Feature Requests
Martin Jones Feature Request: Offset Lines and Areas
I'm surprised I'm the first to post this but I have come across it several times in the past. It would be awesome if we could offset either a line or an area either positively or negatively. For example, I got a request in a recent bid to undercut a building pad plus 5ft. There's not a great way to do that right now except to try and drag it around. The same goes for calculating gravel for paving when the details call for it to extend 1ft behind the back of curb. You could trace the curbline and then apply a +1ft offset to get your total fine grading and gravel area. I can imagine that it would be helpful in a lot of other uses. Anyone else think that this could be a useful feature?
Thanks for the post here Martin. Do you expect that the most common use case would be to offset as a new takeoff, or that we actually move the points of the currently selected takeoff?
We've been planning to add this. I think we're getting close on the ability to put it in.
I’d like to chime in as well. For me, I’d like a takeoff item for concrete paving, with a subassembly specific to the gravel. If I can avoid it, I don’t want to do the takeoff twice. Ideally, I’d do the initial takeoff (count, linear, area, etc.) once, then use subassemblies and calculations for the offset items. I could also see this working well for footing excavation/over-excavation, and maybe even utility trenching. I’d really love to eliminate some spreadsheets.
I do the same thing for Ground cover and drip irrigation, except it is an inward offsets, just use the linear qty and remove from area a certain width.
Heber, I would say that normal for me would be offsetting the currently selected takeoff. My dream UX would be in the right-click menu or hotkey > Offset > Dialog box with a number in feet/meters or inches/cm to offset. A positive integer increases the offset (moves the points further away from each other) and a negative integer moves them as an inward offset. Maybe you could even include a checkbox option for "create offset in new takeoff item" or somesuch to cover both use cases if it's not too complicated.
Justin, you can currently do that with parts! I've got a bioretention assembly (If you're not familiar with the term, think of a pond but filled with layers of media that act as a filter). It's actually a Volume takeoff with four different Material parts for the reservoir stone, choker stone, geotech fabric, and bioretention media. I hear that the future release will also allow nesting takeoff items - but for now what you're asking is fairly easy. If you would like a quick walkthru on the setup, let me know and I'm happy to show you.
Todd's example is another great one - he doesn't want put emitters right on the boundary, but if he can just draw the entire perimeter and then offset it inward a few feet, that gives him what he needs without complicated math/guessing. If it's a square or rectangle, it's fairly easy to pull a measurement on the X&Y coordinates from the corners and offset manually - but it gets infinitely more complicated if you have more than 4 corners.