Tag: Grading Optimization

Just to be clear, yes, we need to reference Civil 3D objects between drawings. There is no debate for many of my customers. To what I am referring are the little XML files that are created when you make a Civil 3D object available for sharing: A.K.A. creating a data shortcut. Those little XML files are not always required!

Why am I brining this up now? Well, recently, a few of my customer are stressing out that they need to move projects to a new folder, or they need to archive projects, and they are wondering how things will unfold once they do.

What happens if those little XML files are deleted, moved, or otherwise go missing? Nothing! The path and file name are stored in the DWG file and the object is resolved without the need for those pesky XML files. Remember, it is a relative path to the source files. As long as drawings are moved relative to one another, all is well. If you move the source and host files to vastly different folders, then all bets are off.

So then what are the XML shortcut files good for? They are used:

• When creating data references from the Civil 3D Prospector. If you don’t have those XML files, you won’t see this. If the XML files have been deleted, simply open the source drawing and create new data shortcuts to reference additional objects,

• When moving Source and Host files to vastly different folders. The Data shortcut Editor can be used to repath multiple source files simultaneously. Fixing Broken References. Without those little XML files, you’ll have to repath all references individually.

For any questions reach out to your sales rep or contact us at info@solidcad.ca

There are many ways to send your data to colleagues, partners, friends, and enemies. DWG, LandXML, KMZ/KML, to name a few. They all have strengths and weaknesses. There’s a new(ish) kid on the block now. IFC. It has been around for a while now, especially in the building industry. It is emerging in the Civil Infrastructure industry, hence this article. Read on to find out more.

I am going to preface this article by saying this is very new, there is not that much documentation about it, and I have limited practical experience. Ask me in 6 months and this may change. Please do your own research.

What is IFC? Here is an article explaining it. Essentially, it is e vendor-neutral format used to exchange model data between software applications such as Civil 3D, OpenRoads, ArcGIS, and more. It is designed by a company named buildingSMART.

Until recently, IFC has been for the most part ignored by Civil 3D users, mostly because it really wasn’t functional enough. Last year, buildingSMART released version 4.3 and this version allowed for more robust feature exchange. This year, with the released of Civil 3D 2024, Autodesk provides the tools to import, export, and configure IFC 4.3 format files.

As a Civil 3D user, you must download and install the new extension. It can be found at manage.autodesk.com in Autodesk Access on your Windows desktop. IFC 4.3 does not come loaded with Civil 3D by default.

What are the new commands? The release notes suggest that new commands are available in the Add-Ins ribbon tab in Civil 3D 2024. Maybe it didn’t work for me, or maybe I’m blind, but I do not see them. Most of the commands begin with IFCINF… Here is the online help document for more information.

Is IFC like LandXML? The 2 formats currently do not share 100% parity. IFC does things that XML does not and vice versa. Your choice to use one or the other depends on your use case. Please, for your own sanity, experiment with them both to be certain your needs are met.

One important thing to note is that IFC 4.3 files do not provide 100% round-trip functionality for all Civil 3D objects. Meaning, you can’t export your fancy parametric constraint rich alignment to IFC then import into another Civil 3D drawing and expect it to behave the same. These files are meant to be sent to non-Civil 3D users, surveyors, GIS specialists, etc.

What about the future? Well, IFC 4.3, for all intents and purposes, version 1.0 for Civil 3D users. It is anyone’s guess how things will unfold.

To learn more about Civil 3D, feel free to contact us.

Grading Optimization was a great addition to the Civil 3D 2022 arsenal of tools. It is one of the first tools to incorporate AI into our civil designs and is able to help us get quick preliminary quantities, FG surfaces, and grading objects in a whole new way.

Despite how exciting this is, there are some commonly encountered issues with getting started in GO.

Civil 3D & GO 2022:

One of the first issues I encountered with GO wasn’t apparent until I went to go design an assembly afterwards and got an error message. “Unable to execute the tool.” GO inhibited my access to toolpallets

There has since been an Autodesk Knowledge Centre post created on this. And an update to GO as well as instructions in the link to the post below have offered an effective fix for this.

The important thing to do if you are installing GO 2022 for the first time, is to make sure that Civil 3D 2022 has been installed and opened prior to installing GO 2022.

*This issue will still occur if you install both at the same time without opening Civil 3D before installing GO.

Click here to read Autodesk Knowledge Center post.

This next problem is described in Matt Kolberg’s December 2021 post about the GO windows appearing, but only the shadow edge when you attempt to open the tool.

To capture this fix in a few words, we need to add a new Windows environment variable to our system to enable us to use GO. This is a work around that Autodesk suggested, and a public fix will hopefully be pushed out for GO 2022 in the future.

A link to Matt’s full explanation is below:

https://www.solidcad.ca/civil-3d-grading-optimization-problem/

Civil 3D & GO 2023:

The above issues appear to be fixed in the 2023 version.

The next issue worth exploring is that Grading Optimization requires more from your graphics card than Civil 3D. You may run into this blank warning screen below when opening GO, even though Civil 3D is functioning as expected.

For me, this window popped up to block the screen with no way to close it when opening the Grading Objects Browser.

There is no description in this dialog box, or posts on Autodesk Knowledge Centre, at the time I am writing this post, explaining the issue. This annoying window was due to an outdated graphics driver on my machine that didn’t affect Civil 3D.

After updating the graphics driver, this window no longer appears.

For any questions reach out to your sales rep or contact us at info@solidcad.ca