Our firm goes through an exercize at the beginning of a project - any size or type- called Due Diligence where we investigate the local building and zoning codes, look for any additional development criteria or design review requirements etc. It is a legitimate billable expense that saves much grief later on (such as the grief described). We do work from Florida to Seattle and everthing in between and even though most states have adopted the International Building Code it is amazing how many interpretations and exceptions there are by the state and local code enforcement officials for the same things and especially the interpretations by the local Fire Marshals - they are godlike and can overrule all the established codes. Anyway, the pay as you go service described might be a good idea, in some respects, for people who want to see a concept or potential for some building idea but the architect is still responsible for professional level service from the beginning no matter how conceptual it is.

Bore da Bigstick, I'm a Cardiff boy myself, but never leaned to speak Welsh. What part of Wales are you living in? I am interested in your experience of using VectorWorks to create 2D drawings from 3D Sketchup models. Perhaps you could start a new post and (if possible) show a few examples - 3D model followed by 2D drawings. There have been previous posts (in Freeware I think) which describe open source and free 2D CAD programs. I think it would be a great step forward if Sketchup could be married to one of these free CAD packages. It would open up Sketchup to new applications that require a more professional output, i.e. fully dimensioned and annotated drawings. Perhaps this is already possible. Regards, Bob

As funny as this is I think the artist is making an important and chilling statement. Dolly the sheep meets the Matrix is pretty much with us now. Who would like to bet that the big toy companies [not to mention the military] are not looking seriously into this now?

Hi Will03, Good to see you again... Looking forward to see more from you..!!

]I have no problems with SU previews in finder windows,quick look, or open dialogues. Im running 10.5.4 and SU6. Oops sorry! I haven't posted an image here before. I'll try again. [image: WEkn_opendialogue.jpg] [image: tPF1_Preview.jpg]

No prob CADken, keep us posted. Mikw

"I think Ron Paul may have been too real" I think you have hit the nail on the head. It appears to be a part of the human condition to want to be liked and accepted by those around you. But I find it depressing that so many people seem to have a sheep mentality. They want so badly to remain a part of the herd that they are terrified to say or even think differently from what appears to be the "popular" view. Very,very depressing. Regards Mr S

It sounds a lot like the beginning of a carry-on sketch.

Seems like a sensible enough idea, i certainly dont mind doing it.

Happy new year,Mr. Eric!(i don t want for u to have just one happy day )

@tomsdesk said: Gotta get me one of those! (The flame thrower, I mean...for my Sunday morning donut runs...since there's nothing, of course, more vicious on the road: than a Christian late for church :`) As somebody who loves messing with these 100mW lasers you can buy nowadays. I thought this was neat. Adam

interesting... although it seems very cheesy... the modeling isn't very impressive.

If anything, it definitely would be a collector's toy.. it can only go up in value; not many of them and diamond nd gold keeps going up ($$$) anyway. But maybe I'll spend my money on something a little more usefull like ... food. lol Mike RL

Alan's right. There's no complicated physics required (especially crock physics) to resolve it. The wheels on the plane are irrelevant- they have negligible effect on the forward motion of the plane. In fact that's the whole point of the wheels, unlike driven car wheels, plane wheels are there to isolate the plane from it's surroundings- i.e. to reduce the friction between the plane and the ground to the point that it is negligible.... until the brakes are applied. The wheels are irrelevant, the conveyor belt is irrelevant, the lift of the plane is irrelevant, the crux of the problem is simply: do jet planes propel themselves forward when their jet engines are fired up? Of course they do, whether they're on land, in the air or in a vacuum (well rocket engines in the last case). Now if the plane was in a wind tunnel which could match the velocity of the plane's jet engines, that would be a different problem altogether (but just as easily solved).

Dunno about being run over. It looks like he found a good stash of Haze.

Here's an idea... (Perhaps not a good one but if someone uses it they'll owe me big bucks!) Smokers of such electronic cigs will suffer the same social stigmas as do other smokers. Some of that suffering would disappear if the electro-cig user could do it more discretely. The solution is to build one into a cellular phone. The ElectroCigPhone user would simply hold the phone up to their head like they were taking a call. There'd be a little smoke sucking hole near the microphone. The user could take a drag while those around them assume they are just talking on the phone.

This is ridiculous, the prostate exam is nothing. For that matter neither is a biopsy if required -- like being snapped with a rubber band. Of course it requires that you visit a doctor more than once in 10 years....

@kwistenbiebel said: That was great . I wonder what Chuck Norris would have said... If he answered Bush to something Batman said, he would have to go back in time and convince Bush to say what he thought he said. Chuck Norris is always right.

Thats what I look like with nappy hair!

Just like XP and Vista, it comes with the computer but if, as in my case, it came with an older version, OS X 9.x Tiger, and you want to upgrade to OS X 10.x Leopard, you have to install and register it the same as you would and Windows operating system (hence OS by the way). Mike RL