Using The Project Mark-Up Feature of ArchiCAD with Project Reviewer

Written by: Balázs Biacs

The Concept

Good communication is vital during the Design Phase - with contractors as with consultants. The Project Mark-Up Tool and Project Reviewer were designed to ease the communication during the design phase.

[Note: Mark-Ups are also referred to as Redlines]

How the Project Mark-Up Tool and the Project Reviewer work is explained well in the Reference Guide [vol. 2., p. 45-53.].
What we'd like to show here through an example is how we think this tool can be used in a project's design phase.

Suppose you're an architect who's designing the interior of a college room for a University. You've made your first draft and want to share it with your consultant from the College, who doesn't have ArchiCAD but wants to review how the design is evolving.

First of all you have to decide which way to go with publishing with Reviewer:

if you have an FTP site for Publishing, and your consultant/counterpart can access it, choose the
"Internet Method";
if you do not have an FTP site then you can choose to use the more traditional
"Local Method."

Using the Mark-Up Tool with an accessible FTP site - the "Internet Method"

In case you have an FTP site that your clients/consultants can access as well, follow these simple steps:

first Open the Project Publisher dialog from the File Menu and create a new set in the Sets... subdialog. Name it i.e. CollegeRoom, and add the QuickViews you want to share.
Then set up the FTP Connection after choosing Upload to internet as the Publishing Method in the Publishing Sets subdialog.
You'll need the following information in order to use it with your consultant:
Note: the settings displayed in this figure are imaginary.
Your clients/counterparts either use the same login name and password as you, or they need an own account [this can be anonymous, too] for logging in to the FTP site with the following rights to the publishing folder:
the user must be able to save [upload] new files and be able to overwrite [modify] the files that are already there.
Hint:
Use Test Login to have it check for you if you have all necessary rights and permissions on the specified server for publishing. The result should look like this:

If the specified user doesn't have some rights that would be needed an error message will be displayed.
In this case please contact the person who's in charge of the FTP site's maintenance.
Hint:
After entering all information needed for logging on, use the "Browse..." button to choose which folder to publish to. You should also create a new folder for your publishing set [if you have permissions to do so] to keep it tidy.
Hint:
You might try the same with the login name of your counterpart to make sure it will work for him.
When publishing, be sure to check the option "Include Project Reviewer Environment" each time you upload information to the FTP site, even if it is the same Publishing Set. This way your counterpart has but to hit Refresh in his browser to see your newly added Publishing items in the list.
Note: The Reviewer Environment is NOT uploaded nor saved each time anew; instead it checks if everything is already there and only gets loaded up / saved if it isn't there. So there's no unnecessary saving / uploading of MBs with Publisher.
Now everything is set up. Publish your concept of the college room interior to the FTP site. You can also choose to send an email to your contact that you've uploaded your plans to this site. The email can include the files, too, and/or the inforamtion that's needed for reviewing it [Project Name, Set Name, URL, Set Structure].
Hint:
You can also import your Contacts as Tab-delimited text files into Publisher, so you don't have to enter every contact's data by hand.
Your counterpart can then review your design and add his comments in Reviewer [Reference Guide vol.2., p. 45-47.]. For adding comments, he has to click on the red pencil to the right: a variety of really intuitive tools is shown like arrow, circle, text, label. He can use them for adding your comments, like in the example below:

Hint:
Mark-Up entries can be moved while working in Reviewer with the help of the Selection Tool [blue arrow, second button from the left], the selected items can be deleted with the red X [first button from the left].
So now he has added his comments with the Reviewer:
- He can either send them to you attached to an email:
  - either with using Reviewer to send the e-mail
    [he'll need to know his mail server's name and port to do so - his network administrator can help if needed]
  - or by saving the selected DWF file from Reviewer to his HD and attaching it to a plain email.
- or upload them back to the FTP site. In this case the original DWF file will remain intact, but a new folder will be created in the list with a new file in it on the server that has his Mark-Ups in it. In our example the new file will be named "Furnished Room - Redline 1.dwf".
Now you have to merge the Mark-Up information back into your project:
in order to merge his Mark-Up Data back into your project you have to first save the DWF file to your hard disk.
Hint:
If you have separate folders for each project, create a new folder in the project's folder for the Mark-Up information, and save the Mark-Up DWFs there.
You can either save them from your FTP site by right-clicking on the appropriate DWF file in Reviewer and choosing Save from the Context Menu, or if you received the DWF in an email, save the email attachment into the Mark-Up folder.
To see his comments in ArchiCAD, you have to import this DWF file.
Important:
You have to import these DWFs, but be careful where you import them. Choose the appropriate QuickView in ArchiCAD first: then go to the File Menu/Project Mark-Up and Open DWF Redline File..., choose the appropriate DWF and click on OK.
Note: If you by any chance merged the Redline DWF to the wrong project window, simply use the Undo function to get back to the previous state of the project.
After importing, the Mark-Up entries of the user will appear in the Mark-Up Palette. You can now go through them one by one. In our example, you disagree with him in the matter of another computer desk in the middle of the room. As you think it's OK this way, - each student should supply his own desk if he wants -, you want to share this with him.
Select his Mark-Up entry in the list, and as your opinion is that this Mark-Up should be closed, change its style from Revision to Closed. In the default Setup this entry will become green.
Hint: If you want to add comments to this entry that your counterpart can see, switch to Mark-Up mode [push the red pencil button in the upper left corner of the Mark-Up Palette] then you can add your comments.

Hint:
If you add your comments, prefix each line with your initials, so that you'll know who's added what.
Hint:
You can change the appearance of the pre-defined styles and create your own with the Edit... button in the Mark-Up palette.
Then choose the other entry of his which questions the basin in the corner. As you agree with this remark, select it in the list and change its style to approved. In the default Setup this entry will be shown in cyan.
(Don't forget to replace the corner basin with another one :o)
After having finished the Review of his Mark-Ups, publish the CollegeRoom Set once more.
Your counterpart will receive the email [if you chose to send him one] and can take a look at your design again. He can start Reviewing the original DWF again, adding his comments sending them back to you and so on until the design is approved by all parts.
All his uploaded Redline DWFs will be saved into the Redlines folder on the FTP site, with a number as a suffix.
Note that once you re-publish your project, Reviewer will not be able to detect the old Mark-Ups and change them - your counterpart can only add new Mark-Up entries in Reviewer, and can not change the old ones.
Say the consultant approved your ideas and added his pipes and OKs to the DWF file. When he uploads his new Mark-Ups, a new DWF file will be created in the Redlines folder on the server with an increased number as a suffix, i.e. "Furnished Room - Redline 2.dwf".
Once you re-import this second DWF in ArchiCAD, you'll get new entries created, while the old entries will still be around.
Hint:
If both you and your counterpart agree to close / approve a Mark-Up entry, then delete it with the help of the Mark-Up palette in ArchiCAD, so that no unnecessary information will scatter your plan.

Note: Of course you can set up own rules to your liking for handling the flow of Mark-Up information in your office.

Using plain email for sending Mark-Up data to your counterparts

This Working Method is meant for users who are not too familiar with FTP and maybe don't know the name of their SMTP server either.

For this you need to publish to a local folder, so first create a new folder to publish to. Publish there with the Include Project Reviewer option checked [Do check this option each time you want to publish!]. Choose to create a real folder structure.

In our example We created a Copy of our previous Set called "Copy of CollegeRoom".
Once ready with the publishing, use compression software [like StuffIt or WinZIP] to compress this folder, and send the compressed file as an attachment of an e-mail to your counterpart.
He can then decompress it on his machine and simply double click on the file [PublishedSetName].html, in our case the file Copy of CollegeRoom.html. This is the only file in the unpacked folder so it's easy to locate it. Double clicking on it will open up the Reviewer Environment for your consultant. (Choose to Trust Graphisoft R&D if your browser is asking for it, of course :o)
Your counterpart can then proceed with the Redlining. Once done, he has to Save the DWF. Click on the Save button in Reviewer and locate the original folder manually, create a folder for the Mark-Ups "Redlines", then save the file.
Hint:
Have your consultant append a suffix to each saved DWF's filename with a number [or his initials and the date], so that it will be easier to track changes in the design.
All he has to do now is to attach the modified DWF files to an email and send them to you.
When you open the DWFs containing the Mark-Up information in ArchiCAD, make sure to choose the appropriate QuickView before importing the Redline file.
Note: choosing the appropriate QuickView before import is not obligatory, it is enough if the same project window is opened before importing the appropriate Redline DWF. Using QuickViews only makes the whole process easier.
Handling of the entries is otherwise similar as described in the "Internet Method" part of this document.

Page last updated: Thursday, June 10, 2004