this has to be the toughest program to learn alone

[Anonymous]

Hi i'm a student and about to give up on archicad. How are people supposed to learn this program. There's no decent tutorials except the pre-programmed soul less and useless ones that ship with graphisoft, (sound like steven hawkins narrates them). i'm at one of the best architectural schools in London,
and nobody knows how to use this program, students or lecturers. There is no classes anywhere,no books anywhere, It a shame iv always tried to promote this program whilst everyone else championed Rhino, Vectorworks or Microstation. I got Vectorworks a couple of days ago and in one night i know more about that program than months toying with archicad and i'm booked on a full day Vectorworks course( 80% student discount!) recommended by VW.
Truthfully feel iv wasted a lot of time on this un- user friendly program.

[Anonymous]

Takes a bit of work to get used to if you already know another system. Historically, one "difficulty" newbies have with ArchiCAD is discovering that some things are easier than they think. Their preconceptions or expectations about "how things probably work" may be the source of their difficulty.

It would have been wiser to post this before you got to the boiling point, when you would have been more receptive to help, not boiling mad. After "months toying with ArchiCAD ...." really tells a story.

Talk to your local reseller and sit down with him/her to help expose the problem and get up to speed. They surely realize that helping students is tending the garden. Within limits, when you say 'jump,' they should be asking 'how high?'

To bang home the point, my 10 year old grand niece did pretty nicely with ArchiCAD 13 in about 2 hours after I showed her some basic tools and basic "CAD" moves. Got a basic 2-story house and focal room of interest with furniture, and roof and skylight.

She got more tripped up by trying to get her 5th grade teacher to sign a paper stating that she was a student so she could get a "student" version, than she did with the software.

[Anonymous]

I understand why you are having trouble with archicad, I had some difficulties when i began as well. I would keep going at it though, because once you do learn the program it is amazing. I am currently working on a corporate tower, and the design is great. I started 5 months ago, and in the beginning, i would have never thought i would get this far. Don't worry about having troubles because once you learn the basics then the rest is downhill from there.

Good luck,
Nick

[Laszlo Nagy]

Have you done the Interactive Training Guides?

http://www.graphisoft.com/education/training_guides/

paulnewsome wrote:
Hi i'm a student and about to give up on archicad. How are people supposed to learn this program. There's no decent tutorials except the pre-programmed soul less and useless ones that ship with graphisoft, (sound like steven hawkins narrates them). i'm at one of the best architectural schools in London,
and nobody knows how to use this program, students or lecturers. There is no classes anywhere,no books anywhere, It a shame iv always tried to promote this program whilst everyone else championed Rhino, Vectorworks or Microstation. I got Vectorworks a couple of days ago and in one night i know more about that program than months toying with archicad and i'm booked on a full day Vectorworks course( 80% student discount!) recommended by VW.
Truthfully feel iv wasted a lot of time on this un- user friendly program.

[Anonymous]

I sympathise with the OP - I have only just begun messing with Archicad and I confess it's a dog of a thing ... not because it's a badly designed app, it's just that there is next to ZERO tutorial information out there.

The ones from graphisoft stink - badly ... they are nothing more than a moronic boring click here, set this value, do this, do that in this order with no explanation of WTF we're doing or why - this is NOT learning it's mimicking.

There is no structured tuition to actually learn the program, where to start, what does what or even a rough outline of a typical workflow. I really wish Lynda.com or VTC or any of the other *professional* tutor companies would put out something. I can see the potential but OMFG - it is such a pain to understand even the basics.

Every tool appears to have a zillion options and nobody bothers to mention what they are for, what they do or how changing them affects your output.

I've googled myself into a coma and still can't advance beyond drawing a few walls around the place.

Going into a reseller in an attempt to learn the thing is (IMO) testimony to the inadequacy of the training material out there and the help files/system.

I'm not sure how much longer I can hold out ... I'm considering taking a look at something like Chief Architect or some of the other low-end consumer apps -- at least they appear to be better supported.

Sorry for ranting .. but once I got started its been hard to stop.

[Karl Ottenstein]

Xennon wrote:
The ones from graphisoft stink - badly ... they are nothing more than a moronic boring click here, set this value, do this, do that in this order with no explanation of <b>[censored]</b> we're doing or why - this is NOT learning it's mimicking.

I agree, for the ones that I viewed to see if they could help any of my clients. The tutorials that are based on clicking on Favorites make the 'student' nothing more than a monkey IMHO...

Cheers,
Karl

[Anonymous]

I was wondering if anyone has come across any online tutorials that may help me get started on this programme! i'm was taught Vectoworks in my first year at university however when working in a practice over the summer no one seemed to of hear of it! i thought the change would be beneficial however i could really use with the help to learn the basics if anyone can provide it?

Thanks

[Laszlo Nagy]

Chek this post I just wrote:

http://archicad-talk.graphisoft.com/viewtopic.php?p=199671#199671

[Katalin Takacs]

I would complete the list of recommended learning materials with the followings:
- Tutorials: http://www.learnvirtual.com/ArchiCAD by Tom Simmons
- Books: on Amazon you can find more ArchiCAD related books, e.g. "Discover Smart BIM: An Interactive Guide to ArchiCAD" by Ken Good
- Help: find detailed descriptions about all options and settings in ArchiCAD - http://www.graphisoft.com/products/archicad/ac15/OnlineHelp/
- In general: if you need help to get much information about the local learning possibilities, please contact your distributor - http://www.graphisoft.com/support/

[Anonymous]

I agree. Even worse, as a Grad student studying Instructional Systems Technology (a MS in which we teach people how to use programs, learn software, and basically instruct using best practices) I submitted my renewal 2 weeks ago and have not heard a word after submitting my student ID, filling out the forms, etc.

They point you to a learning site, which, of course, costs more money (i.e. Tom Simmons).

Monkey see monkey do is all I have found. How about a lesson with a blank slate, instruct the tool bars, then how to begin a project, with interactive problem solving Q/A in the Help area?

This will never become used in the United States unless they have a better response to students, who will then lead the charge in bringing this to the forefront of instructors, such as myself, and champion the cause of why this product is better than AutoCAD, VectorWork, both of which have much better customer support.

If my trial ends on the 21st as slated, so long ArchiCAD, it will never see the light of day at Indiana University where I attend. skaiser_633@hotmail.com