[rkmcswain]

Originally Posted by BIGAL

In the documentation there is example VBA apps for CIV3D these may help.

We are certainly not looking to rewrite these in VBA. As soon as C3D is out on 64-bit, we will make this move and at that point VBA becomes worthless.

[sakka252]

This is a little lengthy, but I think many people are suffering through a similar situation ... Should our surveying department use Civil 3D?

I am an engineer trying to work with our stubborn surveying department on surveying software. I know a little about surveying and even less about processing points, but I am very capable with Civil 3D just not with it's functionality for surveying.

We have a new guy dead set on using Carlson to process points, however it costs money. We are already on subscription with Civil 3D, and as I understand Civil 3D is highly capable surveying software. (Sinc, your company has gone to using Civil 3D correct?) I understand the new guys point that he knows Carlson, he knows it works, it operates in a way that makes sense to surveyors, etc. However, he really is unwilling to (and really not capable of) diving into Civil 3D to learn how it works and find the functionality. Since I don't really know the inner workings and everyday tasks of a surveyor I couldn't say which one is better or justify spending money when we supposedly have software that can get the job done.

I have played around with pulling points into Civil 3D using the survey database and it really seemed very easy (I have even setup all the styles and groups and working on figure prefix). I am just not skilled with processing points or the equipment database and what is necessary for both.

Ultimately should I give up this fight because Carlson is simply better than Civil 3D for surveying? Could we continue to pull the processed points into Civil 3D and draw the survey in Civil 3D?

Thanks.

[rkmcswain]

Originally Posted by sakka252

Ultimately should I give up this fight because Carlson is simply better than Civil 3D for surveying? Could we continue to pull the processed points into Civil 3D and draw the survey in Civil 3D?

Thanks.

A) Yes
B) What exactly do you mean by "pull the processed points into C3D"? Why doesn't your surveyor just give you a completed drawing that you xref in the background, and a finished ng surface, that you can import with LandXML. If you need the points in C3D, they can be part of the LandXML file also.

(I'm not trying to tell you how to do it, I'm simply asking because that is for the most part how we do it - we are a Carlson for Survey and LDT->C3D for engineering shop...)

[sakka252]

A)Thanks. Out of curiosity, can you give me some functionaly that only Carlson can do and Civil 3D cannot? Or is is just that Carlson user interface operates better for surveyors?
B)Let me clarify. I am actually talking about the drawing the survey not when it moves forward to civil design ... Since we are pretty bare bone these days, there are no surveying draftsmen remaining, engineers draw the survey (the new guys is too slow plus he is managing). If the points are processed by the new guy in Carlson then the engineers would pull the processed points into C3D to draft the survey.

I know there is linework functionality that could draw the majority of the survey by coding it correctly in the field ... My guys are not there yet ... baby steps. BTW do you or any other surveyors use linework coding to help draft your survey?

[sinc]

Originally Posted by rkmcswain

We are certainly not looking to rewrite these in VBA. As soon as C3D is out on 64-bit, we will make this move and at that point VBA becomes worthless.

What apps are they? I'm still quite curious as to what features would be powerful enough to make you want to stay on Land Desktop...

[sinc]

Originally Posted by sakka252

Ultimately should I give up this fight because Carlson is simply better than Civil 3D for surveying?

That is not a given. Unfortunately, there's no fast and easy way to determine which software is better for your purposes. The two pieces of software are different, and have different capabilities. Carlson is somewhat easier to learn. Carlson tends to be a bit more user-friendly - for example, when working on roadway alignments, it can automatically display the alignment and profile on-screen, arrayed in a very readable fashion, with little glyphs on each marking your cursor location on each. Civil 3D can also do things like this, but it takes a lot more work from the user, and it doesn't work as well as in Carlson Civil.

On many levels, the guys at Carlson also think more like Surveyors and Civil Engineers, whereas the guys at Autodesk think more like computer engineers. This thinking is reflected in the design of their respective softwares. One key point is the way Point Labels are handled. Carlson's points can automatically rearrange themselves so they don't overtype. This feature doesn't always work quite as planned, but it generally works pretty well. Meanwhile, Civil 3D doesn't even have it, and we waste a lot of time dragging point labels around.

Carlson is also more like the software we've been using for decades, which makes it easier for people to learn. But we've found that once we fought through the learning curve with Civil 3D, we can do things there that we can't do with Carlson. We can't do what we do with Civil 3D as it comes out of the box, but Civil 3D is far more customizable than Carlson. So we use the Sincpac-C3D in addition to Civil 3D, and we can whip out extremely high-quality products very quickly. If we compare plain out-of-the-box Civil 3D with Carlson, then yes, Carlson is better for Surveyors. But the tools in Civil 3D, combined with those in the Sincpac-C3D, let us do an extremely wide array of Survey tasks extremely quickly, and we can really zip through things that are difficult or time-consuming in Carlson. This has allowed us to be very responsive to clients. When something changes, we can often be ready almost immediately, no matter how significant the changes. This is one of the reasons why we are so busy right now, when other Survey companies in our area are on skeleton staffs, or even shutting their doors.

Then, there is also the nasty yearly upgrade roller coaster with Autodesk, the cost of the software, the cost of training, the cost of hardware to run it, the fact that Civil 3D is incompatible with itself every year, as well as incompatible with Map (which is built-in to the same product)... We had been strongly considering a move to Carlson because of problems like this. But we've simply reached the point where we are too productive with Civil 3D, and even Carlson would slow us down considerably.

So, with Civil 3D, you get incredible power and flexibility, surpassing even Carlson. But will you actually use that power and flexibility? We use it - as a Survey-only company, we often do tasks that we might otherwise hand off to our Engineers, and let them do it. If we were in such a situation, it might be easier for our Surveyors to use Carlson, and let the Engineers use Civil 3D. But in our case, we actually use most of the features in Civil 3D on a regular basis, and Civil 3D is working out to be the best choice for us.

At some point in the future, we will undoubtedly revisit things. We are intrigued by the possibilities of running Carlson on Intellicad or Bricscad. But as of now, we use too many features that those products are lacking, and do not find those to be viable options. We actually use the new features in core Autocad, such as Sheet Set Manager, MLeaders, Annotative Text, etc., and would not want to miss those features. But the other products are improving rapidly, and we will keep an eye on the progress.

Regardless of which software you use, DEFINITELY learn to do auto-linework. That's one of the greatest time-savers you can implement.

[sinc]

Originally Posted by sakka252

If the points are processed by the new guy in Carlson then the engineers would pull the processed points into C3D to draft the survey.

So what exactly do you mean by "processed points"? What exactly is being done in Carlson?

Typically, the field survey data is simply imported, and if the linework and point coding is correct, AND the field guy didn't make any errors, that part is done. In practice, there are typically some coding errors to clean up, but hopefully not many, and this part of the process should go rather quickly.

If that is all you would be using Carlson for, then it does sound like something of a waste of the software...

[rkmcswain]

Originally Posted by sinc

What apps are they? I'm still quite curious as to what features would be powerful enough to make you want to stay on Land Desktop...

In-house built VBA applications.

[sakka252]

Originally Posted by sinc

So what exactly do you mean by "processed points"? What exactly is being done in Carlson?

To be completely honest, I don't exactly know what I mean by "processed points." That is what the new guy says, "I need Carlson to process points!" I believe he is referring to the adjustments that you mentioned, but also boundary/traverse adjustments, to distribute the error amongst the points. Does that sound right?

[sakka252]

Originally Posted by sinc

Regardless of which software you use, DEFINITELY learn to do auto-linework. That's one of the greatest time-savers you can implement.

Thank you for your response. I am doing everything I can to get auto-linework implemented. Can you recommend any good tutorials?