PHASED Projects

Hi Jeremiah,

Thanks for the reponse. Yes, I think you are understanding what I am trying to describe. One comments:

• I would be OK with changes in one phase reflecting across all phases. If the change is unique to a phase, I would be OK creating a new unique key note. Or maybe there is a radio button that says "change only for this phase", which effectively creates a new unique ref note in the master list.
  

Just to make sure I am getting the finer details across... This is a long response, but its mainly examples in table form. And apologies... I couldn't find a table format tool. If I were to break down the various parts:

Refnotes
The master project contains the list of all refnotes. By that I mean they have the text for the note, and all the associated fields. They are even assigned to a category if appropriate (K-Rock, W-walls, etc) They just dont have a number assigned.
Example:
Master
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
TBD / Screen Wall / Tan / Stucco / Library Detail 1
TBD / View Fence / Bronze / Powdercoat / Library Detail 2
TBD / Dog Fence / Bronze / Powdercoat / Library Detail 3

Phase 1 has a screen wall and view fence, so its refnotes schedule would look like
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
W101 / Screen Wall / Tan / Stucco / 4/L105
W102 / View Fence / Bronze / Powdercoat / 5/L105

Phase 2 has a view fence and dog fence, so its refnotes schedule would look like
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
W101 / View Fence / Bronze / Powdercoat / 1/L103
W102 / Dog Fence / Bronze / Powdercoat / 2/L103

If I want to change the color of the view fence to be Grey and Painted, I could change it in either phase, and it would reflect across all phases. (I am editing the text/fields at the master level, but the number assignment, and detail page reference are happening at the phase level.
Master
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
TBD / Screen Wall / Tan / Stucco / Library Detail 1
TBD / View Fence / Grey / Paint / Library Detail 2
TBD / Dog Fence / Grey / Paint / Library Detail 3

Phase 1
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
W101 / Screen Wall / Tan / Stucco / 4/L105
W102 / View Fence / Grey / Paint / 5/L105

Phase 2
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
W101 / View Fence / Grey / Paint / 1/L103
W102 / Dog Fence / Grey / Paint / 2/L103


Say I have a third phase, and for the screen wall, I want it to be ground face CMU. But only for that phase. I would create a new keynote in Phase 3, and it would sync with the master list, but just not be used in the other phases. (It would show up in the other phases as 'unnassigned')

Master
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
TBD / Screen Wall / Tan / Stucco / Library Detail 1
TBD / View Fence / Grey / Paint / Library Detail 2
TBD / Dog Fence / Grey / Paint / Library Detail 3
TBD / CMU wall / Pebble / Groundface / Library Detail 4

Phase 1
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
W101 / Screen Wall / Tan / Stucco / 4/L105
W102 / View Fence / Grey / Paint / 5/L105

Phase 2
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
W101 / View Fence / Grey / Paint / 1/L103
W102 / Dog Fence / Bronze / Powdercoat / 2/L103

Phase 3
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail
W101 / View Fence / Grey / Paint / 1/L103
W102 / Dog Fence / Bronze / Powdercoat / 2/L103
W103 / CMU wall / Pebble / Groundface 3/L103

In writing this out, it might be helpful to know which keynote are being used in across phases. For example:
Master
# / Keynote / Color / Comment / Detail / Used?
TBD / Screen Wall / Tan / Stucco / Library Detail 1 / Ph1
TBD / View Fence / Grey / Paint / Library Detail 2 / Ph1, Ph2, Ph3
TBD / Dog Fence / Grey / Paint / Library Detail 3 / Ph2, Ph3
TBD / CMU wall / Pebble / Groundface / Library Detail 4 / Ph3
TBD / Brick Wall / Red / Pretty / Library Detail 5 / Not Used

It would be a reminder that you are editing something that will impact other phases, so you might rather create a new keynote.

Obviously, any changes to the library details are reflected across all phases. Some details may be phase specific, but they are all in the library available for all phases. I think the details library already kinda works this way... I can point multiple projects to the same detail folder and reuse details, and they get assigned the page reference at the project level.

You idea of using one projects for all phases, then 'renumbering' the keynotes would work for the number part, but correct me if I am wrong, once I inserted "Library Detail 2" onto 1/L103 in phase 2, it would also change the sheet reference in phase 1 and 3. Also, since we are working on the phases simultaneously, it would mean running renumber every time. That might be OK, just not sure what downstream impacts it would have.

Planting
Similar to the planting schedule. And this one seems easier, since I can have hundreds of plants in my project (if I had them in the original template), but only use a handful of plants. There are two key parts to my request... (1) If I add a new plant to one phase, it would show up as available in all the phases. and (2) if a change is made to a specific plant in the list, it would reflect across all phases.

Example:
Master
Plant / Size
Palo Verde / 36" box
Live Oak / 36" Box
Sephora / 24" Box
Pistache / 24" box
and lots more...

Not all the plants are used across each phase, so individual phase schedules may look like
Phase 1
Plant / Size
Palo Verde / 36" box
Live Oak / 36" Box
Pistache / 24" box

Phase 2
Plant / Size
Palo Verde / 36" box
Live Oak / 36" Box
Sephora / 24" Box
Pistache / 24" box

Phase 3
Plant / Size
Live Oak / 36" Box
Sephora / 24" Box
Pistache / 24" box

Now say client wants to add Cascalote as an accent tree to some phases, and wants to change all the Pistache Trees to Elms across all phases, and change the Sephora in Phase 2 only to Sweet Acacia. And they do not want any 36" box trees. All 24" box. I am oversimplifying the change to Elm. But the point being, a change to the specific plant is reflected across all phases. Or maybe a better way of looking at it, is each phase is looking at the same master plant list. If a change or addition is made in one phase, its to the master list that all phases are looking at.

Master
Plant / Size
Palo Verde / 24" box <--- editing this plant size info is reflected across all projects. They keep the same symbol.
Live Oak / 24" Box <--- editing this plant size info is reflected across all projects. They keep the same symbol.
Sephora / 24" Box <--- no change
Sweet Acacia / 24" Box <--- New Entry for Phase 2
Cascalote / 24" Box <--- New Entry for all phases
Elm / 24" box <--- This one is trickier... to avoid having to add a new plant to the list, then going into each phase and using the replace tool, and it also having a new symbol, I am thinking you could (1) just edit the plant name and plant code, OR (2) add a new plant to the list (Elm), then open the plant editor for Pistache, and use the change plant button. But I am not sure how that works. The goal would be to change the Pistache to Elm, keep the symbol, keep them planted where they are, just change the schedule.
and lots more...

Phase 1
Plant / Size
Palo Verde / 24" box
Live Oak / 24" Box
Elm / 24" Box
Cascalote / 24" Box

Phase 2
Plant / Size
Palo Verde / 24" box
Live Oak / 24" Box
Sweet acacia / 24" Box
Elm / 24" Box
Cascalote / 24" Box

Phase 3
Plant / Size
Live Oak / 36" Box
Sephora / 24" Box
Elm / 24" Box


Irrigation
The simplest example would be changing an irrigation component, and having it reflect across all phases. Say the original design used a Hunter Controller, and Hunter MP Rotators in the turf. Client wants to switch to Rainbird. I change it once in a phase, and its reflected across all phases. Yes, there may be some redesign to adjust for spray coverage/radius.

Other scheduling tools
Same concept would apply to concept plant manager, concept graphics, zoning graphics, lighting manager.

Thank you again for your responses and ideas.
Tim

Tim,

First regarding the irrigation, again it just seems best to use a single project for all phases. As there doesn't seem to be a need to retain the former equipment types for all projects. But also! Something we've mentioned a lot to many users - run an irrigation schedule with the Entire Palette option, and send that to the client! Get them to sign off on your equipment choices *before* you place everything.

For the rest, I really don't like an option for "change in all" versus "change in only this phase". I think it's confusing and error-prone. Changes that will impact every phase need to be done in the master project, done and done.

But that is also impacting, how are these edits to be done? How much time does it take to open up the master project to make edits, versus just doing it the way you are now, replicating across X project phases as necessary. It's going to be difficult to engineer anything that is simpler, easier, or saves more time, than simply doing it the way you are.

I'm definitely still open to the idea, but it certainly needs a lot more pondering. Concepts like this typically need to be watering way, way down, to a much simpler idea. For instance, adding a TBD capability for the master project numbering is just not going to fly. The master project absolutely has numbers, and has the ability to affect all phase projects.

A note regarding the Planting - I'm not seeing an instance where you have different Size versions of the same plant across multiple phases. If this is the case, then here too is not so much a need to have multiple projects. As long as you only have a single size version of each plant by code, the system will auto-correct to match the data. So in your example, simply using a single project for multiple phase drawings, you can change the Size and it will auto-correct in all drawings.

The only time you absolutely need the multiple projects, is for the differing sheet and details numbers, and differing RefNotes. The dilemma here is just what is less effort - duplicating a change across 3 projects, or opening up the master project to make it there (and then likely still opening the 3 dwg's to confirm the change).

--J

Thanks Jeremiah,

Agree on the irrigation schedule approval prior to design. And we usually do try. Unfortunately, we had been working on a project for a year with a client, and then out of the blue they send our plans to their maintenance person, and now our irrigation equipment is changing. Why this didn't happen earlier... well... lessons learned.

I could live with your suggestion that universal changes happen at the master level, and changes made at the phase level are specific to that project. The reason that I like the automation over the way we are doing it is that the human way is definitely error prone If we change a a specified site furnishing (bench) for the entire project, staff would need to go into potentially 5 to 10 separate phases to change the keynote, vendor, color, etc.

I disagree on the master project refnotes needing to have numbers to start with... at least from my perspective. From how the coding works in LFX, it may be mandatory though. The example I would use would be a template we use for typical single family home parcels. Our template may have 30 'typical' refnotes that we use. As far as I am concerned, they do not need to have a number assigned, until they are used in the project. But how we do it now is that they come from the template, numbered 1 through 30... we may only use 15 of them on a given project, then use the renumber tool. I would be OK with something like that.

You have a lot of valid points on using a 'single project' for all the phases. Irrigation and Planting would work great... the schedules generated are based on what is in the drawing (or attached xref if chosen) You are correct that it is keeping the refnotes synced, and the inability to have differing sheet/detail numbers. It is this reason that we had to move to separate projects for each phase. I think our biggest is around 10 or 15 phases for a single project. In fact, when we first started with LFX, we did use one project across all phases. But once we started using the detail manager and refnotes heavily, we couldn't continue that way.

And yes, there are risks with making a mistake change that propagates through all the phases. Also agree that simple is better.

Thanks for pondering. I would be happy to go over other case studies we run into if you want more background. I guess I would summarize with this... master planned community work (one large project with anywhere from 5 to 25 or more parcels) can be highly repetitive. Clients expect to be able to tell us something once, and we are responsible for making it so on all aspects of the project moving forward. This seems ideal for some type of automation or syncing.

Have a great evening!
Tim

After reading everything and thinking through things, I think one of the biggest helps (for me) would be to run reference notes schedules base on the active dwg. Similar to plant legends. However I don't know how this would work with details. I rarely attached details to plants so that's never been an issue for me using the same plant list for multiple phases. Since the detail is assigned to a plant it doesn't matter which page it is on. Often only 1 or 2 pages of planting details in a project anyways.

Maybe there could be a way to use "user fields" and a filter process. Currently Ref Notes don't allow duplicate numbers but if this were allowed a user field could be applied assigning a specific ref note to a phase. Then in the REFNOTE MANAGER there could be a way to filter notes based on which phase is assigned in the "user field".

Example Project Name:
Eagle Ridge
ER2201

Reference Note Manager
Example:
NOTES DETAIL USER FIELD
4" TYPICAL CONCRETE HEADER ER2201-01 Phase 1, Phase 2
6" TYPICAL CONCRETE HEADER ER2201-02 Phase 1, Phase 3,
8" TYPICAL CONCRETE HEADER ER2201-03 Phase 2, Phase 4
LANDSCAPE BOULDER ER2201-04 Phase 1, Phase 2

The number would be assigned once a schedule is run. Maybe the "Place/Callout" buttons would simply place "placeholders" much like the detail builder. Once the schedule is run then the placeholder gets updated with the correct number.

When a schedule is run the user could select to run base on a user field.

Phase 1:
SYMBOL DESCRITION DETAIL
1 4" TYPICAL CONCRETE HEADER 101/1
2 6" TYPICAL CONCRETE HEADER 101/2
3 LANDSCAPE BOULDER 101/3

Phase 2:
1 4" TYPICAL CONCRETE HEADER 101/1
2 8" TYPICAL CONCRETE HEADER 101/2
3 LANDSCAPE BOULDER 101/3

This wouldn't necessarily automate the universal changes in Reference Notes but it would allow them all to be in a single project where making a change would be quicker than having to open separate projects. This would still require some thinking on how to handle detail numbering.

hopefully this makes sense.

In either case. I do love the software and am constantly learning new and exciting ways to integrate it into projects. SO MUCH easier than having to do leaders and typing out all the notes.

Good points Clay. Based on what you are saying, and if you are not attaching details to refnotes, then you could probably do all your phases in one project. We also rarely attach the planting details (although its a good practice) to each plant either. Even if we did, our plant and irrigation detail sheets are so standard they don't really change pages or numbers.

Jeremiah mentioned the renumber tool earlier that might apply to your situation. You could have all your refnotes in one project, but when you run your schedule, renumber them to remove gaps. You will just need to remember to do that with each phase, every time you run a schedule.

Your user field for phase idea seems to have merit. But it also sounds like your thoughts would require the refnotes to not be numbered until the schedule is ran... not sure we will get Jeremiah in alignment with that. I am just glad they are thinking about it.

Thanks,
Tim

Clay,

Nice thoughts, it's very helpful to see more simple examples and brainstorming.
Although, I just don't think the user field option would be viable, as for instance Tim's case of 25 different parcels -- the possible combination of parcels that the note would show up in would require a whole additional interface to check off which ones it is in.
However, your thoughts did jog my mind a bit. I like the idea of somehow filtering the RefNote Manager to only the notes that are in the current drawing. If we bring in the idea of a Master list, the master list could have the preferred number for each note, and then the number could vary on each sheet as necessary, but still have access to its preferred number.
Keep the ideas coming!

--J

To be clear on why the Master absolutely needs numbers - guys, come on. Do you really want to try to explain to someone which note needs to be edited if it doesn't have a number??? "The walkway note." "The concrete walkway or the asphalt one?" "Concrete." "Wait, there's 3 concrete walkway notes, which one?" It would be madness. You need the number to identify it.

--J

This makes complete sense.

Quoted from Jeremiah Farmer on Jan 05, 2022

To be clear on why the Master absolutely needs numbers - guys, come on. Do you really want to try to explain to someone which note needs to be edited if it doesn't have a number??? "The walkway note." "The concrete walkway or the asphalt one?" "Concrete." "Wait, there's 3 concrete walkway notes, which one?" It would be madness. You need the number to identify it.

--J

How about a master list, with preferred numbering as you mentioned. Those numbers could be revised to be unique at the phase level when a schedule is generated.

• New notes added at the master level become available for all phases
  
• Changes made at the master level reflect across all phase
  
• New notes added at the phase level show up at the master level as available to all phases, at the end of the list with a 'preferred' number. It would be visible to all phases, just may not be used.
  
• Changes made to existing note at the phase level results in the creation of a new refnote, at the master level, available to all phases, although they may not be used. (If it was easy to determine, if a change was made to a refnote at a phase level, but that note was only being used in that phase, it wouldn't generate a new note, just update the existing one in the master list)
  

I could be wrong, but I am thinking this would be easier since there is really one list (the master list), and not separate lists that may contain portions of a master list, but also separate little bits specific to the phase. If a refnote from the master list isn't sued in a phase, it wont generate in the schedules, and the numbering would be unique to each phase. One master list with preferred numbers, and each phase has way to set unique numbers.

combine the ability to have detail sheet numbers specific to a phase, and I think that would probably cover 90% of the cases I can think of.... would be a great start anyways.

And Jeremiah, with respect to "which note needs to be revised".... I would probably be reviewing a set of plans when I made this comment, so I would say Note SF104 on the phase 4 plans (which might happen to be SF108 on phase 1, or SF102 on Phase 3). They go into that plan set, revise the refnote, and shazam, its updated across all phases... in my world... but not in the world we outlined above. So instead maybe when editing a refnote at a phase level, replace the "OK" button with two options "Make this change to the master list" and "Make this change unique"... the more I think about it, it would probably have to work this way... How would I go into the 'master list' to make any edits? A project is assigned to a drawing. Once in a drawing, I can edit the schedules associated with that drawing. In our scenario, the only thing associated with the 'master project', might be a preliminary master plan. It would be weird to go into an old master plan to edit a refnote for CD's So maybe combining Clay's filter idea... adding tabs or buttons (see pic) at the top of the refnote manager would let you see either the filtered list of notes in the phase, or all notes. Then you could stick with the single OK button. A change made in the phase tab is unique. A change made in the master tab is universal. sorry, thinking as I type.

However, Jeremiah, you have a good point... ideally I may ask someone to print the master refnote list for review, prior to generating schedules or anything... so having 'preferred' numbers at a master level does make sense. You win. I gave you an upvote.



Thanks!
Tim

I'm trying to come up with a standard practice for dealing with phases as well. The only current challenge/limitation I see is if we have the same detail placed on multiple hardscape detail sheets because of different phased submittals then the refnotes schedules won't callout the correct sheet (unless details were placed on sheets with the same page number/name). I like the simple idea of just having all of the details in the same set for ease and callout which phase they are associated with but what are your thoughts on the workaround below if we're requested to only show details of a certain phase?

Have a "master" project which all plants across phases are associated with to create symbol consistency.
Create a new project for each phase which FX site and detail features would be placed but link this to the same detail folder so we don't have to make detail changes multiple times as changes come about. The downside is if we have to change a paving type, furnishing, etc. after it's already separated into different phases then that change would have to be duplicated on other phased .lfx files. (or if there's a lot of changes could do it once, back up and restore the .lfx to assign to the other phased .dwg files)

Ryan,

This is similar to what we ended up doing. Create a master project for the entire community with its own detail folder assigned to it. All details get saved to that folder. Each phase gets its own project number and detail folder for phase specific details. Phases reference details in the master to keep continuity.

Learn to use the Organization tab in the Land F/X Projects.

Clay - in your example... if you have a set of details in the 'master project', and then supplemental details in the 'phased portion' of the project, your phased project can reference details from both folders... and then the ref notes correctly show them on the page they are placed for each plan set... is that correct? That works for detail consistency if that is the case.

Unless I am missing something, that still doesn't address refnotes that are common between phases, plant list, etc.

I haven't looked... is there a LandFX video or help article on best practices for setting up phased projects?

Yes, projects can reference details from multiple different folders. I'm not sure how all the programming works but it does.

Regarding the Refrence Notes and Planting you're correct, still not a great option. You can create them in the master project and import into each phase and reassign details if necessary. Importing into a new phase might actually be better. Once a project is approved and set for construction you wouldn't want to unintentionally make a change that would retroactively change a specification for an already approved phase.

Here's some documentation we have:
Advance a Project into a New Phase

Power Tip: Show a Phased Planting Plan

One thing I'll add about the details: if your office normally forces a copy of a detail for each new project, it is still possible to bypass that and use the insert button in the detail manager to add a detail to this new phase's project without copying it, allowing edits to details to auto-update in both phases without duplicating edits.

If you have copying details set and you import the reference note, it will also copy the detail, if like Clay mentioned, you'd rather not have edits in Phase 2 retroactively also change Phase 1 details.