Updating your template

[Anonymous]

I have a .pln template that I created, with all my layer combos and layer settings, line favorites, leader favorites, etc, and on and on. As I work on projects I find that I am constantly adding to and improving my template. once I finish a project and move on to a new one I take that last project file with all of the most recent updated information and remove all view sets and storys etc and then resave as my latest template. Every job I always seem to improve, update and resave as my "template" a .pln.

My question is, is their an easier way to do this? What are other users work flows like in relation to your own project "template" ?

Thanks,
Jim

[Anonymous]

I have an email address set up as "cad_template@mydomain.com".

Whenever anyone is working and senses a slight feeling of...impatience, disappointment, or whatever you want to call the emotion that says "If only I were using a computer to do this, this part part of the job would be automatic," they send a quick email to the CAD_TEMPLATE expressing their wish for a tweak to the template.

A dedicated CAD template guru (usually me after hours) reviews the requests and integrates the good ones into the template. This avoids the hateful activity of cleaning up a project file to be later used as a template. That task should not be done more than once.

The above method works only after you have achieved useability from your template. Its not really a smart way to generate a template from a blank slate.

[Link]

I recommend having a separate & concurrent template file.

You'll be surprised how many attributes sneak in ( and sometimes out) using the method you are now. The concurrent file can be a pln in AC9, but you'll want it to be a tpl in AC10.

Whenever you make a change in your existing file, simply open up another version of AC and make the change in the template. Favorites should really be stored in a separate prf file from the Favorites palette. This way they can be loaded in any project. You can do the same with attributes, schedule settings, translators, profiles, schemes, etc.

As always I recommend making your template file part of a template folder structure, so that in your OS you simply copy the entire job folder, rename the appropriate folder/files and you are good to go. It's clean, consistent, predictable and easy to use.

Cheers,
Link.

[Anonymous]

Link is right...you should maintain your template separately so you can have more control over it. You can use the attribute manager, modules, copy/paste, etc. to move good stuff from active projects into your template file as things develop.

[Anonymous]

Thanks guys for the responses. Helps alot.

Jim

[Anonymous]

How do you save changes to a tpl file? Choosing "Save" or "Save As" creates a copy of the file, which is the whole idea. Any quick ways to update a template file?

Thanks for any clues.

[Anonymous]

Doug,
I am on a PC (and still using AC9), but all may be the same. After Selecting Save As..(or Save if this is a Template file that is untiltled and not saved yet) use the "Save as type" drop-down to and select tpl.

[Anonymous]

Doug,
I am on a PC (and still using AC9), but all may be the same. After Selecting Save As....(or Save if this is a Template file that is untiltled and not saved yet) use the "Save as type" drop-down to and select tpl.

[Anonymous]

Doug,
You open your .tpl, make the changes you want then Save not Save as.
When you want to open an instance of it as a new untitled document
When the start Archicad screen appears select Create a new project'
use template, and select the template you want from the list.
If AC is already launched go to File-> new->select template.
These two ways do not open the .tpl itself but an instance of it.
Peter Devlin