Typically Joists and Rafters are purchased in specific sizes such as 8', 10', 12', 14', 16' and so on with the shortest length being 8' and the longest dependent on availability of the material. When you frame a floor you may have pieces that are smaller than 8' which than must be added up to equal a purchased size. That being the case you would start minimizing your choices with the smaller pieces to a base minimum size of 1' which is divisible into all of the purchased sizes. If you begin to add up all the pieces which were smaller than 1' you could come up with say a 16' purchased quantity. This will make sense when you have several pieces at say 4'-9" which will round to 5' and when added up will pull from 10' purchased stock. The file which holds the standard lengths and pull stock needs to be available for modification so the user may adapt availability for specific location. VW can sum up the base sized pieces and worksheet formulas can calculate and sort to optimize the purchased quantities.
Here is how it optimizes...5' pieces add to 10' purchased lengths, 2' pieces add to 4' which add to 8' which add to 16' purchased lengths, 3' pieces add to 6' which add to 12' purchased lengths, 7' pieces add to 14' purchased lengths. All of this can be accomplished with very simple math calculations in VW
Response and action would be appreciated.
Could someone let me know how to look into the VW script files and verify the math calcs.