markups list available at all times.

3. I can split the screen and look at multiple pages at the same time without having to open another file. I sometimes undock and drag one of these pages onto a separate screen.

4. Having everything in one file saves me time at the end of my workflow when I export my markup list to wash in Excel and upload to B2W.

5. Tradition/Old Habits – I started in the business with full sets of 1/2 size drawings in 11×17 binders. A multipage PDF is similar…

One drawback of this is my computer can get bogged down a bit at times. My IT guy says that it’s time for an upgrade…

My boss on the other hand works with single sheets for his takeoff – but he exports his quantities onto a yellow pad using the “#2 pencil” app. 😎

[Doug McLean]

I’ve mentioned before that there are some issues with working with Sets on the cloud (in both SharePoint and Studio) but the solution is almost too simple. I’m actually a little ticked at myself for not thinking of doing this sooner because I actually USE this workflow at times.

Sets allows you to create a drawing log really easily. Once the Set is created, simply make that and then pin the log to your file access panel. That’s it. Incredibly simple right? You can just use the drawing index page, if there is one, but a full log does have the potential to be more useful if you want to see revisions easier.

When you go to load a Set from the DMS toolbar, it takes quite a while, and I’ve noticed that the files don’t automatically try to ‘check out’ when opened from a hyperlink. If I do this from the drawing log… they ‘check out’ themselves. Plus you’re not opening the whole set, you’re really only opening the drawing log.

SharePoint doesn’t recognize the .bet file that Revu creates for a Set, so you can’t open it directly from SharePoint, like you can with a regular PDF. The drawing log is a regular pdf file, so it opens.

I’m kicking myself for not thinking of this earlier.