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The Vectorworks Twitch


Jim Smith

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Yesterday the file I'm working on turned into Crash-O-Matic. Hours to do about 45 minutes of work. When I've caught up & can get a few hours into a couple of other projects my thought is to reference the into a blank file in hopes of fixing / salvaging what work I've already put into this file.

 

So many crashes that I've developed a twitch. The Vectorworks Twitch is where my thumb & 2nd finger jab at the keyboard every 15 seconds to at least save after really memory intense activities such as joining walls or, zooming in or updating elevations. 

 

so I'm sharing this ear-worm because working in VW 2019 is making me very twitchy

 

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@digitalcarbon DaVinci would be proud. BTW I thought "we cannot manage what we have not measured" was from one of my favorite books, The Mythical Man Month, but I guess not.

 

Here are few gems from that one:

  • “An omelette, promised in two minutes, may appear to be progressing nicely. But when it has not set in two minutes, the customer has two choices—wait or eat it raw. Software customers have had the same choices. The cook has another choice; he can turn up the heat. The result is often an omelette nothing can save—burned in one part, raw in another.” 
  • "The bearing of a child takes nine months, no matter how many women are assigned."
    • See also: "Everyone knows it takes a woman nine months to have a baby. But you Americans think if you get nine women pregnant, you can have a baby in a month." –Theodore von Karman

As a Mac user of Vectorworks, every September is a clearcut case of expectation vs reality, so I patiently choose to wait, and eat my Apple and Vectorworks omelettes a few months later. That also goes for most of the software I use. 1Password is still reverse engineering issues in Mojave. 3Dconnexion still hasn't figured out what Apple broke in High Sierra.

 

Edited by Mark Aceto
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1 hour ago, Mark Aceto said:

The Mythical Month,

ok...so I just read the wikipedia overview (The Mythical Man Month)...WOW! on the money!!

I have experience most of what is written... in large projects...communication & import/export chews up half the week near the end of the project...even Bluebeam Revu does not really help in the end because of the need to update all sheets...a 4 hour affair for 17 sheets then upload to BBR, then people need to check it and mark it up meanwhile I'm still modeling so the prints on Bluebeam Revu are outdated within hours.

 

The writing is on the wall...people need to be invited into a live, browser based collaboration Earth where everyone can see the state of the project in real time...& its location on the earth, flood plain, wetlands etc...so many sheets, so many people needed to make sheets...

We have arrived at the point in time called https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_numbers

 

Models can generate more information than the creation of sheets & import/export can handle.

 

then everyone on the team in various offices around the world needs to have the latest hardware to handle the vast amounts of import/export...

 

I can't even get people to use Skype without major arm twisting.

 

Had a big fiasco with team members using Dropbox last week...not all team members have the same amount of space...so someone deleted the project file off their computer because THEY were running out of HD space...but they deleted it for everyone...this was caught 10 days after the 30 day delete restore ran out...but we got it back with the help of the techs at Dropbox...the point...everyone needs to have the same communication capacity...more arm twisting... 

Edited by digitalcarbon
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17 hours ago, digitalcarbon said:

then everyone on the team in various offices around the world needs to have the latest hardware to handle the vast amounts of import/export...

 

I can't even get people to use Skype without major arm twisting.

 

Had a big fiasco with team members using Dropbox last week...not all team members have the same amount of space...so someone deleted the project file off their computer because THEY were running out of HD space...but they deleted it for everyone...this was caught 10 days after the 30 day delete restore ran out...but we got it back with the help of the techs at Dropbox...the point...everyone needs to have the same communication capacity...more arm twisting... 

 

Reminds me of this anxiety image illustrating communication between various team sizes (notwithstanding time zones):

 

image.thumb.png.e608c2db1c7af7e1f484577eb8cc4cde.png

 

Edited by Mark Aceto
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@Mark Aceto, I like stuff like that...the whole why do things fall down thing...

 

Here is the problem...Inventions are made to better mankind...if you listen to all the inventors they at one point say "I want to help people"..

 

So we have cars instead of horse and buggy...mass production makes the car for everyone...horse and buggy roads are now inadequate for cars.

 

road improvements are made...cars go faster...we can do more with cars...the roads get choked...Interstates get made...more can be done with cars and interstates 

 

Interstates get choked...

 

there is a pattern here...

 

a problem exists when a invention gets made to solve that problem...problem gets solved for a time but then the invention gets choked and a new "bypass" needs to be had.

 

Computers were invented to solve a few hard problems...then they became cheap and now everyone has one...creating choking amounts of data...

 

seen this in my own office...I made 3d models to help me confirm that the drawings would be correct...now I have been asked to make fly throughs for clients and now BOMs

 

BOMs have now ratcheted up my modeling organization...instead of just having layers to make sheets...i now have to think about who is doing what with the model...what parts are Vendor or Fabricated or Field installed...and keeping those separate so I can make a BOMs  

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On 1/20/2019 at 6:01 PM, David S said:

 

@digitalcarbon true the more you show ....I shied away from such stuff (still do with walk throughs) because the more you show the more needs fixing/arguing about (isn't that what builders do?)  Although to be fair to our VW programme the more effort I make to show the real thing the less re-iterations I have to do ( 2x in 3d visuals, 4x in 2d only) saving me days of time.  

Edited by David S
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5 hours ago, digitalcarbon said:

just had this in front of me for an advertisement...

 

this is not going to help anyone...it will start out as saving time but then we will fill up our time with other things and soon our lives will be choked...again. 

 

 

 

Depends what the other things are - are they things that are more enjoyable or not. In theory, technology means that we can replace tedious labour with rewarding pursuits - of course, history so far has shown that this is not necessarily what happens, but some would say that the blame for (or solution to) that can be found in the way we organise our societies.

 

On the choked motorways analogy - the solution is organise better: public transport! Then we have a mode of getting around that potentially functions better the more people use it, rather than what happens with private cars which is the opposite.

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23 hours ago, digitalcarbon said:

this is not going to help anyone...it will start out as saving time but then we will fill up our time with other things and soon our lives will be choked...again

 

 

All I want is a decent GPU in a MacBook Pro. Instead we get bluetooth toothbrushes and an app to tie our shoes. Everything's coming up WALL-E.

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