Keynoting or PSD w/ Schedule Table?

[Steve_Bennett]

I'm hoping someone can help me think out loud here. I am working on a project for ACA involved in Single Family Architecture. The floor plans and some elevations reference what they refer to as a keynote legend. The keynote legend lists things like Fireplaces, tubs, Sinks, medicine cabinets, etc. The actual objects which the keynotes call out are items consisting of a combination of ACA objects and AutoCAD blocks (some are dynamic). The team wants to have these items get some automation. They would like to be able to tag the item in plan and have the keynote legend populate automatically.

What I am having a field day with is, how to have the same functionality to accomplish the end result with a mixture of content from both ACA and AutoCAD. I know I can tag AutoCAD Blocks with ACA tags & PSD's and get those to appear in a Schedule Table. From the way I look at it though, I would have to build a massive formula PSD that would contain all possible keynotes.

The other way I could do it is to use the keynote system in ACA. The ACA objects can be assigned keynote numbers to reference in advance. However, the AutoCAD objects would not be able to have a keynote assigned in advance - disrupting the smoothness of the desired workflow described above. Turning the AutoCAD blocks into ACA Multi-View blocks really isn't an options since many are Dynamic AutoCAD blocks and placing them into a Multi-View block would kill their Dynamic functionality.

So... Am I missing something here? Help me out you scheduling pros! Can I avoid a massive formula PSD or am I living a pipe dream and the functionality just not there yet?

[dkoch]

Here are some suggestions, but keep in mind they are only suggestions. I have never tried any of them and have not worked with the keynoting feature or tried to access a database from a formula property, so I have no idea if they will even work, let alone in a way that fits the desired workflow.

The Details feature has a means to add keynoting information to AutoCAD objects, including blocks (not sure about Dynamic Blocks, but do not see why they would not also work). You might be able to incorporate the non-AEC items into the Details feature and achieve ease of keynoting that way. Whether that would be worse than picking a keynote from a list would need to be determined, but using Detail tools from a tool palette may may the workflow acceptable.

There may be a way to have a formula property query a database and retrieve the keynote for a given block name (which could be an automatic property), if VBScript is up to that sort of thing. Whether that is easier than creating a monster formula property that holds all of the possible blocks/keynotes would have to be determined. I have no idea where to begin with that.

You might be able to attach the keynote text to AutoCAD blocks (etc) as extended data, and then might be able to retrieve that through a formula property. Whether that would work in an acceptable manner if the files need to be shared outside the firm and have the keynoting work would need to be determined.