The available layout area is the paper size minus the margins. Our current masters, based on narrower margins, don't fit in the new, slightly smaller layout area. When you go to print, you will see the Print dialog trying to put the layout onto four sheets, and offering to shrink the layout to make it fit. Neither is a good idea.

This is easy to fix.

First, get the margins from the printer. For each master in use, highlight it in the layout tree and click Settings. At the Size control, select "Import Settings From Printer".

You will then get a Page Setup dialog box. Select the 192.168.1.214 item and then the appropriate paper size. (These are: C - 18x24in. D - 24x36in. E - 30x42in.)

OK that dialog box. If you look fast you can see the margin values change from less than a hundredth of an inch to more than a tenth:

Second, for each detail master you have to change the grid. In the master's settings again, click Grid Setup. Change the four values under "Distance From Margin" to be 1/8" less:

This change makes no difference in the printed output, since the new margin still lies outside the graphical frame of the sheet.

This isn't a lightly covered topic by any means, but I find a lot of organizational guidance to be perfectionist bordering on, no offense, compulsive. I don't care if my inbox is completely empty, or if I have too many folders or too few. I only care that:

• No important messages get missed

• No less-important messages get to interrupt me. I'm busy.

Throughout this discussion, I am using a narrow definition of 'important', which is roughly: Having some legitimate claim on my near-term attention. And don't get me wrong, where would we be without so-called less-important stuff?

One of the reasons many of us...love Apple products is because they think about a lot of the details that a lot of other manufacturers don't, in both hardware and software. And it's those little details that a lot of people think don't matter, or aren't worth the time and money to get right, that add up to a really great experience and goodwill from your users. So that's always been a high priority for me, to try and get all the details right.... Even if somebody has never run into something, I'm still happy it's there, because for the few people who do run into it, it makes them a little bit happier. If you look at a lot of the features of luxury cars, for instance, they're features that most people won't ever use. And they accidentally discover it sometime, they're just a little bit delighted by that.... And if we can do that same thing in software by providing these little delights to users, or by smoothing over a few rough edges that they should never have to see, that adds up to a significantly better product than one made by a firm that doesn't really care about those details.

I find less irritating tools to be less irritating.

In most cases, if two surface edges meet whose materials are the same, the line between the surfaces is eliminated.

Crown Tool JM10

I use GLOB_MODPAR_NAME statements to keep such parameters in sync. In the code there are a bunch of IF/THEN statements associating the angles and the named slopes.

Since this lookup is used by several objects, I keep it in a macro and use RETURNED_PARAMETERS to get the data back to the calling object.

Element priorities effect plan and 3D geometry. Skin priorities effect only plan. Managing skin priorities is the key to proper automatic joint cleanup between composite walls in plan. Here's a look at the essentials of skin priorities and our standard composite setup.

Make sure Archicad is not running.

Activate Time Machine on the Dock.

Navigate to [Home]/Library/Application Support/Graphisoft/. You should see a folder called Archicad Autosave Folder. If you don't, go 'back in time' by clicking the next window. If you see more than one Autosave folder, sort the window by Date Modified to determine the right one.

Highlight that folder and click the Restore button. (You shouldn't get a 'replace this folder' warning, because if the Archicad Autosave Folder was present, Archicad would have seen it and given you the recovery dialog. If you do get it, make sure Archicad is not running.)

Once the folder copies over, relaunch Archicad. It should find the Autosave data and present you with the recovery dialog. Depending on when Time Machine ran last, you may have lost more work than you would with a normal autosave.

These are OS X instructions. We use the free utility Pref Setter to edit plist files. On Windows, use whatever Windows users use.

The AC preference files are at [home]/Library/Preferences/. There are a number of AC prefs; the one we want is com.graphisoft.AC .plist. You can right-click on the file and choose Open With... Pref Setter, or open the file from Pref Setter's File Menu.

The Pref Setter window will present all the 'Keys' in the plist file. Scroll to Recent Files.

Projects are listed first: Plan File_1., Plan File_2.,... You can delete any of these items. You can also modify the path in the Value field, to point to a different server, for example. Following the projects themselves, there is a Plan FileType_ item for each project. If you are deleting project items, you can delete these items as well, or not. It doesn't matter. Following that is a Plan Number item. This value is set automatically; you can ignore it.

After all the project list information, there is a similar arrangement for recent library parts that have been created or opened for editing. In this context the word 'Symbol' means library part: Symbol File_1., Symbol File_2.,... You can delete or hack these exactly like the project items.

(There are also integer keys for the number of RecentPlans (projects) and RecentObjects (library parts) you would like to see in the list. These are set to 12 by default, perhaps you would like more or fewer.)

We had to do some of this recently when we moved our projects, libraries, modules, etc. to a new server with a different address. When AC launches, it will try to make sure the recent files are accessible. This may lead to a prompt to log in to the missing server. Or, if the password for the server is stored in the user's keychain, the old server volumes can mount without you noticing it. Next comes confusion about where you are actually working, which is never good. Tip: Delete the password to the old server in Keychain Access. That way, you will be notified when AC wants to go looking where it shouldn't and you need to hack your prefs.

(To be honest, even after carefully working through this, I have seen AC mysteriously seek out the old volumes. There's some glitchy behavior going on, but it seems to settle down over time. We do what we can.)

One object -> A few worksheet views -> Several masters -> Many layouts.

Graphical changes to a given sheet type are made in the master. Changes to all the sheets are made in the worksheet. Changes to every sheet in the office are made in the code of the object. (Rare.) To change every future sheet in the office while leaving extant work alone, you need a new object and you need to update the template(s).

The text information in the title block object is a mixture of autotext tags in <angle brackets> and hard-coded text in quotation marks. The TEXT2 shape commands can use hard-coded text or string variables. Both of these will display the text 'Bar':

!! Display the text in the string variable named foo
foo='Bar'
TEXT2 0, 0, foo

!! Display the literal text 'Bar'
TEXT2 0, 0, 'Bar'

(In this usage, double and single quotation marks (and grave accent marks, on the ~ key) are interchangeable as long as the pairs match.)

Within each script of the object, you need to do a Find (Cmd+F) for all the text bits that need to be changed. If the company name has changed from Foo Architects to Bar Architects, you need to find each instance of 'Foo' and replace it with 'Bar'. Optional: Use the Replace button to find and replace in one go. I usually don't use Replace All unless it's a very straightforward case with a lot of instances. Also note the checkboxes.)

In the title block object, only the master script and 2D script need to be changed. But while I was in the neighborhood I added some years to the relevant values lists in the parameter script. (Values lists offer the user choices for a given parameter.) I did a Replace All of

'2010', 

with

'2010', '2011', '2012', 

taking care to remember that last comma.

Save as, not Save. Actually, you should save as before you make changes so you don't forget.

More: Structure of Objects, and the Object Editing Environment

Put the abbreviation in the Short Name parameter. If the parameter is empty, the full name is used in plan.

Another idea would be to hard-code standard abbreviations for typical room names.

Download (AC11)

The Artlantis Attitude is being distributed as a personalized PDF file. If you are skeptical you can contact Dwight directly at info.beginnernomore@telus.net to ask for a sample, and he's easy to find on Archicad-Talk. You can buy the book from various outlets that would show up in Google, or you can Paypal US$85 to that address.