[David Cutler]

I found another useful aspect of the Revu Snapshot tool – it allows you to “freeform” the boundaries of your capture. The Snip & Sketch tool is limited to a rectangular shape. The ability to freeform is handy as it allows you to minimize the collateral linework that can be captured if you are bound to a 4 sided rectangular caption.

[David Cutler]

One that I’ve been meaning to look into is setting the space bar to match the escape key – or some other method of canceling the current tool. When I had done work in Trimble Sketchup previously this was a keyboard shortcut that I used a lot. While the escape key certainly works, the space bar is more conveniently placed and a larger target.

[David Cutler]

I’m on the fence on this one. I’ve just started working with layers for my takeoffs. Previously I’ve made copies of the utility sheets for example and completed my sanitary sewer, storm sewer and water system takeoffs independent of each other. My thought is that using layers I could keep my files smaller which might help with performance. I haven’t noticed any of the issues that you noted yet @troydegroot but that doesn’t mean that I won’t.

My one concern would be that if I have a layer turned off when I make my export I might miss a few items on my import to our estimating system. If I have everything on separate, duplicated pages and never turn a layer off this would appear to mitigate this risk. If I find later that I need all of the markup on one page I can use “paste in place” (cntrl-shift-v) to combine the markups.

[David Cutler]

I’ve always heard/used the term “punch list” to represent the items that need to be addressed prior to final acceptance.

[David Cutler]

This could take some getting used to, but I can see where it would be helpful.

It appears that in order to “unstack” the Tool Panels you need to drag the icon from the upper portion of the left column to the lower portion. Took a few minutes to figure that one out. 🙂

[David Cutler]

How about this as another idea @vince ? When you get to a point where it would be useful to fill against a markup print the file to a new PDF as @troydegroot suggested and save it as another name. This would allow you to maintain your “live” un-flattened file. Perform the dynamic fill that you are looking to capture, copy the markup and then use “paste-in-place” to bring that markup back into your live file.

This certainly isn’t a perfect approach – it’s kinda clunky – but if you are working with a significant number of irregular shapes it may be faster than re-tracing the boundaries of the area that you are trying to capture.

[David Cutler]

I tried this earlier today with no luck. Revu didn’t recognize the flattened markup as a boundary. Do you think the type of markup would make a difference @troydegroot ?

[David Cutler]

Would it work for you @vince to flatten the markups, complete your dynamic fill using the flattened markup as boundaries, and then unflatten the markups so that they are available for editing?

[David Cutler]

Interesting question Vince. I’m relatively new to layers so I can’t say that I’ve come across this problem myself.

How are you combining the drawings? Have you tried a simple copy/paste pages to see if that brings the layers over without corrupting them? Just a guess but if you are using a more advanced combining method there may be some sort of setting that is flattening the layers out on you.

Curious to see what others have to say on this.

Dave

[David Cutler]

That’s a nice setup @andrew-veggian . I’ve never heard of an ultrawide monitor. I’m setup with two good size monitors and then a TV as a 3rd. Works pretty well but the edges can get a bit annoying when you try to spread across multiple monitors.

[David Cutler]

I think this may be my new favorite Revu feature @troydegroot ! The ability to see more of the Markup List combined with increased real estate in the drawing area is tremendous – especially with multiple monitors!

[David Cutler]

I might have to turn in my Brainery card @troydegroot . Turns out it was working correctly the entire time and I didn’t realize that was the case. What was throwing me off was that the “Comments” column was indicating “L = 14′-11″ Rise/Drop = 10′-0″ ” and my custom “Quantity” column was indicating “15” when I thought it should be returning “25” (14′-11″ + 10′-0″). When I went and scaled this dimension on the plan I found that the base measurement was in this example 4′-11″ (from the water main to the curb). This means that the value in the custom “Quantity” column was correct at “15” (4′-11″ + 10′-0″).

So a couple of lessons learned:

1. If you want to use “Rise/Drop” make sure your tool is setup as a “Polylength” measurement not a “Perimeter” measurement type.

2. When using “Rise/Drop” check your measurements to ensure you know what your base (horizontal) measurement is and that you are getting the output that you are expecting.

3. The “L” value in the “Comments” column includes the “Rise/Drop = X’-X” ” quantity.

Thank you for the opportunity to work through this. Hopefully it will help others in the future!

[David Cutler]

And thickens…

I was able to modify the formula in my custom column for “Quantity” to include the “Rise/Drop” value. Unfortunately, when I added this to the formula the system stopped reporting a value in the “Quantity” column for any measurement that doesn’t have a “Rise/Drop” value. Ugh.

Time to go back to the old fashioned way to get this one off my desk. I’m open to suggestion @troydegroot and others!

[David Cutler]

The plot thickens!

One of my custom columns is setup to capture the quantity that was measured. Unfortunately the way I have this configured the quantity reported doesn’t include the rise/drop quantity – so a service that is 40 lf to the curb with a 10 lf extension that should indicate a 50 ft total still displays 40 ft…

Time to dig back into my custom column setup and see if I can figure how to get it to capture the rise/drop quantity.

[David Cutler]

Thank you for the quick reply @troydegroot

“Distance behind curb” would be similar to “height above floor” for a wire run – I’m just looking to add an additional horizontal length rather than a vertical length. For the civil site side “distance behind curb” is a typical term for how far from the edge of the road we extend utilities towards the house.

I guess the biggest lesson of the day is that our tools should be “polylength” measurements rather than “perimeter” measurements. Hopefully others can learn from this experience!