Trimble is having SketchUp pay its way!
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Wow! All they really need now is a slick plugin that makes it easier to model the structure onto the surveyed land... maybe there is someone working on something like that...
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@unknownuser said:
Wow! All they really need now is a slick plugin that makes it easier to model the structure onto the surveyed land... maybe there is someone working on something like that...
And who better to do that, Aaron...?
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@unknownuser said:
I've found it more difficult to model not to scale. I've removed that note from all my plans and actually now tell contractors the opposite - "go ahead and scale them"
I think this could result in even more collaboration as having a field model during foundation set and framing would really help speed up the understanding of the build.
..... and when we think about it, surely paper plans (blueprints) will shortly be a thing of the past on building / fabrication sites now that pads / slates are becoming so common.
I think the current system of 2D plan production for site building / work is on its last legs. Cloud computing coupled with Pads / Slates is the way thing will go I imagine and I have a feeling that SketchUp could 'play' as a full-forward in this game as it would be friendly to all in the process.
On this subject! Its strongly rumored that the iPad will soon have a little brother with a 7.85-inch screen. I would like to see a big brother iPad with a screen size roughly equivalent to A4. This size with retina display should be capable of displaying the most complicated of Con Doc on a site. And I am sure many builders would adopt this tech rather that trying to open A1 sheets on wet and windy sites!
This kind of tech could also virtually eliminate the requirement for the designers / tech supervisors to pay site visits. Imagine this set up, a big bother iPad with built in cameras in the hands of the builder as he goes around the project talking / discussion the ins and outs with the designers back in the office with all kinds of data at their fingertips (really with their feet up drinking coffee) which would allow for nearly instant informative and accurate decision making that could only result in better projects being built.
When you think about it, all the tech is current in place for such a system! Maybe this is the way Trimble SketchUp should be going with their rumored BIM!
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@unknownuser said:
Wow! All they really need now is a slick plugin that makes it easier to model the structure onto the surveyed land... maybe there is someone working on something like that...
slick plugin = landscape architect and/or civil engineer
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@mike lucey said:
On this subject! Its strongly rumored that the iPad will soon have a little brother with a 7.85-inch screen. I would like to see a big brother iPad with a screen size roughly equivalent to A4. This size with retina display should be capable of displaying the most complicated of Con Doc on a site. And I am sure many builders would adopt this tech rather that trying to open A1 sheets on wet and windy sites!
This kind of tech could also virtually eliminate the requirement for the designers / tech supervisors to pay site visits. Imagine this set up, a big bother iPad with built in cameras in the hands of the builder as he goes around the project talking / discussion the ins and outs with the designers back in the office with all kinds of data at their fingertips (really with their feet up drinking coffee) which would allow for nearly instant informative and accurate decision making that could only result in better projects being built.
A few years back I spoke to a design professional who said that the greatest advancement in the design/build industry he had seen in the past few decades was the fax machine. Not software or survey/construction hardware, but the fax. In this vein, I think that PDF, the first and most widely accepted digital drawing format, would get my vote for the "best" way to collaborate or share information.
I think this is a shame. I really think that technology is at a point where we can do exactly what Mike is saying. There is not reason that an architect cannot visit a site with a digital copy of his/her drawings. Or that a builder should not be able to mark up a plan set in the field digitally and send it back to the designer.
We are in the future...
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Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless. A couple of our local building departments are starting up the process of digital reviews. That said, I just bought a new HP T790 plotter
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@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless. A couple of our local building departments are starting up the process of digital reviews.
Just hope by that they don't mean dwg or dwf. Will be nice. On some jobs we've just uploaded to print service and what people ordered (DL pdf or prints) was up to them. But no movement around here to go digital at the building dept. I am surprised it's more advanced up there on the "hill".
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I'm not in any way knocking Trimble's buyout of SU. But for anyone to say that the ability to use SKP's in Trimble's devices as a "direction" of their intent, is not logical.
You do not need to own the SU engine to use a drawing data file, which we call a SKP.
You only need to understand how SU structures its data, and any good Ruby magician knows that well.It then becomes obvious that Trimble has some other strategic plan to either somehow use the engine in its products (royalty free) or upgrade SU to better suit the community's needs, as well as their own, again without paying royalties and navigating Google's political/bureaucratic landscape.
Hopefully, upgrading SU in the spirit it has been for a long time, and NOT relegating all of the good new stuff to only the Pro version is the better way. Maybe putting some older Pro only features into new free versions would be an act of good faith on Trimble's part.
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Hi Joel,
You may well be right, however its the first instance we are publicly aware of where Trimble are leveraging SketchUp and surely that could to some degree looked on as a direction
Mike
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@pbacot said:
@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless. A couple of our local building departments are starting up the process of digital reviews.
Just hope by that they don't mean dwg or dwf. Will be nice. On some jobs we've just uploaded to print service and what people ordered (DL pdf or prints) was up to them. But no movement around here to go digital at the building dept. I am surprised it's more advanced up there on the "hill".
No, it will be PDF format. There are too many variations between acad users to make review of cad files work. It still needs to be a static output form that can be produced by different programs like old school paper.
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@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless.
The "paperless office" has about as much chance of success as the paperless toilet!
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@jgb said:@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless.
The "paperless office" has about as much chance of success as the paperless toilet!
Think about getting cash without writing a cash cheque and stop being such a Luddite.
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...... good point. I write very few cheques these days ALSO very few letters, its nearly all email. So I think the paperless office is somewhat well over 50% here already!
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@jgb said:
@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless.
The "paperless office" has about as much chance of success as the paperless toilet!
We have four Toto toilets with Washlets (think Bidet). No paper. So you just never know
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@mike lucey said:
...... good point. I write very few cheques these days ALSO very few letters, its nearly all email. So I think the paperless office is somewhat well over 50% here already!
Maybe not off topic after all.
I don't think you can claim "paperless" while paperwork processes persist. For example I remember seeing cheques being sorted by hand in long file boxes before being bundled and sent off to the clearing house. Later, cheques were coded so that the sorting was automated to a degree but the basic process was unchanged until real computerisation took over.
I think we are at the same basic stage with construction project documentation and it won't change until in simple terms every little thing becomes clickable. We may well be able to produce the finest drawings but really we need to be assembling pertinent self-organising networks.*
A good Sunday topic you may think needs its own space.
*After Toffler's well-worn: "Static competition may well produce the thoroughbred racehorse but would never produce the automobile."
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@bob james said:
@jgb said:
@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless.
The "paperless office" has about as much chance of success as the paperless toilet!
We have four Toto toilets with Washlets (think Bidet). No paper. So you just never know
what? not the three seashells?
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@jgb said:
@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless.
The "paperless office" has about as much chance of success as the paperless toilet!
This is why most offices cannot do it. They think like this. You just have to change your attitude and approach. You're probably still writing checks
I'm doing quite well at it right now - not a single roll of drawings in my office.
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@bob james said:
@jgb said:
@unknownuser said:
Agreed. I am in the process of going almost completely paperless.
The "paperless office" has about as much chance of success as the paperless toilet!
We have four Toto toilets with Washlets (think Bidet). No paper. So you just never know
I don't know, that might be one paper I'll keep. The thought of what that toilet may look like after a hard weekend scares me a little.
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@unknownuser said:
I'm doing quite well at it right now - not a single roll of drawings in my office.
But are there still huge piles of drawings in your projects' site offices?
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I am at a computer all day so accessing anything in my projects is second nature for me. However I have both digital and hardcopy code books. While I can search the digital, I still find the hardcopy better for studying an issue. I can move through more quickly and see related information (despite the dismal indexes).
Similarly the big issue will be making finding digital information more accessible to people on the jobsite. Will it require more standardization (never seems to work) or indexing and linking for this to catch on? Or maybe the pdf on an Ipad sort of interface is enough. I can thumb through an iPad set pretty quickly compared to handling E size sheets, myself. It's already clear that distribution of new issues is instantaneous compared to paper copies, (as long as there's an internet link).
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