Topic: What is Carlson Civil/Survey

[rkmcswain]

I have never understood how removing one of the most useful tools from Civil 3D would make it good for Surveyors.

Assuming that plain Civil is built on AutoCAD and not Map, then the whole thing sounds like a marketing ploy.

Kind of like --> here is a new car, but it doesn't come with wheels or seats.
Or you can just buy this other one over here that does include wheels and seats.

[sinc]

That's what I thought...  On the other hand, if Autodesk really thinks removing the Map tools from C3D makes it good for Surveyors, we have a pretty good clue as to why their Survey support is so bad...

The only real use for Autodesk Civil that I see is that it might be good for PM types, who need to jump in and out of Autocad drawings regularly, but don't really do much work in them, outside of the occasional tweaking.  You could get a license for Autodesk Civil for people like that, and save a tiny bit of money.

[mjfarrell]

The press releases I saw said that Autocad Civil was the same thing as Civil 3D, except without the Map tools...  Maybe I misread it.

Well, you did say C3D, which is the commonly accepted abbreviation for Civil 3D.
You may be right though, plain Civil may not be built on Map. Maybe someone who knows for sure can chime in...

Yes, it's a marketing tool, and I think a covert plan to KILL MAP because they can not get it to use C3D data properly. (at all)
What 'platform' it's built on is autocad, even if it is built on map; as map is based on autocad.

[Dent Cermak]

I received a phone call from the folks at Carlson Software today. They are looking at setting up a 1 day training session on Field To Finish procedures and surface creation and manipulation. It will be held in Jackson, Mississippi. This is much closer for some of us than Colorado or Virginia. I will let you know more details as I get them when this is all firmed up.

[Dent Cermak]

Event: 'Carlson Survey Fundamentals'
 
  Training Class

Open Enrollment Training Class
 Date: Wednesday, May 27, 2009 At 08:00 AM
Duration: 2 Days 
Contact Info:
(877) 335-4016  Email: info@carlsonds.com
URL: http://www.carlsonds.com/images/stories/images/carlson%20survey%20fundamentals.pdf
 


2 – Days, May 27-28 Jackson, MS (Location to be determined)
• How to get started in Carlson
• Importing data
• Field to Finish
• Processing Raw Data
• Working with Points
• Deed Entry
• Creating Lots
• Annotations
• Contours
• Exporting Data (includes LandXML)
• Creating Finished Drawings

Cost is $795 per person. CDS Will provide training facility, laptops for use during training with all software needed, and training materials. We need a minimum of 6 people scheduled for the class to prevent cancellation. To sign up for the class call our office (877)335-4016 and say you want to register for the Mississippi Class. You can also RSVP to info@carlsonds.com with the subject Mississippi Class.
 
OK, here's the class I mentiioned. Y'all come on down!! looks like it is going to be a good class. I'm trying to get them to hold this thing at the Holiday Inn next to Bass Pro Shop. Get the class, catch a Braves ball game and get all that fishing gear that you really want.

[Dent Cermak]

Well, we had the class. I won't say that it was a good class, but the end resault is that we will be switching totally to Carlson. I learned more stuff in 2 days than I have ever before in anyother "training" class. Man!! The things I can do now! A seamless interfgace to the field crews and a little simpler system that meets the needs of my company AND MUCH less exspensive!! Much more bang for the buck!! Face it, surveyors will never need 90% of the Civil3D package, so why pay for something that I will never use?

[Slim©]

Sounds like it was productive at the very least.

[Dent Cermak]

One of the big things that was re-enforced in my mind is that if you are among the 95% of the companies NOT using the coding and Field To Finish, you are pizzing away a ton of money!! But PLEASE keep doing it, because my company will be able to do the work faster and, therefore, cheaper. We will smoke your azz!
The coding works totally differently now than it did before. And if you are still relying on TDS, please keep doing so. I hope smoke does not bother your eyes. There's POWER in that there coding and if companies are going to remain competitive, they better learn how to use it.
One shot on a tree will bring in your tree symbol AND the lable for size and type. I shoot a culvert pipe and the shots draw the pipe, label size and type AND labels the invert elevations. If people are still doing that by hand, they need to understand that that all happens as I bring in the files via Field to Finish. That takes about 2 minutes. I'm gonna like this!!

[mjfarrell]

Dent,

Love your enthusiasm for this!  Just this afternoon a gentleman using the 'new' line coding in C3D (an OLD surveyor) was able to do pretty close to exactly what you describe here.  And then processed his lines and codes in the office in around 10 minutes, to get his DTM, contours, symbols, etc. all ready for the finished drawing.  Most excited as he realized they had allowed FOUR (4) hours for this task.

You are right about anyone NOT doing line coding in the field will be getting eaten alive by those that do.  Only Carlson isn't the only way to get there.   

[Dent Cermak]

No, it is not the ONLY way to do this, BUT it gives me more options and Codes than my Civil3D/LDD. PLUS I keep hearing about all of the survey tools that AutoDesk has removed from survey. Plus, their weak spot is text and Auto-annotation. Compared to what I can now do Attributes are incredibly cumberson.
I just cannot justify the cost of a Civil package to do what I do. AutoDesk really should have kept them separate and introduced a good field package. They chose not to do that. I don't know why.
Wheather you call it "Field To Finish" or "Figure Prefix library and Descriptor Keys", you better learn how to do it in the field and office, or you will be left in the dust.

[Slim©]

What kind of setup, preparation is needed to get things to look the way company standards require?

[mjfarrell]

The funny thing is about; say 6 years ago, Carlson and Autodesk released a product called Field Survey.  (then they killed it)
It was probably one of the best products they (Adesk) ever released most everyone that used it loved it because it was simple and it worked.  I think Carlson got, or used more of the knowledge of putting that product together than Autodesk did, and are most likely putting it to good use in the product you have working with.


Yes there is setup involved with both products to get them meet your particular standards.

[Dent Cermak]

What kind of setup, preparation is needed to get things to look the way company standards require?

One file and your standard *.dwt file. EVERYTHING is pretty much done in the Field To Finish setup. All symbols, point groups, auto line work, labels, etc. Those 2 files set up most everything except the variable text options. A one time setup. IF you know how all of it works, the setup time is minimal, probably less than 4 hours for someone that can type. Seeing that I was not TOTALLY into every switch and my other normal limitations, it took me a weekend to get everything peaked and tweaked. Now it is simply a matter of copying these two files to all the other computers (in the office AND in the field) and we will all be setup the same way.  AND these two files both go in the same place. No chasing all over your hard drive looking for the proper place to put files.
Please understand that my company does ONLY surveying. We do no "engineering"stuff. We leave that to the folks what owns us. So our setup requirements are rather basic and limited to what we do. That's what I like about this package, it is only what I need ands I do not have to wade through a bunch of engineering functions to get to where I need to be.
Oh, MJ, Carlson Field Survey is still alive and well. That's what we will be using on the hand held field computers.

[sinc]

Well, that's nothing.  I managed to get all my C3D F2F stuff working great, including figuring out all the quirks of Point Styles and Point Label Styles, especially when Named Plot Styles are involved, and figuring out all the rotate bugs, and coming up with the pre-processor that converts the CSV to FBK, and figuring out all the bugs involved in coordinate transformations in C3D, etc., etc., and I probably didn't spend more than a few months total.  And I ripped out hardly any of my hair.

(Although, to be fair, it was with C3D 2007, which was considerably harder to work with than C3D 2010.)

[James Cannon]

Never thought I'd learn so much about C3D in a thread I started reading to find out about Carlson Civil/Survey.