Transferring ownership of architecture model

[grudy]

On our current project, we will be transferring ownership of our architecture model from the design architect to the architect of record's office. Unfortunately, I think that this may cause us to lose a lot of information in our plans. I can see problems arising with room tags, areas, and dimensions. I imagine that this will create a lot of unnecessary work for our office in redrawing these items in all of our floor plans and details...

What is your advice on this major shift? I think that it is is not as simple as just handing over our floor plans, because we will still want to work on the 2d aspects of these plans after the change. This is not to mention all of our details, which will likely be affected as well. It would be simple enough to transfer ownership if things like tags and dimensions did not automatically delete when they lose their hosts...

[wmullett]

deleted - wrong post

[cliff collins]

???

I think wmullet replied to the wrong thread?

cheers

[tcatana]

You have encountered what I refer to as the 21st Century Copyright vs 20th Century Copyright Laws. Even the 1998 update does not cover what to do with shared property rights of models.

Your legal department should craft language in your contracts to allow limited use of your property, or you will be giving it away to them, and technically not allowed to use it yourself.

[grudy]

I don't see what this has to do with copyright laws. You mean that Autodesk is limiting the flexibility of its software to prevent people from infringing on copyrights???

All I am talking about is trying to work efficiently and fluidly with another office. Losing work because someone else needs the 3d aspects of your model is a serious issue.

[tcatana]

Misunderstood your question. When you talked about transferring ownership, I thought you were referring to ownership issues, not lost productivity.

[cliff collins]

Grudy,

If I understand the question correctly, it sounds like you need a better workflow
when sharing your model with another architect?

If so, you might take a look at a WAN/WAN accellerator system like Riverbed Steelhead,
or a software solution like Globalscape WAFS.

These make sharing the model over an internet connection possible.

If you decide not to go with either of these, a good old FTP posting once a week or more
can still work--albeit not the most elegant solution.

cheers

[iru69]

I don't see what this has to do with copyright laws. You mean that Autodesk is limiting the flexibility of its software to prevent people from infringing on copyrights???
The language of "transferring ownership of the architectural model" is going to lead most people to think your inquiring about the legalities and liabilities of transferring ownership of your CAD files.


All I am talking about is trying to work efficiently and fluidly with another office. Losing work because someone else needs the 3d aspects of your model is a serious issue.
It's still not clear what you're seeking advice on. Are you seeking advice on best practices for exporting your revit project out to AutoCAD?

[grudy]

I see. Terminology... :) Let me describe our situation.

The architect of record would like to take the 3d elements of our model and begin to flush them out a bit more. This means giving them our model as is and allowing them to take control of these elements. We would delete 3d elements from our model. The problem comes in that both of our offices are producing parts of the CD set. To get around this, we would create views in our office from views of the (now) linked architectural model. HOWEVER, this does not resolve the issue of views that we would like to continue to work on, but which contain tags and dimensions that are dependent on 3d elements. Additionally, to keep our old floor plans, sections, etc,. we would have to spend weeks re-doing our visibility/graphics work for each view based on the linked model, which includes determining which worksets should be visible in each view. I don't think Revit even allows users to control on a view-by-view basis which worksets of a linked model are visible.

This is a complicated issue, but perhaps I have explained it a bit better.

[twiceroadsfool]

As brutal as this will sound...

Its completely doable in Revit, but i cant see why you would bother. The workflow sounds a little scary and strange, to me.

You CAN do everything youre tlaking about with Linked files, with the exception of Room tags... But it sounds to me like your best option is Colocation, and/or remote desktop to work in one model together.

Secondly, worksets arent (imho) a great visibility tool, although you now CAN control visibility of worksets of links. I dont believe they should ever be used for it. It wasnt their intention, and there are better tools for the job.

[grudy]

You CAN do everything youre tlaking about with Linked files, with the exception of Room tags... But it sounds to me like your best option is Colocation, and/or remote desktop to work in one model together.


I assume by colocation you mean keeping the elements in multiple files, using copy/monitor? This is actually what we were thinking of doing as an alternative, since all the other architect's office needs is the interior walls. We were thinking of allowing them to copy/monitor our walls. This way we could avoid the craziness I've previously described.

[twiceroadsfool]

No, i was talking about either using remote desktop, or physical juxtaposition in an office somewhere, to actually work in the same model together. if all they need is your interior walls, why dont they just link in your model and call it a day?

EDIT: I keep reading different things: Theyre going to alter the detailing on the exterior, they need control over the elements, they only need the interior walls, etc. What is their role on the project, and what is yours, and how does that pertain to the documentation set?

[Scott Womack]

I assume by colocation you mean keeping the elements in multiple files, using copy/monitor? This is actually what we were thinking of doing as an alternative, since all the other architect's office needs is the interior walls. We were thinking of allowing them to copy/monitor our walls. This way we could avoid the craziness I've previously described.

This sounds like concern on a couple of possible issues.

1) Actual production work flow: Cliff Collins, and Aaron Maller provides the best input; Riverbed, or other Wan accelerator.

2) Concern over Intellectual property. This can be handled in part by executing an AIA E202 as an amendment to the contract between you and the CD architect. Not sure why you discussed "deleting" elements from the 3D Model? Unless they are extremely super-sophisticated families, it should not be necessay at all.

[sbrown]

You have a very difficult situation. We are in a similiar situation where we are the production architect and another firm is the design architect. I think you will need to work together on a solution that works for both of you. We basically decided that the design architect would work in 2d and we would export views for them to work on, then we would encorporate that info into our working model. Its very difficult to have 2 offices work on one model(don't blame autodesk for this, you would rarely if ever had 2 offices work on the same cad file either). So you need to identify which sheets you will produce any own that information, the rest is the production architects ownership.

I would'nt want the design architect working on my production model. So I think you need to divide and conquer.

Good luck. Please keep us posted on your solution.

[mthurnauer]

We encountered this issue very recently. In my opinion, you are best to try and make the hand off when there is a certain amount of stability to the design. It would seem that the architect of record will need to have full control of the model. If you need to move around walls after the exchange, it would be easiest to just send them a sketch of the needed changes and let them do it. This break in ownership will also force a bit of constraint on constant tinkering > get it set and move on to the next level of detail. How are you splitting up CD production? On my example, we did the majority of the cd's and the firm we were working with did casework details, elevations, interior details, etc. We could have let them just own those sheets, but ended up opting to have them provide us with the casework models and drop them into the main model at some point. This is all applicable only if you don't have the technology to share of course....

[ededios]

I also had a similar situation. During DD we needed an interior consultant to access our file, they needed to be in our file so working like an engineer where they would link our file to theirs wouldn't work. We used VPN to have them access our central file, I created a workset for them to work in. The process was, they would log in to our network, create a new local, make their workset active, and disconnect, they work in their file, at the end of the day they would reconnect and STC, it worked fine for us. If they stayed connected to our network it was very slow, because of VPN, we don't have Riverbed yet. For their sheet files, they created a new file, where they linked in a copy of the main model and did all their detailing there, like out other engineers.
Now that we're in CD's they are done with their design, and we will be completing the rest of the work.

[tcupp]

I had a similar scenario on a project exept the other way around. Our firm was the architect of record, the design team did continue to develop the model. My recommendation would be to use linked models as recommended and come to an agreement early on where the model is split, who has ownership of what parts of the model, and at what point in time each team transfers ownership of portions of the model. The key is to have a well defined gameplan of who is responsible for what.

[ruthellenwilliams]

I had a similar scenario on a project exept the other way around. Our firm was the architect of record, the design team did continue to develop the model. My recommendation would be to use linked models as recommended and come to an agreement early on where the model is split, who has ownership of what parts of the model, and at what point in time each team transfers ownership of portions of the model. The key is to have a well defined gameplan of who is responsible for what.


Yes, early planning, which is often so difficult to achieve, looks like it would have been the answer.

Once you tag and note and etc. the model, how can you then remove the model so that you can change it to a link without losing all of the tags and notes and etc.? If you start with the model as a separate file, link it in, and then add info, it would be easy to hand off development of the model. No?