BIND etc XREFS- EMAIL + ARCHIVE

[Anonymous]

Can someone please explain to me their method for ARCHIVING and/or EMAILING drawings to consultants? I get to the end of a drawing set and I'd like to send the PLOT SHEETS (including XREFS et. al.) to a consultant - but I know that these drawings are going to change. I'd also like to set up an archiving procedure for these drawings for when I get to the end of the project.

1. Is there a way to get all the PLOT SHEET information together in order to send via email and allow the XREFS to update? Or do I need to go through a "BIND" Xrefs or a "PAK N GO" Procedure each and every time I send out an updated drawing? 2. Should a BIND XREFS Procedure be executed before moving all the project information to a CDROM (or other archive method) and does this operation end any XREF utility - - and how is this BIND different from say "insert".
If possible please also reply to chertok22@hotmail.com

[stijn]

you could use pack and go from the express tools if you have them.
that works like a charm

[Anonymous]

When we send drawings to consultants for
coordination, we send the plot drawings, (one drawing file for each plot using
xrefs) we use e-transmit, remove the xref paths. When we send drawings to
consultants for their information and plotting, we bind the xrefs and then
e-transmit each plot drawing.

For archiving, we used to load the plot drawings,
saveas to a archive sub-directory and bind the xrefs. Now we simply use
e-transmit to remove the xref paths and create a zip file in a archive
sub-directory.

Dave Alexander

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<chertok22> wrote in message
href="news:f15af48.-1@WebX.maYIadrTaRb">news:f15af48.-1@WebX.maYIadrTaRb...

Can
someone please explain to me their method for ARCHIVING and/or EMAILING
drawings to consultants? I get to the end of a drawing set and I'd like to
send the PLOT SHEETS (including XREFS et. al.) to a consultant - but I know
that these drawings are going to change. I'd also like to set up an archiving
procedure for these drawings for when I get to the end of the project.

1. Is there a way to get all the PLOT SHEET information together in order
to send via email and allow the XREFS to update? Or do I need to go through a
"BIND" Xrefs or a "PAK N GO" Procedure each and every time I send out an
updated drawing? 2. Should a BIND XREFS Procedure be executed before moving
all the project information to a CDROM (or other archive method) and does this
operation end any XREF utility - - and how is this BIND different from say
"insert".
If possible please also reply to
chertok22@hotmail.com

[Anonymous]

Stijn,

I gather you open each drawing in Autocad and then use the Expresstools pack'n'go.

1. This takes all the files with this Plot Sheet and puts them into a folder that you have pre-named? Is this correct?

2. Then you do this for all the Plot sheets you wish to send, even though most of the information is duplicated in the previous information.

3. When it comes time to send these files I seem to have a load of XREFS and other information that sits separately in a folder and I have to chop it up into smaller folders in order to shoot it out under a 1024 KB limit.

4. Do you know how it is exactly that opening the plot sheet on the other end will allow the viewer to get all the information back into the plot sheet?

I seem to have a vendor that had some problems with how I sent the information.

5. Is there some .pdf type format (that would retain my plot settings!) and which would allow me to shoot them just the printable file? I used .plt, but there did not seem to be any ability for them to open a .plt on their end.

Thanks,

JDC

[Anonymous]

Dave,

etransmit sounds promising. Is it in 2000? And could you explain it specifically?

1. When you send to consultants for coordination you "remove the xref paths" - what does this do for you and how do you do it?

2. When you send to consultants for their information you "bind the xrefs" - does this preclude the xref from updating with future changes, and if so do you bind the xrefs and create a separately named - and separate file for that drawing?

3. For archiving I gather removing the xref paths is similar to binding the xrefs in that it causes the xrefs to be attached to the drawing without any ability to update a linked xref.

Finally, should I assume that there is no email equivalent to a .plt file (my understanding of .plt files is that they cannot be sent to another user unless you know what their printer driver is - and they would not be able to see the drawing anyway) which would act similar to a pdf file in the sense that I could see it, save it, print it, but not alter or edit it...

Thanks,

Jonathan

[Anonymous]

<etransmit sounds promising. Is it in 2000? And could you explain it
specifically?

E-transmit is a core AutoCAD command that came out of pak-n-go. I am not
sure when it was included in AutoCAD. We are at 2004 now and I have trouble
remembering the diffence between 2002 and 2000i never mind 2000. However, it
works the same way as Pak-N-Go except you have the option of "saving a folder
set of drawings", creating a "zip" file or creating a "exe" file (which is not
recomended as most government e-mail systems will not accept "exe" files). You
also have the option of converting all files included to 2000 dwg format for
e-transmit 2004 and R14 dwg format for e-transmit 2002. You can also create a
e-mail transmittal that can be sent.

<1. When you send to consultants for coordination you "remove the xref
paths" - what does this do for you and how do you do it?

This is part of e-transmit and the reason is we use
hard paths for our xrefs while the norm seems to be relative paths.

<2. When you send to consultants for
their information you "bind the xrefs" - does this preclude the xref from
updating with future changes, and if so do you bind the xrefs and create a
separately named - and separate file for that drawing?

Yes this turns the xref into a block. Some people don't use xrefs and
are confused by the concept. The other thing is that "for your
information" is for viewing and plotting only. They could easily
extract anything out of the drawing that they want easily as well. It is the
same file. We just saveas to a archive sub-directory to have a copy of what we
acturally sent them for our records.

<. For archiving I gather removing the xref paths is similar to binding
the xrefs in that it causes the xrefs to be attached to the drawing without any
ability to update a linked xref.

Yes, however, the Express Tools have a utility for convertng blocks back to
xrefs maintaing the scale and rotation. Archiving by defination is just a copy
of the drawing at a particular point in the drawings history that you may
want to reproduce again for some reason. Think of it as being similar to a file
copy of a letter.

<Finally, should I assume that there is no email equivalent to a .plt
file (my understanding of .plt files is that they cannot be sent to another user
unless you know what their printer driver is - and they would not be able to see
the drawing anyway) which would act similar to a pdf file in the sense that I
could see it, save it, print it, but not alter or edit it..

Plot files are not viewable in AutoCAD although I think that there are some
third party programs that will read and display them. I think that there
is or will be some plt to dwg conversions out there but don't know. I have
a hard enough time keeping up with AutoCAD to worry about the rest of the
"stuff" out there. If you want to give them something they can view and print
then probably pdf is the way to go.

Hope this helps.

Dave Alexander

[Anonymous]

Dave, your information is really helpful. It appears that etransmit is not a 2000 feature, but I can work around this. Also, you had a reference to "hard paths" versus "relative paths" and it seems you use hard paths, which is somewhat different from "conventional" use. I really leverage XREFS to the max (tried some 3D with it as well) and it would be great if you could just drop some knowledge on me about hard paths, relative paths etcetera and how you are using them vs another way of working. Thanks again - JC

[Anonymous]

Our use of hard paths for xrefs goes back to the old days where we
inserted floor plans as blocks in our mechanical drawings with the
(really old "sneaker net"). The current floor plan drawing was on a
floppy disk and everyone would copy it onto their station for use. Then
we got into networks and simply inserted the floor plan from the server.
With the advent of xrefs, we simply carried over the use of paths with
the xref.

The way we work, we have a facility sub-directory which contains all the
current mechanical design drawings, architectural xrefs, structural
xrefs and electrical xrefs. We then have "dated sub-directories where we
store the up-dated drawings we get from Architects, structural engineers
and electrical engineers. Then we have "project sub-directories" where
we have our plot drawings which xref the same floor plans as the design
drawings as well as xrefs of the mechanical drawings. The reason for the
"project sub-directories" is that we usually have more than one project
on the same facility (at different times though) and even though the
project may be a small one room renovation, we always use the complete
building as the base. In the old days of hand drafting, you would always
just draw enough of the building to show the new work which after a
number of years of renovations, resulted in umpteen different drawings
of the same building but different areas. When we first started with
Cad, Architects kept doing renovations this way but as we usually needed
to show all of a mechanical system that was being changed, we quickly
came to realize that we should be designing with the complete building
in the drawing even though we would only plot out smaller portions of
it. It also meant that we wouldn't have to search through a bunch of
different drawings to find what we want. I am still trying to convince
others that we should move all the project information (hard copy)on a
facility to one location so that we would only have to look in one place
for any previous information.

Anyway, now for the plot drawings, we create the first one, attach xrefs
with paths, do a saveas for the next plot drawing, change the plumbing
xref name to hvac xref name and change the path to the hvac xref
drawing. The plumbing xref name is "1APHNPDA" and the xref drawing is
2345A1PA.dwg while the hvac xref name is 1AVHNDDA and the xref drawing
is 2345A1VA.dwg. The xref manager allows you to edit an xref path
directly in the dialogue box where it shows the loaded path. We just
have to change the one letter "P" to a "V".

The other reason for xref paths is the ability of AutoCAD and computers
to create copies of drawings all over the place. We have always used
unique names in file names so that we would always be sure of the
correct file being used and the xref paths always assure us of the
correct drawing being xreffed.

Dave Alexander


chertok22 wrote:
>
> Dave, your information is really helpful. It appears that etransmit is
> not a 2000 feature, but I can work around this. Also, you had a
> reference to "hard paths" versus "relative paths" and it seems you use
> hard paths, which is somewhat different from "conventional" use. I
> really leverage XREFS to the max (tried some 3D with it as well) and
> it would be great if you could just drop some knowledge on me about
> hard paths, relative paths etcetera and how you are using them vs
> another way of working. Thanks again - JC