| Cannon Design Product Review of CodeBook 9.0 |
by Elizabeth Chodosh, LEED AP, Cannon Design.Download original excerpted Review (requires registration) Original Article courtesy of Augi|AEC Edge Cannon Design recently started looking long and hard at programming tools that meet the demands of our healthcare, laboratory, and education planning teams to “take spreadsheet (Excel, Access) data to and from Revit.” Thereare a lot of different tools available to any enterprising firm, including Autodesk‘s own Revit Database Link tool that recently graduated from Autodesk Labs. We use many database tools at Cannon Design, and most recently began implementing CodeBook on a pilot test case for one of our projects. Being a newly minted user means that I, like the rest of my team, have a lot of outstanding questions for long-term implementation at a firm as large as Cannon Design. And, while we see the potential, we have only just begun to explore the software to its capacity. This article is an overview of what we‘ve found so far. To begin with, what is this software, anyway? The following description is found at the Codebook website. Codebook is the computer application and database that allows the designer to work with coordinated graphical and textual information, producing schedules, themed graphical views and room data sheets. CodeBook is used by all members of the design team from inception to completion [including]:
There really is a lot in a name. For reference, in cryptography, a codebook is a document used for implementing a code. In social sciences, a codebook is a document containing list of codes used in research. And, Codebooks were also used in 19th- and 20th-century commercial codes for the non-cryptographic purpose of data compression. Generally, this software “sorta-kinda” does all of that: implements codes, decodes, and aligns data (not too sure about data compression part). In this case, it‘s CodeBook. That‘s capital C, capital B, no space between. And, before we go any further, let us dispel the first assumption everybody makes just in case all that reference to codes and data above still leave questions: CodeBook has nothing to do with checking your building code compliance. Instead, CodeBook is all about Rooms and Spaces, think: Room Data to the nth power. CodeBook provides an interactive database management tool that relates Room (and/or Space) data within Revit to more Room Data outside of Revit (which then gets ported into Revit) and also corresponds to content such as things which belong in Rooms and Spaces within the Revit model (dataset). Get it? Or are you as dizzy as I was when that first sunk in? Hang on to your hats, folks, this is one heck of a great ride. Let‘s quickly define what Revit is doing with the “i” in BIM. We are all most familiar with the “m,” or modeling of BIM. I proposed a theory a few years ago that implementation of Revit is BIM in reverse: M, to the I, to the B. Without any reservation, I still believe this is true 99% of the time. And, despite how many times I referred to me, myself, and I in the previous sentences, the “i” in BIM is often overlooked, or under-utilized for much of our day to day production. Often, this is for unknown reasons, or because it is more difficult to manage than necessary for the average deadline. The potential, however, is what makes all us BIMmie folks get all excited over nerdy topics like XML, IFC, OmniClass, COBie, IFD, etc. Somewhere in the middle, we can tap into that information inside of Revit and capitalize on why we often hear Revit Project files referred as “datasets” in favor of the more common term “models.” For what CodeBook does it is best to think of your Revit Project as a “Revit dataset.” So, what does this mean? And, no I am not going to bore you with too much tech talk about data and metadata (even though that is exactly what this is all about). We are dealing with sets of data, classifications, if you will. And this data is bound to other more general classifications of more data. Revit is innately structured this way. CodeBook just upped the proverbial ante by classifying these objects with a project-specific set of codes assigned to elements within Revit. By developing a set of codes and wrapping the program requirements of your project around them, you begin to develop a book of data around your project. Thus, a code book, and what CodeBook does for us is to connect our modeling to programming information. Take the proof if you will: if BIM, then M + I = B. The website for CodeBook International purports that CodeBook is “the Vital Tool for Leading Designers of Complex Buildings,” which is a slight change in direction from what many of us have heard before where CodeBook was described as the “Vital Tool for leading Healthcare and Education Building Designers.” he tool itself is really non-denominational, although it is still targeted at “complex building types” with specific emphasis on Healthcare, Education, Defense, and Airport market sectors. he further we got into the training and the more I have played around with it, the less it seems specific to only those market sectors. I think it can be applied to any Revit project requiring sophisticated Room Data management and content coordination. Annie Lehatto, a lead Healthcare designer observed: “CodeBook looks like it could be good for organizing a lot of things and easily inputting information without having to be in the model. It could be very useful for people like Project Managers who may not be so good at understanding how to draw things in Revit. Instead they can just input the information by picking it in CodeBook.” One of the advantages that CodeBook offers is the ability to populate the rooms with equipment and other components (e.g. Revit Families), rather than having to dig through libraries and locate a specific piece of equipment, for example. The disadvantage to this method is the time to set up all the components and libraries in CodeBook. Time well spent, but time that must be invested if you wish to have your customized planning and programming datasets ready to go as a corporate standard. Each CodeBook project requires a defined Equipment library. Once the library location is defined, the software provides three methods of importing components into your project, and assigning them to your Room or Space data:
LET‘S TALK TECH...The software is available in both 64bit and 32bit compatible versions (parallel to your Revit installation), but remains a native 32bit application. I would note that running all of this on my 32bit laptop, I was impressed at how my classmates on their 64bit HP desktops were easily steps ahead of me while my computer processed...and processed...and processed. That said, my laptop is a Revit and graphics powerhouse that blew the benchmark results in Revit 2009 out of the water just one short year ago. This is data-intensive software, and just like Revit, needs everything you can throw at it: your productivity is only as good as your processing power (and, well, only as good as your patience with any new software, too). While the engine running the databases you interact with and edit in CodeBook are powered by Microsoft Access, you do not need any experience with Access itself to utilize the software. A basic familiarity with digital spreadsheets is all you really need to have. hings like using Tab to go to the next field and other basic Windows interactions many of us take for granted are the only application skills you need to bring to the table. What you do need, however, is knowledge of your Program. Now, in an application‘s review, that may sound odd to say. It‘s a given, we‘re reviewing a program, right? But, that is not what I mean: CodeBook demands that you, as a user, are familiar with the intimate details of your project and its program of requirements. Therefore, you cannot hand this off to an intern to fill in the data without having done some heavy lifting first to set up the parameters around your project based on the knowledge of a healthcare planner, for example. This release of CodeBook is Revit-compatible but it also supports various other BIM and CAD applications too. One of the first things a user does is to select the BIM or CAD system, as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1-Choosing the BIM/CAD software to work with. Each project requires that you define two Library locations: Equipment and Room Data (see Figure 2 and Figure 3). As pictured below from the demonstrations we receive with the training materials, these include Microsoft Access databases:
Figure 2 - Defining the location for Equipment Library.
Figure 3 - Defining the location for the Room Data library. INSTALLING CODEBOOK 101Before you start Revit Keep in mind that you can now manage your Add-ins from within this new UI for the Keyboard Shortcuts. So, if you‘re an external tools junkie and are tired of tabbing over and sorting through a pull down menu just to do something nifty, but quick (like changing model lines to symbolic lines in the Family Edi tor), you can now set up your custom keystrokes to initialize these external commands. The basic requirements are:
My advice? Do not PASS Go without getting someone from IT to give their input, advice, or just to be on-call to support you. And, as always, don‘t forget sense of humor. Naturally with any pilot project when we run into problems with the program we contact our supplier, CDV Systems (US Distributor of CodeBook) to help us work through it. This project is a lot more cumbersome due to the fact that we are trying to blend the information from our REVIT model and our space programs. Had we started out using Codebook, I believe the process would have been a lot smoother. One of my other co-workers on our architectural team, Victor Malerba, said that despite the difficulties, “It will be a powerful tool for equipment, furniture, and typical room layouts. For the planners, it is going to make our lives a lot easier to make room data sheets and creating reports for spaces throughout the building.” Elizabeth Chodosh, LEED AP, is a firmwide BIM Specialist with Cannon Design. An experienced A/E/C practice technology coordinator with a background in architecture, she joined Cannon Design in Fall of 2008. She currently specializes in BIM with an emphasis on Revit and related technologies, including development of and supporting Revit projects, libraries, external utilities, as well as best practices and standards. She is actively involved in promoting the expanding knowledge base of BIM and virtual design technologies, leads staff training in Revit and related technologies, and is a contributing team member establishing integrated modeling and collaborative BIM practices. Liz is also a member of the buildingSMART Alliance and participates as part of the National Practice Committee toward development of the National BIM Standards. In 2008, Liz had the honor of participating in Autodesk University as a lecturer. Today she often contributes to Revit Phoenix (www.revitphoenix.com, the Phoenix Metro Area Revit/BIM Users Group) and has previously served as an Advisory Board Member of RevitDC (www.revitdc.org), the Washington, DC Metro Revit user group, where she has presented on a few occasions with her peers, including “Shared Coordinates Tips and Tricks: Basics of Using Shared Coordinates for Large Projects.” She is also a charter member of the fledgling Architecture for Humanity Phoenix chapter, which is growing and seeking new membership in the Metro Phoenix area. |
