How to Not changing the Default layer set

[lbuttery]

Patrick:

If I understand Tim's demo, there is a way to have wall A and wall B occupy the same space. I just haven't figured out how to "easily" clone wall A as wall B.

Once there there are two walls in the same space then using the layersets to display the desired wall is easy.

I'll play tonight again, on how to clone wall A as wall B, it may be as simple as build a wall adjacent to wall A and assign it to the remodel layer, then turn off the layer for wall A and then slide wall B into the same space.

I am trying to avoid having to clone all the other walls also ?

Then again, I could be totally wrong

Lew

[Tim O'Donnell]

what you want to do implies to me you need two walls to see changes you make...or use two plans

...if you make changes to an item...I would hope it would retain those changes in all layer sets and that all layers in those layer sets would have the same name...or it could/would get very confusing very quickly...

i have worked on plans for others who do this very thing and they more often than not, do not have a clue as to what is what from one layer to another and in what layer set what is what..

there are already user controls for "...add a control function to allow user to turn on/off Global and Local change in Layer set" they are the 'modify all layer sets' and 'modify name in all layer sets'...you need to learn how they work

think about it

the statement was made that you could not do what you wanted, as you could not have two wall occupy the same space in a plan...I have shown you that two wall layouts can indeed occupy the same space in a single model...and that the control of the display of those two wall/door/window setups is simply a matter of placing each on approriately named layers and setting up your layer sets to display one or the other by simply changing the layer set you are using...

[patrick]

Thanks Tim,

Let me go back to the drawing board and study again

[Allen42acj]

I have not tried this yet,looks interesting.I would not rely on that for my master plan set.
I can see the wrong things getting printed out and built wrong..Especialy if it's a plan you go back to after a time...I would get confused..
But if you can get people to pay for the extra work=great...
Thank you Tim for the pictures and your time....

[Tim O'Donnell]

I'm with you on that Allen, and agree with what you say...I would not do it this way either for the working drawings and plan set.


but for a simple presentation it does offer some quick advantages for view changes



I was just showing that it could be done if one were so inclined ...and because it has been stated many times that it couldn't be..

[lbuttery]

what you want to do implies to me you need two walls to see changes you make...or use two plans



Tim:

I got home too late last night to "play' some more but I do have a question based on the above statment. Were you able to do this with two "physical" walls that occupy the same space or is one of them a "virtual" wall that can't be updated after it is created.?

I need to have two "physical" walls occupy the same space, in the same plan.

I am working on a remodel of my house and am placing an addition on the front, such that the current exterior wall with siding etc. will become an interior wall and have slate for the first 4' and then painted walls,
and changing the current exterior door to a bi-fold door.

I would like to be able to have both wall A and wall B in the same plan and control which one displays via layers and layersets, and when I have the "remodel" layerset active I should be able to make further changes to wall B without having any effect on wall A

If your example illustrates this then I will "hack" away at it until I figure out how you did it.

Thanks

Lew

[patrick]

I still couldn't figure out how Tim did it per his Gif animation.

[Tim O'Donnell]

they are two physical walls in the same space...you get them into alignment by using the wall offset handles ...first bump them together then watch the status bar as you move them on top of one another with the wall offset handle(zoom out a bit) then when it displays the thickness of your wall you are there...

this may be more work than it is worth if you have a lot of walls...

as I am not interested in doing it this way, I have not played with it much more than to show you it could be done..

[gpickren]

I think the effect can be very useful at times in presenting design alternatives. I previously posted three rendered views of a kitchen in which the client thought he wanted to frame out a walk-in pantry in a corner. I set up a camera view and rendered the as-built corner and exported a jpeg. Then, leaving the camera open I added the two walls and a door to create the pantry, opened the camera and rendered again, then deleted my two added walls and copied a full height cabinet and an upper and lower, and rendered again. This was far quicker than it sounds.

Then, to make the presentation all I had to do is click the image and click Slideshow. By having the camera settings the same it gave an animated effect just like Tim's animated gifs. I haven't learned how he does that or I would post them here. In any case, once you have set these up it is very easy to present to a client in person, in Gotomeeting, even email, plus these can be used in a collection in a sales website presentation to demonstrate how 3D views make it possible for clients to make good design decisions quickly and with confidence.

I was surprised how much more effective the animation effect was. Especially with the slideshow fade it looked like the kitchen was morphing into various configurations and it was very easy to decide which one looked the best. I think this will work well even for some more elaborate and complications comparisions such as completely different elevations with different materials, roof styles, colors, etc. You would never want try this with layers IMO even if it could be done.

Christina does this for clients a lot as is shown on her website. Some of them have many permutations. I would love to see them in an animated sequence. I think it will be much better especially for exteriors. Curb appeal is just that -- a first impression from the curb, often driving by. It is not a studied impression, but instant.

Glen

[Dan Park]

Layerset design was intended to show or not show objects that are in the plan. Regardless of if the object is showing or not showing the object is still there thus it will not go away simply by turning the layerset off.

I think it would be nice to have a way of taking items in and out of a plan but this is a departure from the current design of the program and would likely introduce some problems if implemented.

Rooms are selectable and you can change the attributes but they are not on any layersets and are always there. Rooms are defined by walls thus removing and replacing walls by using layersets is tricky at best. To create this feature would likely mean rewriting the way walls and rooms work from the ground up. This is not likely to happen anytime soon.

The wall trick of using wall offset handles works but it is not intended to be used that way. You will get anomolies using this method and I would not be suprised to see plan corruption and odd behavior.

[Allen42acj]

I have "Morpheus"software that would probably work good at this if I knew how ti use it....

[lbuttery]

To create this feature would likely mean rewriting the way walls and rooms work from the ground up. This is not likely to happen anytime soon.

Dan:

thanks for the reply. I do hope this issue would be addressed for ver 12, as having to use multiple plans to show existing and remodeling and alternatives is a PITA at best and fraught with error at the worst case.

I look forward to the day when everything can be kept in one plan and the layers/layersets determine what is built in Chief's scratch-pad area and then displayed, etc.

Rooms are defined by walls thus removing and replacing walls by using layersets is tricky at best. To create this feature would likely mean rewriting the way walls and rooms work from the ground up.

It would seem that when a plan is opened up, a new workspace should be created and then each floor should be created by examining which layerset and layers are active and that would determine the rooms etc.

If a layer is off then all the objects on that layer shouldn't even be in the "workspace" that defines the model to be displayed.

Whenever, the layerset is changed then a new workspace should be created and only those objects active in that layerset should be in that workspace.

To save time, chief should allow for X workspaces to be active at a time. When X +1 workspaces are opened then by default the oldest could be closed or the user could be prompted from a list to close one or more workspaces.

A methodology like this would allow for total control of the model via the layersets and layers.

BTW: Since Chief is on ver 10 and soon to be on ver 11, It probably would benefit from being written over again from the ground up.

Please keep up the good work, Chief is awesome and we are all anticipating ver 11 and future versions to be even better.

Thanks for paying attention to our wants and rants.

Lew

[patrick]

Thank You all for answering my question.

I do learn a lot in this thread.

CA has been a lot of fun for me.

Thank Dan for following up on our need and concern.

[Dan Park]

I think this idea of having the objects go away when you turn them off in layers is an intriging idea.

There are, however, reasons why you might want an object to not display yet still be in the plan.

For example: let's say I want to not display a roof plane, do we then recalculate the wall heights at that point and not show the wall going to the roofline?

If I turn off everything but framing then rebuild the framing do we recalculate the framing so that it does not show the window and door openings? Using the logic in this thread this is what you are asking for.

I think the feature you want is quite different than the feature you are asing for.

Much of what you are asking for (if not most) can be accomplished now by having two plans.

A couple of points to keep in mind.

1) While we would love to implement each and every request we have limits on what can be accomplished each release cycle. That said - don't stop making requests, it helps us understand what you are asking for.

2) There are sometimes requests that we have no intention of implementing. Usually this is because we have a different plan in mind that should give a better solution. Sometimes it is because the feature being requested is to solve a problem that is created by the program. In cases like this we like to solve the underlying problem.

3) Rewriting Chief from the ground up is not a feasable task. Each portion of the program is being reworked in a methodical manner. Many parts of the code have been refactored dozens of times to allow new capabilities. A rewrite would take years and you would end up with a program that had no new features and probably would work somewhat differently than the current program.


Here is what I see is the goal of asking for this feature.

We want to be able to have the ability to easily create and show before and after models of an existing design that we intend to remodel.

[alobartn]

Yes, you nailed it.