Topic: How do you compare the same drawings that have been updated?

[MSTG007]

This might be a strange question. I would not say this happens to us a lot, but we deal with surveyors who like to go out and give us progress drawings. Usually with our deadlines, we have to use the preliminary survey before we get the final.

Question is, if we do a lot of layer control within the preliminary survey. What is the easiest way to compare the differences? (Without asking the surveyor exactly what changed, etc.)

Is there a way a routine can highlight the differences in location of XY entity objects?

Like I said, just curious what you guys do... Thanks for the feedback either way...

[Rob...]

Autodesk used to have a drawing comparison tool that worked quite well. I'm sure that has advanced some.

BlueBeam has one that is pretty good.

[Matt__W]

Xref one into the other. Set one's color to red, the other to grey. This will make it obvious what has changed.

[MSTG007]

We do have BlueBeam Revu, Not really an expert on it yet, just use it as a PDF Reader. Can you elaborate possibly on how to do this? Looks interesting...

[MSTG007]

Oh yea... I have already done that. about xrefing and changing colors. Just panning around its hard to tell. I like Magenta in the for the updated and send it to the back of the original drawing objects.

[Matt__W]

We do have BlueBeam Revu, Not really an expert on it yet, just use it as a PDF Reader. Can you elaborate possibly on how to do this? Looks interesting...

https://www.bluebeam.com/us/bluebeam-university/pdf-tutorials/revu-11/compare-documents.pdf

[mjfarrell]

This might be a strange question. I would not say this happens to us a lot, but we deal with surveyors who like to go out and give us progress drawings. Usually with our deadlines, we have to use the preliminary survey before we get the final.

Question is, if we do a lot of layer control within the preliminary survey. What is the easiest way to compare the differences? (Without asking the surveyor exactly what changed, etc.)

Is there a way a routine can highlight the differences in location of XY entity objects?

Like I said, just curious what you guys do... Thanks for the feedback either way...

Part of the challenge is all tis 'layer control' INSIDE the original drawing,  one might want to do that layer control to the XREF of that drawing,
then it doesn't matter what changed, because the XREF will always be current (given you replace/rename the old xref with whatever new one
they provide you with.

Although the question might still remain "What is new and what do we need to avoid, remove, relocate, or otherwise impacts the design?"

But the first thing I would do is stop messing around inside the surveyors file.  (Unless of course they are providing you with a civil 3d file and you MUST
make changes to object styles, etc.  If that is the issue then they should have a template provided by you to do their work in.  Then it arrives ready for you to use.

Also I think with a little file naming creativity DWGCOMPARE could work for you.

[MSTG007]

Interesting  . . . Yup this stuff still has Civil3D Objects in it. Let me try to play around with this ideas.

[Jeff H]

Xrefing works pretty well.

I create a compare drawing for some projects and have code that will copy everything into new drawing and sets all on Layer 0 and ByBlock.
Then overlay it over two instances of previous version with draw order different so one set shows what was removed and the other shows what was added.

For anyone not familiar with xrefing to compare here is an example and can go ahead and have yourself ready for next update.

[ronjonp]

I overlay the old file into the new & use this simple code to change layer colors:

Code - Auto/Visual Lisp: [Select]

1. (defun c:checkchanges (/)
2.   (vlax-for x (vla-get-layers (vla-get-activedocument (vlax-get-acad-object)))
3.     (if (wcmatch (vla-get-name x) "*|*")
4.       (vla-put-color x 1)
5.       (vla-put-color x 5)
6.     )
7.   )
8.   (princ)
9. )

[danallen]

I do both xref & bluebeam compare. I usually ask consultants for PDFs for coordination as record because CAD is too volatile with xrefs after several months have changed. The bluebeam compare is a life-saver for me when I have to write narratives for drawing changes to contractor, that's how I usually catch sneaky civil engineers changing things on me and not clouding (or clouding whole damn drawing).

[Jeff H]

Isn't all the blue beam thing do is just overlay old to and new to see what it covers up or not

[Jeff H]

Also this would be a great time for Revit Snob remark.

[ChrisCarlson]

Isn't all the blue beam thing do is just overlay old to and new to see what it covers up or not

In a roundabout way, yes.

[danallen]

Isn't all the blue beam thing do is just overlay old to and new to see what it covers up or not

yes, but it does old in green, new in red. The stuff same in both goes black, highlighting the changes in color easy to see. I review plans, make notes on the overlay and then copy/paste in place into the new drawings to send comments back as required.

[dgorsman]

Isn't all the blue beam thing do is just overlay old to and new to see what it covers up or not

yes, but it does old in green, new in red. The stuff same in both goes black, highlighting the changes in color easy to see. I review plans, make notes on the overlay and then copy/paste in place into the new drawings to send comments back as required.

I've done similar with DWF files and Design Review.