sloArch

Month: December 2009

  • The Studio 1: An Introduction

    The Studio 1: An Introduction

    Merry Christmas!  Our present to you this year is a shiny new podcast dedicated to Cal Poly Architecture students and alumni.

    Tim Alatorre, LEED AP  joins with Haley Gipe, Assoc. AIA, LEED AP to kick off the first episode of what is destined to be the most talked about weekly netcast in building 5.

    In this episode:

    • We introduce ourselves and why we are doing the show.
    • The goal is to talk Architecture with our friends in a more in depth manner than just poking each other on Facebook.
    • Haley discusses how she got involved with the AIA and discusses how she ended up on page 122 of the 2009 December issue of the Architectural Record. She and Tegan Andres are the new face of the AIA!  http://www.aia.org/practicing/AIAB081406
    • The emerging Architect is looking for ways to stand out and move the profession forward.
    • Technology allows us to connect and gain more experience than prior generations.
    • There are firm leaders that don’t even use computers.
    • Things are advancing at a rapid pace and the emerging professions are going to have to deal with an ever changing profession.
    • We talk about the benefits of technology versus the “old” way of doing things.
    • Cal Poly architecture program ranked third best undergraduate program in the nation by Design Intelligence (http://www.di.net/archschools/schools.html). We’re the best in California!
    • We discuss how there isn’t a venue for Cal Poly Architecture alum to connect, and discuss the Connections magazine where we learn that Tim is really bad at pronouncing names.
    • Haley is mentioned in the CalPoly Architecture student news (http://www.arch.calpoly.edu/news-events/student-news.html) for her IDP changes report (http://www.arch.calpoly.edu/news-events/documents/news-0910-documents/idp-letter-2009.pdf). Did she really graduate in 2007?
    • What does Haley do to survive job cuts?
    • Haley talks about starting an IDP program in her firm.
    • School and hospital work has been more stable this year, but it comes down to luck.
    • CalPoly grads will save the economy!
    • Contact us with your stories about the workplace. Why are you still working? Let us know what you think.
    • Exciting mystery guest next week!

  • End and Beginning: Thank You

    With 2009 and this decade at an end I want to say thank you to all my readers, commenters, and supporters.   When I launched this site on May 4th I had no idea of the global audience that I would stumble upon nor the learning experience that writing here would become.

    2010 is going to see some big changes to the site.  Between today and the end of the year this transition will start to take shape.

    Be sure to check back on January 1st to see the beginning of what I hope will be an exciting new chapter in sloArch’s contribution to the Architecture community.  Starting with the new year the site will take on a new role and start to serve a more focused purpose.

    Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and may God bless all our efforts as we work together to make the new decade one that we will be proud of.

  • Revit Families 102 – Revit Experts don’t Use Locks

    In May I published my picks for Best Revit Blogs on the Web.  Coming in at number 2 was The Revit Kid and Jeff’s Lock Noob Classic Thong.  I still try to read everything Jeff writes but I thought I might stir up a little controversy and make the argument that, contrary to what the thong says, a Revit expert is one who doesn’t use locks.

    I think that Jeff has it backwards.  In my experience the newcomer to Revit wants to lock everything.  I think the initial instinct is to not trust Revit and just lock things down.  Later when this user tries to change something they get a string of messages telling them constraints aren’t met and they end up getting frustrated and removing all the locks anyway.

    therevitkid-locknoobthong

    I’m sure Jeff would argue that the Revit Expert knows how to use locks properly.  I would agree that as you experiment with Revit you learn when to lock and when not to lock.  With Revit family creation that time is only as a last resort.

    So what to do instead of locking?

    1. Reference lines and planes:  Hosting and aligning geometry to reference lines and planes automatically creates a strong connection between them.  The link isn’t quite as strong as a lock, under some conditions it will detach.  But for most purposes it works just fine.  Align geometry to a reference plane and flex your model.  You’ll be surprised how often this works.  Carl Gibson has a great overview of the types of Reference lines.
    2. Parameters:  Instead of locking a dimension to a fixed dimension assign a parameter to it.  Using parameters gives you flexibility to easily change things later, and more importantly it lets the user of the family know what’s going on inside it without having to edit the family.  For example, create a a parameter called Table Thickness and give it the formula 0′ 2″.  This tells the user that the Table is 2″ thick and locks it from changing.  Note that locking a parameter with a formula locks it across all types in the family.

    Locking does have it’s place, but I always try to make a family work without locks first.

  • Revit Families 401 – Data Validation

    As I mentioned in a follow up comment to Revit Families 103 – Formula Basics, Revit still doesn’t allow you to do data validation on values or formulas in families or on table data.

    Still, you can build some functionality into your families to ensure that a value never exceeds a specified range or create warnings for the user of your family.

    Lets start with a simple example.  In the plan view below I am showing a basic table.

    Screen1

    Lets say in this example that we never want the table’s width to be greater than 1/2 the depth.  We have a few choices.

    1. Don’t do anything
    2. Display an error message for the user
    3. Default to another value

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  • Building Code Nonsense: Accessible Showers

    For those not familiar with it, the California Title 24 Building Standards Code consistes of 10 fairly hefty binders containing over 4,614 pages of small text.

    2007_CBCThe entire set costs a little over $1,000 and Architects are expected to know or at least be aware of all of it.   Not surprisingly, a lot of our time is spent scouring over the code trying to make sence of it all.

    Yesterday a coworker of mine and I stumbled across this little gem of the building code when designing the threshold into an accessible shower stall for an apartment building.

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