Archicad 14 New Features

[Dennis Lee]

See what's on youtube!

http://www.youtube.com/user/Archicad#g/c/5C1926DD91A70C7B

Personally, not much in it for me at all!

[Laszlo Nagy]

Yes, those YouTube videos were created by people in GS.
Those are sort of introductory videos while the GS site contains more elaborate information.

[JaredBanks]

I know a lot of people are really down on this release, but for someone who's about to jump from v11 to v14, there's a lot of things over the past few releases that seemed small but add up. Some of the features, say prefixes and suffixes on dimensions, should have been there for ever. Sure. But they're finally here now and that's going to make my life a lot easier. I choose to be happy about that.

For the firm I work for, our next steps in growing our business include better collaboration with consultants. I'm thrilled that I don't have to give up on ArchiCAD to do that. How's that a bad thing?

[Anonymous]

Still watching the videos...

This ifc version tracking looks very interesting... Can anyone tell if this feature could be used to Construction/demolition plans?... If so this would be huge.

Also: Can anyone elaborate on "face to face" collaboration?...

txt survey to mesh! Dam good!

[Rakela Raul]

I'm thrilled that I don't have to give up on ArchiCAD to do that. How's that a bad thing?

thinking about the same.. glad !!

[archislave]

Please tell me the GUI has been refreshed and modernized especially on the Mac?

[Anonymous]

I have ArchiCAD 13 at home for my own use and I also use Revit Architecture at work. I will let you know that Revit does not compare to ArchiCAD. Revit is a Pinto as ArchiCAD is a Porsche. I don't understand why people think that Revit is a much better product. Great work Graphisoft.

[Anonymous]

vhfan2u wrote:
I have ArchiCAD 13 at home for my own use and I also use Revit Architecture at work. I will let you know that Revit does not compare to ArchiCAD. Revit is a Pinto as ArchiCAD is a Porsche. I don't understand why people think that Revit is a much better product. Great work Graphisoft.

Totally agree with you! ArchiCAD today is best from best BIM solutions, and 14 version confirm this again!
Keep your work and rock the world!

[owen]

mikoaj wrote:

NeckoFromSarajevo wrote:
if this is a ARCHICAD 14 update then it SUX and it SUX a LOT !
Most of users dont need this stuff cos my everyday problem is how i will draw a stair, wall, roof, facade . . . What to export to IFC if i cant model it ...

I totally agree with you.
Graphisoft is going its product in completlly wrong direction.
Archicad should provide modeling tools first then collaboration opions.
I don't need teamwork when I can't model my project.

I hear what you are saying, but realistically if you cannot model it in ArchiCAD (albeit with difficulty in some cases) then you probably will have a very hard time documenting and having it built. I am not talking theoretical works here - the stuff you see come out of Uni's these days which is all about Rhino scripting etc but had very little grounding in physics or the realities of the construction industry. I am talking about built work that could not be documented primarily in ArchiCAD .. because that is what we are using the program for. While concept design might take place in SketchUp, Rhino, etc at the end of the day you need a documentation tool to create drawings (for the foreseeable future) and get the damn thing built by a contractor. The best tools architects have available for that today are ArchiCAD and Revit ... and i still think ArchiCAD has the edge of those two.

mikoaj wrote:
I'm leaving archicad and moving to Rhino.

Good luck with that - great modeller, but have fun producing your CDs. And you can forget about BIMing if that ever becomes a requirement of one of your clients.


Let me be clear - I am not defending Graphisofts lacklustre improvements to their modelling tools in the last few releases .. i think they are really falling behind in this area and are now playing catchup to Revit. I fear the modelling tool gap is only going to widen. However what they have done with AC13-14 - focus on upgrading the core of ArchiCAD and improved collaboration tools - they had to do for their survival. I'm sure everyone has noticed the increasing profile of Revit in the last few years .. it is assuming the position in the BIM world that AutoCAD did for 2D CAD. Firms quite rightly are concerned about being able to work with others in their field without constantly running into interoperability issues - it ranks very highly on the list of things to consider when looking at applications like ArchiCAD and Revit. Unless ArchiCAD can break the perception it is only going to be a problem working with consultants in Revit then it will not stand a chance. AC14 is a tactical response to this mounting perception the only way to go for architects is Revit if they want to work with consultants (who will be using Revit).

Now i wish Graphisoft had the resources to do more at the same time but they obviously don't ... or as I said before they are working on something else not ready for 14 (which i think highly likely as I do not think what we have seen in AC14 takes the whole GS development team to produce).

Do not expect me to be defending them if we do not see some really great things with AC15 ...

[Anonymous]

Graphisoft has already lost the "war". Revit is the new AutoCAD and will dominate the industry as AutoCAD once did. What Graphisoft needs to do is redefine what it's trying to "win".

A fitting analogy is of Apple versus Microsoft. Apple's goal is not to have the most market-share... it's to create products that appeal to those users who care about product design, user experience, etc. even if the vast majority of their potential customers don't care about those things and will never buy their products. Microsoft's goal is to have the most market-share. It tries to be all things to all users and therefor its products tend to be rather mediocre. It has all the resources any company could wish for, but that doesn't help make better products.

Autodesk is like Microsoft. While I personally think Revit is the "best" architectural CAD software for our firm, that's not saying much. It sorely lacks the kind of thinking and detail that Apple brings to its products. The developers talk about such detail, but they don't execute it, again, much like Microsoft. Autodesk couldn't care less whether Revit is "great" software - their only interest is in market-share. Graphisoft has been trying to compete on Autodesk's terms, trying to retain its place in the market that it once led. They are no longer leaders, and never will be again. However, they are missing an amazing opportunity.

My advice to Graphisoft would be to become the "Apple" of architectural software. Graphisoft needs to stop trying to make ArchiCAD work for every type of project, platform and user. They need to focus on a market segment, whether that's a certain industry such as residential architecture, or a certain type of user such as Mac users. Then they need to focus on making ArchiCAD the best product for that market segment and hope that there's enough market-share to make that approach sustainable. The question is, does Graphisoft have it in them to be a company that really cares about design detail and elegance and thinking different.

It may not be in Graphisoft's DNA (I can't say that I've seen much evidence that it is), and ArchiCAD 14 doesn't suggest that they really get the bigger picture here. If that's the case, the shrinking die-hard user base will eventually not be enough to sustain meaningful development and ArchiCAD will fade into the dustbin.

Best of luck.

Full disclosure: I'm a long-time Revit user and proponent of the Revit platform.

[owen]

irusun wrote:
Graphisoft needs to stop trying to make ArchiCAD work for every type of project, platform and user. They need to focus on a market segment, whether that's a certain industry such as residential architecture, or a certain type of user such as Mac users. Then they need to focus on making ArchiCAD the best product for that market segment and hope that there's enough market-share to make that approach sustainable.

They do focus on a tiny segment .. architects. Autodesk wants to dominate software services to all sectors of the construction industry, Graphisoft just wants to produce the best architectural software for architects - a drop in the ocean compared to engineers and contractors.

At the moment they still have a better tool for architects - anyone who has comparable experience in both applications who would say ArchiCAD is still a better program than Revit Architecture. For now. ArchiCAD is ahead in user-friendliness, collaboration and documentation production tools. Revit is just now starting to pull ahead in the modelling area, but its not that much better. What it is showing however is Autodesk is making a big investment in developing the parametric modelling capabilities of Revit .. something Graphisoft has not done for some time. They release a lot of not-quite-finished new features, but often fail to follow through with additional development in subsequent versions.

irusun wrote:
and ArchiCAD 14 doesn't suggest that they really get the bigger picture here.

which is?