Happy Holidays!

I wish you all a wonderful Christmas! Almost a year has passed since I started writing and it's been great fun to connect with so many other users. I'll do my best to keep this blog interesting, informative and entertaining in the years to come. May the upcoming New Year be a great one for you and close family and friends. Let's keep our fingers crossed for a great new release of Revit!

PS: My apologies to those that have tried to get in touch using the "Email the Author" link, which is currently not working properly. Please use the email address in my profile or post a comment.

Filtering application - now works on 64 bit!

Back in September, I wrote a post about a third party filter tool for Revit, called FilterTool 2009 by Jochen and Shenqiang from Toolbox4Revit.com. As a few of you found out, this version did not work on 64 bit XP or Vista. Well finally, the new version is out and they have added some great enhancements!

Remember two of my suggestions about grouping and distinguishing between model and detail lines of different styles? Guess what...that functionality is now in! This is a great little addition that I'm sure lots of you will find very useful. I know we needed to filter by line style and type several times in the past. And now that we can build selection filters, this tool will get used very often. Give it a try! I think it's great value for the money.

Seuss Railings

One very interesting session I attended this year at AU was Inside the Factory: How Revit is designed. We were exposed to the rigorous approach that the team takes when assessing all the feedback they get from various sources and how they "storyboard" potential tools and prepare mockups. It helps to know what the tool should be capable of achieving so you don't push yourself into a corner.

One particular example that was used during this session was the infamous Edit Baluster Placement dialog box.

Attendees made lots of points about what could be improved, but I believe the governing question of all in this case should be"Why a dialog?". Dialogs are great at organizing a set of rules, but how will I model and document the following railing? I rest my case :)

AU - Day 5

Well it's a little bit late, but here's an account of the last day...

Woke up and got ready to head to Palazzo E-G for the morning session. 422 were signed up, but only 254 were scanned. It seemed like more were actually present, but I doubt THAT many slipped through the cracks. Having an intensive session on the last day of AU is not easy and in fact, many commented on that. Sorry, speakers don't create the schedule! I received a hint that things would not go as smoothly as Thursday once the laptop was plugged in and the projectors were not recognized. After some fiddling, they were recognized and we were on our way to start. My sincere apologies to all those that could not see the screen properly due to the resolution being too high. That's a lesson learned for the future and I'll always check from now on. I was under the impression that projectors had lower resolutions, but it wasn't the case this time. To make matters worse, one was a bit out of focus and the other was flickering (noticed it the previous day during Paul's class). This, coupled with lack of sleep, made things worse for some.

"Murphy" came in and visited (meaning, Revit stopped responding due to display issues related to the new Dell hardware). So once again, I apologize for not being able to do a live demo of one particular example. Rest assured that the hardware was MORE than capable of running that little example, but it just wasn't meant to be today. The Thursday session was recorded when Murphy wasn't around, so hopefully you'll get to watch it again ;) Thanks to all of you for your comments. Speakers learn a lot from them and I hope to be able to address some of your concerns in the future. As of today, 46.67% responded for Thursday's session (96.94% speaker recommendation) and 41.73% responded for Friday's session (96.23% speaker recommendation). I'm humbled and really thank you for your support. Presenting to large groups isn't easy, especially with so many Experts on the floor! The new online evaluation system ran better than expected (higher turnout), so thumbs up Joseph W! The overall session average was 9.32 and 9.01 respectively.

Afterwards I hung out for a while in the AEC Lounge in the company of Steven Campbell, Harlan Brumm and Kelly Cone before checking out and meeting up with my work colleagues for a relaxed lunch in the Piazza (again!). I bumped against Steve Stafford on my way out and that was the last I saw of him.

After lunch we roamed around to the new Palazzo and finally walked out of the hotel for the first time. The weather was gorgeous and we took some pictures, joked around, talked about the experiences and what we learned, and then headed to the airport for an on-time flight home to Houston Hobby. It has been a memorable AU and I'm already looking forward to next year.

AU - Day 4

Today was a special day for me and marked the first time I was a main presenter in a session. The class was at 10 am, so by 9:15am I was at the lounge waiting for Steve. He anxiously called me around 8:45am when he didn't see me around! I prepared a lot for this class and Steven really helped shake off the early jitters and kept me on track really well, driving the PC and switching between Revit examples and the Powerpoint Presentation. The class size was 200 and in quite a compact room. So far from the feedback that people left, it seems to have been well received and I appreciate all your kind comments and support! You have been a great audience too and made my first experience very enjoyable. Thanks to all of you too for introducing yourself.

We went to enjoy a good lunch at a Wolfgang Puck restaurant in the piazza once again and chatted over the good old days of pre-Autodesk Revit, how it all started and how difficult Steve's job is to manage the Revit content across all platforms. Soon after lunch we attended Paul Aubin's mega-class on detailing in Revit. Then my stomach sank to my feet when Steve pointed out that we would be presenting there tomorrow morning! There are 423 signed up right now. Obviously the last day I won't bank on all of them being there ;) I'll make sure to snap a picture tomorrow.

Afterwards I went to a CAD Manager's round table Unplugged session that was organized by Joseph Wurcher. It was great to see Autodesk trying hard to figure out ways through this discussion to give CAD Managers a platform to connect, communicate and share  experiences. I'm not sure we reached a clear goal as to how Autodesk can help, but the theme was clear: there's need for more networking outside of our everyday competitive environments to help implement technology and lead & empower people. Autodesk needs to also step up to the plate and help drill straight down to answers, especially when professionals of certain caliber are the ones asking the questions. They need to cut to the chase quickly, avoiding the usual "is the power turned on" kind of questions. Overall I wasn't sure I would fit in this session since my role isn't really "CAD Manager", a title which I despise. I would rather change it to something else that puts emphasis on how we help people use technology effectively, but I have not been able to sum it up yet.

Then I was off again to the mega-space (Palazzo E, F & G) where members of the Revit team gave a great interactive presentation about the process of Revit development. It is remarkably similar to how we program and design buildings. There is a very rigorous process of collecting data through various sources such as surveying users, wishlists, usability sessions, direct observation of users at work, etc. All this is then analyzed and condensed into a set of useable formats utilizing whatever medium that works. It could be as simple as colored cards. Priorities are set, functionality is outlined and visual mockups are created. It is quite similar to story-boarding for movie making. Then each part is turned over to coders to implement it and things are adjusted so a reasonable scope can be defined for a year's worth of development, keeping an eye and resources focused towards the future and long-term plans, and some resources applied to bug-fixes, etc. Then software is Alpha and Beta tested before finally being released, with hopefully little need for more fixes, although we all know that's difficult to achieve. Data and feedback from attendees was actually collected and great points were raised, such as why certain tools are turned off in Revit Architecture and turned on only in Revit Structure. In a future post, I plan on elaborating on this subject that I feel strongly about and I'm sure lots of you out there agree that it's a ridiculous marketing ploy.

Finally I went to the closing party, with great entertainment by Don McMillan. He is awesome and my jaws still hurt from all the laughter. If you're easily offended, this might not be for you! I wish I could get more of this kind of comedy. There were also two sessions of the Design Slam, where designers and power users produced their creations in 20 minutes while they worked to loud music at a very fast pace. They used a variety of Autodesk software tools such as Alias Studio and Maya. Amid great food, drink, gymnastics and other "weird" entertainment, AU celebrations came to an end with the announcement that AU2009 will be held at Mandalay Bay. And since I forgot my camera and don't feel like downloading bad pictures from my phone, I'll close here with no imagery for the day!

AU - Day 3

I opted to start the day a little slower and purposely missed the morning keynote. To my surprise and that of others, some snippets of future releases of Revit were shown, such as the Ribbon interface, and what looked like better freeform modeling tools. I didn't see them myself but the air was buzzing with excitement and people were texting each other. I know Aaron, you don't like the ribbon ;) Hopefully we will not have to wait too long before seeing these changes.

Later I decided to go to two Unplugged sessions instead of a scheduled class. These were really informative, great discussions led by Robert Manna of Burt Hill and Scott Brown of WATG. The discussions revolved mainly around management of large project teams, with the aim of documenting some best practices that are not found out there and are based on experience running such projects. I had to slip in late and out early for a lunch meeting (this year is turning out to be crazier than usual!).

We went for lunch at Mario Batali's restaurant in Piazza San Marco (too bad it wasn't the real one!). I had some pasta that was to die for, perfectly al dente, as BIM Managers/Coordinators from around our offices and our Director of Technology met and discussed some topics over a great lunch. Thanks Bob!

In the morning I met Kyle Bernhardt of Inside the System (in his new role as Product Manager for AEC Sustainable Design) and he kindly invited me to join a focus group discussion on the subject. I have to confess that I have only just scratched the surface so far in the use of sustainable applications (such as the VM-Ware Revit Architecture plugin), but intend to push myself and others to learn and use more products in our practice, such as Ecotect. So I attended this session after lunch and we started slightly later because of a scheduling misunderstanding. I'm actually more surprised that things like this don't happen more often!

Once again I slipped out early. I hate doing that but I had something else scheduled that I needed to attend. I arrived slightly late but we actually started 10 minutes after I got there. Yep, I could have stayed a little longer at the previous event! Oh well. Here I saw some strategies and direction of future products and we'll leave it at that.

I attended part of a class where one of my colleagues, Nate Renfro, and his buddies of the Revit DC User Group presented a class on Real World Problems and Real World Solutions. It was a class filled with great tips.

I ran into several AUGI friends at the lounge, like Mike Gatzke and the "Rock'n'Roll Architect". Later I went to the AUGI meeting, collected the Beer Mug and off I went to the AUGI Beer Bust, and drank a diet coke (loser!).

I visited a couple of booths and then decided to go to the Pecha-Kutcha, It was the first time I attended (decided to do this in lieu of the Design Slam. I'll attend the finals tomorrow). It was great and later shook hands with Laura Handler of BIMx, who turns out to be quite the clown (I mean that in a nice way) as she gave a very entertaining presentation. And oh, I had my first and only beer.

After a trip to the exhibit floor for the last time, I met up with my work colleagues (sorry Mr. Balding; couldn't find ya!) and we went to an Avatech party at Tao. We had some munchies, plenty of eye candy and I grabbed a water (I'm an alcoholic). I did run across Steve, who introduced me to several other people, including Hiroshi Jacobs, who is one of the founders of Revit City.

On my way back to my room, I ran into Ed Goldberg and we had a quick chat. What else could I want from my day? I can finally get some rest!

AU - Day 2

Day 2 marked the official start to AU2008 with the traditional keynote presentation. Needless to say, there was a lot less fanfare than last year. Gone was the mega circular screen, which was featured in a video recording as part of the presentation, and you could tell there were less attendees from last year. Perhaps signs of the economic downturn? One thing is for sure though: the revolution in our workflows which has picked up incredible speed and grabbed headlines all over the place over the last few years, is here to stay. I guess now is the time to painstakingly implement all this vision and dreams about moving data seamlessly between applications, consolidating existing tools and interfaces into more efficient ones. Innovation will be seen in a more toned-down fashion as work is done to solve all these issues and the marketing department is involved less in painting our future and moves on to other ventures. We get it, we're on board, now let's get it done!

I had a very interesting discussion with Jeff Hanson of Autodesk in the AEC Lounge regarding documentation, Revit in particular. The online Help that comes with Revit has been steadily getting better recently and we have also seen an increase in other forms of documentation such as subscription White Papers that are useful to BIM Managers and users, together with a slew of tutorials and guides, such as the very detailed Families Guide. I have no doubt that this trend will continue and that's great news to all. It is incredibly difficult to create such documentation due to "localization", where each piece of documentation that is released has to be translated and made relevant in other languages (I believe around 39 languages). I'm sure you can appreciate that it's not cheap or easy to achieve that task and we'll obviously continue to expect and push for more.

I met with Steven Campbell, my moral support and coach during our presentation on Thursday and Friday, and we went over the class material briefly, trying to time each section so we don't run past our period or cut it too short. I'll have to spend some time today rehearsing in my head too. You can never do enough and it'll be hard to go to bed early!

Here's how you feed hungry masses of highly intelligent design professionals, change agents and experts:

A class I attended, Successful Change Management, had some interesting information about the dynamics and psychology of change. Those of us that embrace change and know that it is the only constant in life have it easier than others, and by knowing some key things about how to approach the subject can only serve to help you and your organization while implementing new technology. It was surely worth my time to be there.

I was really excited to be part of a an "expert panel review" of some upcoming Revit features. I can't say anything about it though, bummer. I'll stay as neutral and cold as a block of ice. You'll have to wait. I know it's painful, but I had to do that myself in the past as no one would tell me anything. Please be patient. I'm kinda enjoying this unemotional portrayal of emotion...what a contradiction. If you cross me in a hallway, don't ask me about it, I'm not cracking down.

The day ended with the opening of the convention floor. Once again, it felt like there was less "uhhh ahhh" technology compared to last year. I visited around with some friends and colleagues and am still trying to meet a bunch of people from previous years and AUGI forum members. I'm looking forward to some of the Unplugged sessions and the Design Slam.

AU - Day 1

What a day it has been!

The Design Computation symposium was very interesting and engaging, and featured several presentations that showed how some of the best minds around are putting technology to work for them and their clients. One can easily say that at this point, these techniques and tools are not as accessible to the every-day designer, but it won't be too far into the future until versions of similar tools might become available to us common folks!

The presentation ended with a keynote speech by Carl Bass, CEO of Autodesk. I was personally quite impressed to notice the passionate "geek" in him as he explained where Autodesk is headed in trying to bring together their portfolio of tools into some "homogenized" form (my word) in order to make them more familiar to users as they transition from one tool to the next while working on various parts and phases of their projects. You could really tell that this person understands, knows and loves this business and it was refreshing to see a CEO that was so "in touch" with their products. It felt very genuine to me and not some marketing-department-crafted speech.

The highlight of the speech was a discourse about the move from the current toolset-centric approach to a data-centric approach. Today we have a lot of great computation tools, either commercially available or built-to-suit for specific projects, that we can use to analyze various aspects of the building such as energy usage, solar shading, structural stability, program/brief requirements (adjacencies), etc., but also other tools that enable us to realize the built form and rationalize complex geometries, such as through digital fabrication and scripting. At the moment, we're forced to use specialized individual (unrelated?) models to obtain results, but if the promise of BIM is to be fulfilled, we need to move to a data-centric approach where data fidelity and exchange is paramount. As the project moves back and forth between different tools while it is being refined and optimized based on their feedback, we cannot afford to lose/corrupt any of the embedded data.

The day ended with the BIM Mixer, which traditionally was the "Revit Mixer". It was a great gathering with a maximum capacity of 1,200 people. There were obviously hundreds of Reviteers from all over the globe amongst other software users. I was glad to meet up with some new faces and some old ones (not quite literally), fellow bloggers and tons of AUGI Forum members. I was hopping around all over the place and I hope my co-workers didn't feel like I was deserting them! I did miss meeting quite a few people, but I'm sure we'll be able to catch up before the end of the week. I had the pleasure of meeting several Autodesk employees, especially ones that are involved (shall we say, key?) in Revit development. And these poor people have to put up with us users, always wanting more and never happy with what we've got ;)

Tomorrow promises to be another jam-packed day. I have too many notes and thoughts that I would like to report on from today's Symposium, so I'll leave that to another future post where I can better do it justice.

Design Computation Symposium - Registered

We're registered and waiting for the symposium to start while chatting (yes, geeky subjects of course!) and having some breakfast. Here's the gang:

This promises to be an interesting day. We shall see.

It's Vegas time!

Yep, 2 hours behind Texas time! I need to make sure to remember that, so I don't go to bed late and be destroyed by week's end.

The flight was great and saw a nice spectacle of nature...topography, mountains, canyons. Too bad my camera was stowed away in the overhead bin. The setting sun sure makes it look even better. I'm now in the Venetian, testing my Internet connection to make sure I can blog easily. This year I plan on posting frequently throughout AU. We'll see how long I can keep this up ;)

Ok, now I'm off to register, see who I manage to run into and grab some food. Tomorrow we're attending the Design Computation symposium, which looked extremely interesting from the description and is the main reason why most from our firm are here on Sunday night (really, scratch those bad thoughts!). Hope this AU turns out to be better than previous years!