One of the biggest oversights I've seen most firms attempting to shove their employees faces into the Revit shitpile have is that even though this software bills itself as being 'teh awesome sauce' for collaboration - how you actually get to the point where you can collaborate is pretty much up to the individual firm to figure out.
Now that's all fine and good - since everybody is going to do things their own way, but that's all fucked and shit, since everybody is going to do things their own way. I've railed about office standards going out the window with the advent of Revit - and despite some well-meaning (but more or less incompetent) attempts at reigning people back in - an 'every man for himself' attitude towards Revit standards has prevailed.
I don't think I've seen two Revit models that were set up the same way in the entire time it's been in use. Every single one is started by someone flying by the seat of their pants, often attempting to reproduce a 2D set of CAD concept drawings that a client provided. (This is where you actually see part of the Reviteer argument of the benefit of 3D drawings in reference to helping the customer understand, because a lot of the people they have designing/drafting can't actually read construction documents either).
Now, the 3D model generally doesn't go anywhere, so with only a few exceptions, most of the views on the final Construction Documents will be 2D plans and elevations (and I can see the benefit in having those be coordinated), but if you were to put the average Reviteer in front of those drawings, they wouldn't be able to reverse engineer (or reverse architect as the case may be) them into a 3D model to save their lives.
Their argument starts to fall apart though , because if you are doing design, (or even drafting/modeling) - you need to have at least a basic understanding of what it is you are doing. I've watched a number of Revitbots whip up some seriously fancy Revit shit, 'ooh' and 'aah' the client, suck their own dicks for being so awesome - and then get kicked square in the balls when it comes time to generate a set of CD's because there isn't a single fucking thing in the entire goddamned model that is correct.
So, now you have barely competent people responsible for setting up models that are intended to be used and/or linked by multiple disciplines - and while concepts like 'worksharing', 'worksets', etc. get thrown around a lot as buzzwords, it's entertaining to listen to people (both in-office and online) try to accurately define them. They will talk about 'coordination' like it's something that didn't exist prior to the Revitlution. In their defense (and at the risk of sounding like an old fogey), a lot of them were still in school when we were already successfully designing and constructing buildings.
As I always say - if they want to stick their own dicks in the pencil sharpener, go for it. The second your incompetence starts to impinge on my ability to do my job though, it's fucking on. You hear a lot of Revit Apologists and Sanctimonious Motherfuckers (c) making a semi-valid point about people who dislike Revit just not having taken the time to learn how to use it.
It also doesn't help that most of the posts you read where someone is actually *IS* trying to learn how to use it (usually while trying to get around something that should be simple, but has them at a fucking standstill) get derided by the 'Revit Elite' unless they are carefully worded and avoid anything that could be construed as 'ACAD Thinking'. I need to take more time compiling posts that I read where someone asks a question - maybe even gets a fairly well-intentioned answer that is wrong and/or doesn't solve (or even address) the problem, and that's where the thread dies.
People have an almost compulsive tendency to want to answer questions - even if they don't have a frame of reference (or any idea what they are talking about), and when called out, it's easy for a Revitbot to just start vomiting all over the discussion by regarding every problem related to Revit as 'user
error' or 'user complacence'. It fails, however, to take into account
that Revit hasn't made the first attempt at addressing the 'flux' aspect
of projects.
When crunch time comes (and it always
comes), there are going to be several disciplines - all attempting to
get their work done at the same time. This is about the same time
someone with actual experience notices that they've been being
bullshitted by the Reviteers (you would think they would learn
eventually - but Revit has really sucked all logic out of the atmosphere
in many offices). Now, to get their own drawings in order, they have to pull out all the stops - and a lot of the work you've done up to that point ends up going in the trash bin (if it's not the first time you've actually got a model you can do anything with).
Minor oversights, mistakes, or attempts to fake stuff in as a last ditch effort on the part of other disciplines can keep you from being able to get things to attach to a model (linked or otherwise), or cause them to do unexpected things as the 'bull in the a china shop' process of forging a usable set of CD's from a pointlessly elaborate (while simultaneously helplessly incorrect) model. Since you have no idea what is being done in a model at any given time (linked or otherwise) you can be putting forth your best effort, and someone else can be countering that effort.
If it's linked, you have to keep reloading the model and then play 'Where's Waldo' with what they've fucked up (basically making it the same as exporting it to ACAD - except that in CAD the fuckups will be much easier to see - and fix). If you are all in one model it's better - but not by much. People acknowledge this from time to time - and will make overtures towards setting up the workflow to where the Architectural model is to a certain percentage of completeness before Systems disciplines get involved - but they are still always making their final tweaks even as due dates loom.
Combine this with the fact that I'm often the one catching other people's fuck-ups because I'm the only one actually paying attention to detail - and it's usually only in the last few minutes before a job finally gets drug out the door that they are fixing problems (that I've pointed out repeatedly) like missing or incorrect project information on their titles, spelling errors, messed up floor plans, illegible details, etc. - and you've just lost all the benefit of Reviting in the first place.
Even if it were to mostly come down to sloppy practices on the part of those using Revit, it is still Revit that allows these practices to take place. There were people who didn't give a shit before Revit, and they could be counted on to waste time, money, effort, etc. - but now they can hide behind a model that is too elaborate for anyone to notice the cracks in the facade until they take a closer look. And once those cracks start to show, it's a motherfucker to try to patch them up, and everyone else gets caught in the lurch.
Fuck Revit. Fuck Autodesk. Fuck Reviteers/Revitbots/Revitshits/Revit Apologists. Fuck Sanctimonious Motherfuckers (c), and if you don't like it - FUCK YOU.
-SkulkingFucker
No comments:
Post a Comment