Enhanced Design Options - Modify

[graber]

For a great number of "Enhanced Design Options" - which are by the way, one of the more useful changes in Archicad- it would be important to add the possibilty to modfy an element.

[e.g.: in the main project a wall is 2,5m high, in option 1 the same wall (!) starts 5cm lower and is 2,55m high.

 - until now I have to duplicate the wall. This would mean not just less and easier work with options -sub-elements (e.g. openings/windows/doors in walls (may) stay in the main project-, but has further advantages: no loss in solid element operations, in dimensioning...]

[Barry Kelly]

But it is not the same wall.

You will need a wall in option 1 and a wall in option 2 and nothing in the main model.

Then once you have chosen the option you want to keep, merge that option and it is all in the main model.

How can you tell a wall that is still in the main model that if option one is chosen, it is to change height?

You have to tell the wall that it belongs in that particular option with the required parameters (settings).

Hence you need to 'duplicate' the wall for each option it will be in.

You wouldn't want one wall in the main model with 3 or 4 alternate heights depending which option may be chosen.

If that was the case you could do the same for width, length, surface materials and even the composite itself.

It is by far easier to place one wall in one design option with all of the various settings you need for that wall.

'Duplicate' for each option.

Then when you decide on an option and merge to the main model, you will no longer have any options to worry about.

Barry.

[thesleepofreason]

In a BIM sense it is the same wall and that identity should hold over different model states (change or alternatives). The current implementation and suggest workflow with a main model and design options as simple integrated alternative models, for which your points make sense, clearly is limited to rather trivial cases as the work and overhead associated with duplication quickly gets out of hand.

[Barry Kelly]

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@thesleepofreason wrote:

In a BIM sense it is the same wall

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No not really.

It will be just that one wall when the final options are chosen.

Until then it is this wall OR this wall.

It is a bit like saying would you like to eat an apple or an orange.

They are two completely different options and must exist as two entities.

When you make your choice, one of the options goes away (never to be seen again) and you are left with your final snack.

Barry.

[graber]

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@Barry Kelly wrote:

But it is not the same wall.

You will need a wall in option 1 and a wall in option 2 and nothing in the main model.

Then once you have chosen the option you want to keep, merge that option and it is all in the main model.

How can you tell a wall that is still in the main model that if option one is chosen, it is to change height?

You have to tell the wall that it belongs in that particular option with the required parameters (settings).

Hence you need to 'duplicate' the wall for each option it will be in.

You wouldn't want one wall in the main model with 3 or 4 alternate heights depending which option may be chosen.

If that was the case you could do the same for width, length, surface materials and even the composite itself.

It is by far easier to place one wall in one design option with all of the various settings you need for that wall.

'Duplicate' for each option.

Then when you decide on an option and merge to the main model, you will no longer have any options to worry about.

Barry.

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Sorry, yes, you're right, I just described it incorrectly.

But the problem stays the same: What we (desperately) need is the posibility to modify a wall: in option 1 the element got a value of X, and in option2 a value of Y.

"You wouldn't want one wall in the main model with 3 or 4 alternate heights depending which option may be chosen."

Well, yes, that's exactly what I want: e.g. On groundfloor I need the same wall to start 5cm further down (due to Isolation) than on the floors above. (same hotlink inserted, one time with option 1 and one time with option 2)

[graber]

see my answer above.

And no: It should stay the SAME wall: With the same windows, openings, the same hotspots (dimensioning), the same properties (except of course the ones I want to be different)

[thesleepofreason]

There is something so simplistic about the process of accepting and merging or rejecting options in relation to a "main model" that makes me question how it squares with a modern BIM workflow at all? Yes, the process of sketching two alternative solutions choosing one and throwing away the other is familiar to all designers and surely something we will continue to do to some extent. But having computerised the design process and being able to build a BIM from the start - why should we conform our core workflow to such archaic practices? We modell to make decision - the model isn't the decision as such.

Ultimately it is up to the modeller do decide on the structure of the model entities, their level of abstraction and criterion of identity. Yes - you can choose to model the eating of an apple and the eating of an orange with two completely different entities exclusively present in each option. But it is far from a necessity as I can choose to more efficiently just use one entity at a higher abstraction level - a snack - and let it alone be present in both options but with different properties. To argue that it isn't the same snack (or wall) is akin to argue that a person changes identity with their hair color. It can be done but to what end?

[Barry Kelly]

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@graber wrote:

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"You wouldn't want one wall in the main model with 3 or 4 alternate heights depending which option may be chosen."

Well, yes, that's exactly what I want: e.g. On groundfloor I need the same wall to start 5cm further down (due to Isolation) than on the floors above. (same hotlink inserted, one time with option 1 and one time with option 2)

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So rather than having one wall with the settings you want for it in 5 different design option, you would rather have one wall in the main model with 5 options for height?

What about the surface material, and the thickness, maybe the wall composite itself?

Where do you store the length in the wall settings?

And now suppose you want to create a new option.

So instead of simply adding new walls to this new option, you have to go through the settings of each affected wall in the main model, and now add extra alternate option settings.

I am sure all of this was thought about when design options were created.

Having a separate element in each design option really is the best way to do it.

That way you can have as many options as you want and the option can contain information that the element can not, such as position and length.

Once you are happy with the choice of options required, you then merge them and they are now a part of the main model.

Until you make that final choice you just activate the options that you currently want and ignore the others and the model will appear complete for that option combination.

Barry.