topic Re: Do you use TeamWork? in Modeling

Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 15:02:48 GMT

I'm curious to know how many of us use TeamWork and in what manner.

This would be an interesting piece of trivia and it might also be helpful to the GS development team. Let us know if you do or don't and why.

Thanks,

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

__archiben — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 15:31:52 GMT

85 - 90% of our projects are BIG and teamworked to some degree or other.

the job we have currently on site (3-6 people at time) could not have been done without teamwork. (although occasionally i felt that teamwork was working against us ).

~/archiben

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 15:56:50 GMT

I'm not sure what percentage of our projects are 'BIG' however after initial design stages ALL of our projects our teamworked.

Our typical project files size is 100Mb+ ...

Although not *all* projects are always worked on by more than one person at a time this setup ensures flexibility and consistency. It also simplifies the backup process (in all ways).

In fact - apart from network speed - is there any reason _not_ to teamwork??

- Stuart

PS. GS probably sells a lot of 'single' licences which might bias the results?

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 17:06:24 GMT

I and most of the firms I work with use teamwork to some extent. You may recall that I started the threads about using teamwork as a standard practice and the wish for the unified file format. (Most of what I have to say on this topic is already there, along with the valuable contributions of many others.)

Teamwork is essential for any project on which more than two people are working; for two it is often useful and sometimes essential; and even for a solo operator it can be useful.

My biggest complaint about teamwork is that it is a different process than working in a solo project and so requires additional training, support and troubleshooting. Secondary complaints are the confusion people have about saving and maintaining drafts, network performance (though this is considerably improved of late), and trying to remember what can be altered as team leader and what requires exclusive access. All these problems could be solved (and probably numerous other improvements made) by merging the solo and teamwork project types into a single file format and open/sign-in interface.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Erika Epstein — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 21:04:53 GMT

Matthew wrote:

Teamwork is essential for any project on which more than two people are working.... and even for a solo operator it can be useful.

Matthew,
You have often said that you recommend teamwork for solo practitioners, but I still don't understand WHY?

I don't use it in my own practice as I am a solo practitioner and my cat has so far refused to learn archicad, nevermind teamwork.

I do, however, use it on occasion when I work with other offices and find its interface as you mentioned, quite different, and also awkward and time consuming; non-intuitive. Although, once you get the hang of it... you get used to its quirks.

I go into other offices quite a bit and often hear when there is more than one person that they change projects to and from teamwork, taking it back to a pln whenever they can for ease of use. They too are finding the interface too time-consuming and awkward to be bothered when they don't have to.

I do hope Teamwork continues to evolve as theoretically teamwork is quite wonderful and essential.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

SeaGeoff — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 21:12:57 GMT

Where I work, at EDGE LLC in Seattle, we teamwork projects as soon as a second designer joins a project. But I have been reluctant to recommend TW as standard practise for solo projects or when only view or mark-up power is needed by the added users. The return is often not worth the hassle. I do feel strongly that TW should be standard practise and agree completely with Matthew's call for a single file format and standardized workflow.

This is so important for ArchiCAD going forward that I've been somewhat disappointed that we haven't heard anything from Graphisoft indicating their commitment to improving TW. From a user's perspective I would like to see the ArchiCAD team improve TeamWork as part of a comprehensive re-engineering of the ArchiCAD file structure. The challenge of ever larger and more widely distributed design teams, which must now include consultants and clients, demands an integrated approach to portability (library management), assembling large projects from nested sub-projects (hot-linking), real-time publishing (querry the model via light weight viewer, IFC, etc.), real-time subscribing (live links to diverse file types like PDF), and multi-user access (TeamWork).

I hope the developers see TeamWork as I do, not only an essential feature of a single file/muti user database, but also as a cornerstone in the construction of a modern collaborative building modeling system.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 21:34:08 GMT

Erika wrote:
Matthew,
You have often said that you recommend teamwork for solo practitioners, but I still don't understand WHY?

I don't recall recommending teamwork on a solo project, only pointing out that it can be useful at times.

I do, however, use it on occasion when I work with other offices and find its interface as you mentioned, quite different, and also awkward and time consuming; non-intuitive. Although, once you get the hang of it... you get used to its quirks.

This is the main problem that I have with teamwork; the workflow is different from (and clumsier) than working solo.

I go into other offices quite a bit and often hear when there is more than one person that they change projects to and from teamwork, taking it back to a pln whenever they can for ease of use. They too are finding the interface too time-consuming and awkward to be bothered when they don't have to.

I have often done this myself (switching back and forth). IMHO this one of the great saving graces of teamwork and ArchiCAD; that it is so easy to do this. In fact just today (yes Sunday ) I am working on a PLN which I have saved from a PLP to clean things up before it is shared again tomorrow to crunch out 66 sheet set by the end of the week (phew).

I do hope Teamwork continues to evolve as theoretically teamwork is quite wonderful and essential.

Here, here! There is much room for improvement in this very important area, but let's not forget that it is still pretty darn good and perhaps the best thing available so far (I haven't had the chance to look at Revit lately). It sure as heck beats tracing over xRefs and such.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Erika Epstein — Sun, 27 Jun 2004 21:59:29 GMT

Matthew wrote:

I don't recall recommending teamwork on a solo project, only pointing out that it can be useful at times.

Semantics.
What I am trying to ask is when have you found working on a solo project that will never be shared with others the occasion to switch to teamwork?

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2004 01:56:22 GMT

Erika wrote:
Matthew wrote:

I don't recall recommending teamwork on a solo project, only pointing out that it can be useful at times.
Semantics.
What I am trying to ask is when have you found working on a solo project that will never be shared with others the occasion to switch to teamwork?

When I am using two copies of ArchiCAD on two computers on the same project at the same time; such as when I am running 3D visualizations or updating sections on one while I am noting and dimensioning on the other.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Erika Epstein — Mon, 28 Jun 2004 02:04:04 GMT

AHA!
I see self-cloning inyour future

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

__archiben — Mon, 28 Jun 2004 14:20:21 GMT

Erika wrote:
What I am trying to ask is when have you found working on a solo project that will never be shared with others the occasion to switch to teamwork?

for a solo practitioner:
automatic backing up of the last <n> number of changes . . .

~/archiben

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2004 17:00:18 GMT

We use Teamwork, largely in a single user environment (me). I have found it useful for the reasons of better backups but also strangely enough I enjoy the way drafts can work in Teamwork.

The interface no longer bothers me as I have gotten used to it, but I do not look forward to explaining it to the next person. Every once and a while one of the partners will log on and do some visualization or layout drafting so it nice to have the collaborative capability there when needed.

So even though we have barely scratched he surface of Teamwork's functionality, I find for a little hassle logging on in the morning the benefits are worth it in the long run even on "small" projects.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2004 23:35:27 GMT

Oh yeah, I forgot. Teamwork is also cool for alternates when working solo. You can save multiple drafts of the same sign-in and later send the changes for the approved version. Of course you can also have different people working on each of the PLC. It's a bit strange having several people working on versions of the same draft (kind of teamwork inside out) but very effective.

It's especially cool with live linked views in a single layout book. Just "Read all from..." each PLC and plot/print the alternates in quick succession.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Sat, 03 Jul 2004 00:50:47 GMT

Bummer....221 view of this thread, but only 21 votes?! Come on now...cast your vote.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Wed, 07 Jul 2004 21:07:08 GMT

We used to use Teamwork on every job which involved more than one person. however, as much as I love the idea of the system, and as much as i would not want to go back to separate files, I find the lack of development in this area quite frustrating.

1) The need for exclusive access to change certain things needs to be eliminated. With people working on multiple drafts, people working at home, people on various scedules, etc... it's just too hard to get it!
2) Workspaces need to be "Saved" somehow. Quickviews, layer combinations, etc all come to the aid of workers managing all their layers and working environments during the drawing process, but there is nothing to make it manageable during sign-in. Inevitabely, people take more than they need to avoid having to do it again later, and they trip up the next person who needs the layers.
3) Typically, fixing annotations and typing schedules are tasks given to junior members of a team because they are straightforward tasks. In Teamwork... not so. If we want to generate the door schedule from the virtual building, we need to have that person edit the doors themsleves with the info, which means they need to have the walls, and they need to understand the calculate menu, and they need to understand how to export the info and format it, etc. VERY complicated for what should be a simple task. And worse, because they need the walls, no one else can get any plan work done. This is a ridiculous limitations. Similarly, if any notes are done through labels, the person needs the label layer and the layer of the original items (?!!!) once again making it impossible for someone else to carry on with related work)
4) Team leader is a necessary function, but it should be hot-swappable (i.e. I should be able to request "team leader" status from the current team leader and immediately get it if they say okay)
5) Graphisoft should be shot for the horror that was teamwork and quickviews. We will be paying for that debacle for years to come. It is criminal to have publisher, the only worthwhile upgrade in AC 7, be based on quickviews, when quickviews are computer specific. A single user would never notice this, but when several computers are working toghether, and changes to quickvies and publisher do not transfer from one computer to the next, mistakes are made. We have lost lots of time and money, and made many mistakes, because of a confused publisher updating our plotmaker documents improperly. Luckily, in AC 8 the system seems fixed, but I sure hope they never pull anything like that again.

I could go on... and I have (on the wishlists, and in discussions with the developpers), but it had been a while since I had vented on the subject.

just wanted Graphisoft to know that AC 7 was responsible for our firm going to Autocad. I tried to save it but failed.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Erika Epstein — Thu, 08 Jul 2004 04:44:18 GMT

"Miguel Ladouceur" wrote:
We used to use Teamwork on every job which involved more than one pers
1) The need for exclusive access to change certain things needs to be eliminated. With people working on multiple drafts, people working at home, people on various scedules, etc... it's just too hard to get it!

Excellent point

To me, as I read the rest of Miguel's comments it brings up another area for discussion. The division of labor needs to be re-thought and restructured working in ArchiCAD. The way to work effectively in archicad is different from how one worked by hand or with other programs. These days many of the "junior tasks" that you describe I see as being done by all team members within a well thought -out template reflecting office standards. This frees up all of us to spend our time on design, learning, gossip rags etc.

An analogy is once we dictated or wrote in long hand our letters and then the proverbial secratary typed them. They took care of formatting, gramar, spelling, looking up the address etc. We now type our own correspondence.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Thu, 08 Jul 2004 23:11:53 GMT

Erika wrote:
We now type our own correspondence.

<<<Begin completely irrelevant reply:

Yeah, and have you noticed how our spelling and grammar has gone down the toilet?

I'm not perfect by any means, but you should see some of the correspondence we get from clients and contractors! It is really sad. We have a 3 ring binder that contains all such correspondence called the "MGA English Language Usage Guide". It's pretty funny but it helps remind us about such errors so we don't make as many ourselves.

On a related not check out www.engrish.com for further inspiration.

<<<End completely irrelevant reply:

Otherwise I agree with what you're saying Erika. In fact most "junior" people are the ones who do the "Team Leader" stuff most of the time anyway, not the actual Team Leader.

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Erika Epstein — Thu, 08 Jul 2004 23:59:51 GMT

so grammar has 2 'm's ?

Re: Do you use TeamWork?

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2004 00:57:04 GMT

Erika wrote:
so grammar has 2 'm's ?

Good catch! I mad esure Iran spelledcheck befor I submitted that lasts one. 😉