Old Files in need of opening?
December must have been the month of old files. I've had a few people ask me about opening up ancient projects. If you want to open a file from before v8.1 and only have v14 installed (I'm pretty sure even
Thanks for the Tip Julia Child
My wife and I were watching Baking with Julia tonight. The episode co-starred Bread Machine Wizard Lora Brody of West Newton, Massachusetts. Julia Child, a bread machine skeptic, had a killer quote: You're the boss of the machine It's a wonderful mantra
Paintings and Frames
There are a couple ways to hang a picture in an ArchiCAD project. There is an object which I can never find in the library when I look for it. There's also the object mentioned in this forum post. My
Aligning 3D Textures on Slabs
Aligning 3D textures in ArchiCAD should be easier. It needs to be done in 3D and this can be tricky if you don't have a node in the right place to snap to. Sometimes I'll make a temporary object or
Assigning Information in ArchiCAD for Material Takeoffs
This AECBytes article by Thomas M. Simmons of ARCHIVISTA is great. Material takeoffs are a lot easier and closer at hand than I thought. Worth a read. I have some experimenting to do.
MNAUG #10 Recap
Although the meeting was focused on new users, there were some great questions and discussions that have value for all users. As in most of our meetings, a fair amount of time was spent discussing complex profiles. For anyone who's
A Really Good Deal
Graphisoft is running a very nice promotion between now and the end of 2010. The full details are here. The basics are below: DEAL 1: Buy any new ArchiCAD 14 commercial license with a subscription and get Virtual Building Explorer as
ArchiCAD 14 Hotfix released yesterday
ArchiCAD 14 Hotfix (Build 3477)
Top 20 Keyboard Shortcuts
All new users I work with invariably ask me a question followed by a request. Is there a list of all the keyboard shortcuts? Yes; go to Work Environments, Shortcut Schemes, Keyboard Shortcuts, click Show Shortcut List in Browser. Once
Some Early December Ramblings
One of the promises of BIM is to help us architects spend more time designing and less time documenting. The lion-share of our fees are typically on construction documentation. Wouldn't it be more fun if we
Paste in Reference Location
Paste in Reference Location is an option I never noticed until recently and it's surprisingly useful. I had structural information form another file that I needed to copy into place. Essentially I was referencing in an
December 13th Minnesota ArchiCAD Usergroup (ArchiCAD Basics)
Our next Minnesota ArchiCAD User Group is Monday December 13th, 2010 at SALA Architects in Minneapolis (6:30-8:30 pm). We're having a special Usergroup meeting in December. It's going to be all about the basics. This meeting will be ideal for: -
Shop Drawings, an intermediate solution
Many years ago when I was an intern at Gensler in Houston, one of my jobs was transferring redlines on shop drawings. The lead architect marked up the original and then I made 5 copies by hand. Some shop drawings came
Bridging Continents – Online BIM Collaboration around the World
Graphisoft is hosting a webinar on Teamwork 2 and how it facilitates collaboration. You can learn more and register here: Bridging Continents - Online BIM Collaboration around the World And watch a nice 35 second trailer here.
MNAUG #9 Recap
We had a good turn out last week for our 9th Minnesota ArchiCAD Usergroup. To celebrate a full year of meetings we had pizza (thanks, Graphisoft). We covered a lot of topics at this meeting. Many of them--like Solid Element
Digging Tunnels through Mountains
A former colleague of mine, who was in the process of starting her own one-person firm, told me “I never liked drafting, I'm hoping to get someone else to do that.”
The November ArchiCAD Usergroup is almost here
Our next Minnesota ArchiCAD User Group is Tuesday November 9th, 2010 at SALA Architects in Minneapolis (6:30-8:30 pm). November's meeting will cover a wide variety of topics that have been suggested at recent meetings and subsequent e-mails. Some of
ArchiCAD 14 Patch for Java Update on Mac OS X 10.6
It looks like there are some issues with the latest Java Update on Mac OS X 10.6. You can learn about the issue and get the ArchiCAD 14 patch here and the ArchiCAD 13 patch here. Future hotfixes of both
Bass Lessons
I've been a bassist for over 20 years (over two-thirds of my life). As college approached and I was deciding what to do with my life, I had two options: professional musician or architect. Much of my life could be
Graphisoft Newsletter, Q3 2010
Graphisoft has relaunched their newsletter. Enjoy.
Graphisoft BIM Bundle helps you go green! (aka ArchiCAD [hearts] EcoDesigner)
Graphisoft is running a promotion through December 15th, 2010. Buy ArchiCAD 14 with a subscription and get EcoDesigner as a bonus! You can see the full promo details here. E-mail or call me if you are interested or have any questions.
When did that happen? / I forgot about that!
I finally started a project in version 14 today. It's probably more accurate to say I got distracted from working on my first version 14 project and spent time transferring over my version 11 template. The task is a little more
Design Sharing in BIM
Graphisoft has produced a very informative white paper on BIM Collaboration. It nicely shows the differences and advantages of the three basic types of BIM file sharing (which could be extrapolated to the original Teamwork, Revit's new Revit Server, and
BIM Breakfast (overdue thoughts)
I went to the September AIA BIM Breakfast. As anyone who's talked to me about BIM knows, I'm a big fan of this group. We were all supposed to bring examples of BIM requirements so we could discuss how they impact
Members In Transition — 10/14/10
I'll be giving a presentation about ArchiCAD to the AIA-MN Members in Transition group on Thursday 10/14/10 @ 4 pm at the AIA-MN office in International Market Square. If you can't make it but are interested, give me a call