Basic

Plan Viewing and Printing

Powerful zooming and scrolling makes it easy to view plans. Scroll by dragging the drawing or using scroll bars. Zoom using the mouse wheel, zoom in/out in steps, zoom in on a rectangle or zoom out to show the entire drawing. The Bird’s eye window shows the entire drawing. Clicking a spot in the bird’s eye scrolls the main window to that area. When measuring, the close-up window shows the area under the cursor for absolute precision. Print the entire image or the current view; match the original scale, a percentage of the original scale or fit to the page.

Electronic Planroom Integration

A simple click on a drawing name in an integrated planroom displays and saves the drawing on your computer. Switch from plan to plan without going back to the planroom. Download multiple plans in the background while you’re viewing.

Simple Scaling and Measuring

Set the drawing scale by selecting from a list of scales, setting a custom scale or calibrating from a length shown on the drawing. Measure count, length, perimeter and area in one pass. Combine multiple groups of points in a single measurement. Cut out parts of an area. Digitize arcs with just three points. Transfer quantities to other applications via the clipboard. Measurements cannot be saved with the Basic viewer.

View All Information Created with Advanced Viewers

Any information created with one of the advanced viewers can be viewed with the Basic viewer. Estimators can share their takeoff detail with Project Managers and others.

Pro

Advanced Measuring and Scaling

Measurements can be saved, printed, and displayed in a list. They can be edited, moved or copied. Two point line and rectangle takeoff lets you digitize a collection of lines or rectangles by clicking on the end points. Display the pitch and angle for measurement lines. Extensions (extended calculations) are available for roof areas, volumes and wall areas. Measurements can be displays in an infinite variety of colors and styles (traces). Detail scales let you set a special scale for an area within a drawing.

Advanced Viewing Tools

The Control Panel can be docked into the left side of the main window providing quick access to lists of layers, drawings, measurements, quantities and/or traces plus other convenient tools. You can open extra drawing windows to display multiple drawings simultaneously.

Annotations

Annotate drawings with text, lines, rectangles, ovals, clouds, freehand lines and arrows. Create hyperlinks that connect a link on one drawing with a view of another drawing. Each drawing can display a “legend”. This is a table of the traces used in the drawing with the trace description, unit of measure and the total quantity of measurements using that trace.

Measurement List

All measurements for a project can be shown in a list. Available columns include desctiption, trace, data type, quantity, unit of measure, drawing name, layer, bid code, extension and audit information. The list can be sorted by one or more column values and subtotals can be displayed. Cells in the list can be dragged and dropped in other applications such as Excel. The list can be printed.

Layers

Measurements and annotations can be assigned to layers. The visibility of layers can be turned on and off to show or hide the assigned items.

Bid Codes

Bid codes can be used to merge takeoff information into other applications such as Excel. Standard bid codes can be created or imported with extensive control over bid code formatting. Bid codes can then be assigned to traces or measurements.

Issue Management

During the takeoff process, issues arise that need to be resolved later. The Issue Management features allow you to define issues, and assign drawings and measurements to them. Issues can be flagged as open, critical or resolved. The issue list can then be displayed to see what items still need to be resolved.

FTP Integration

FTP is an Internet protocol that allows an web site to work much like a file server. Many general contractors are using FTP sites for plan distribution. With FTP Integration, the FTP information is entered for a project, the drawings on the web site appear automatically in the drawing list. Selecting a drawing downloads it (unless previously downloaded), adds it to the project and displays it for viewing and takeoff.

Pro-Plus

Advanced Excel Integration

Instead of transferring quantities to Excel, formulas can be transferred that refer back to eTakeoff measurements. If the measurements change, the value in Excel is updated to reflect that change. Formulas based on bid codes can also be transferred. The formula calculates the total quantity for all measurements with that bid code. From Excel, the user can drill down on a formula to see the measurement it uses in eTakeoff.

Extended Measurement Calculations

Extensions allow user input and calculations to be added to individual measurements. For example, a “Wall Area” extension would allow the user to enter the wall height then calculate the wall area as the measurement length multiplied by that height.

Drawing Comparison

Drawing comparison allows you to overlay two different drawings and see the differences between them. Markings that are common to both drawings are shown in black. Markings that exist in the old drawing but are missing in the new drawing are shown in red. Markings that are added in the new drawing are shown in blue. Drawing comparison can be used to compare an original drawing to a revised drawing, compare different floors in a multi-story building or compare a specific unit to the original model in residential construction.

Premier

Quantity Worksheet

The quantity worksheet is used to organize drawings, measurements and annotations. It also lets you perform calculations and easily transfer them to other applications. The quantity worksheet uses a hierarchy of items. The worksheet lets you accumulate quantities across drawings and calculate quantities based on multiple measurements.

Advanced Drawing Management

Purge unused drawings from a project in one simple pass. Generate scaled grid drawings for field sketches.