Digital Formats for Project Manuals

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Author Message John Hunter Senior Member Username: johnhunter Post Number: 93 Registered: 12-2005 Posted on Friday, December 09, 2011 - 12:13 pm:    We're seeing an increase in the demand for digital versions of Project Manuals, to the point where for some projects only one or two hard copies are being produced and the majority are distributed as PDF's. Our formats are optimized to produce two-sided printed documents, which may not be best for digital use. Are there changes to the document format that we should be considering to make them more digital-friendly? Sheldon Wolfe Senior Member Username: sheldon_wolfe Post Number: 521 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Friday, December 09, 2011 - 12:55 pm:    Great question; I've been pondering that myself. I've been using odd/even headers/footers for fifteen years or so; they make sense for hardcopy. They don't make sense for reading on a monitor, though. During the change, it's good to use a font that works both on a monitor and online, but as long as it does work in both places, there should be no reason to change. In the end, though, it's likely the guys in the field will be using hardcopy, so I don't think it's safe to favor online viewing - yet. Liz O'Sullivan Senior Member Username: liz_osullivan Post Number: 11 Registered: 10-2011 Posted on Friday, December 09, 2011 - 12:57 pm:    I give my clients 2 PDF sets. 1. One PDF file set up for printing two-sided, that they can send to the printer. 2. One PDF portfolio, with all sections bound together, but separate. Adobe Acrobat does this when you "Combine Files" and select "PDF Portfolio" instead of "Single PDF." Liz O'Sullivan Senior Member Username: liz_osullivan Post Number: 12 Registered: 10-2011 Posted on Friday, December 09, 2011 - 01:00 pm:    Oh, I understand the question now. Good point. I use odd/even headers and footers too. I'm just used to looking at them on the screen and haven't thought about my users that way. I don't have blank pages in the PDF portfolio I send. So that's the only formatting difference I use. Paul Gerber Senior Member Username: paulgerber Post Number: 83 Registered: 04-2010 Posted on Friday, December 09, 2011 - 01:02 pm:    YES!!! Adobe introduced the PDF Portfolio in Acrobat 9. This is sort of the same as using blocks or XREF's in AutoCAD. Each PDF for individual Sections is inserted into the Portfolio. Once the volume of the Project Manual is assembled, the entire Portfolio can be printed at once or a Section can be printed individually. The BEAUTY behind the PDF Portfolio is that the day of inserting blank pages at the end of Sections to maintain page 1 of a section being printed so it is bound on the right side of the book are gone!! When the entire Portfolio is printed, Acrobat prints each "file" (Section) continuously. This has probably saved me on average 2 hours of fooling around on each issue of a Project Manual (60%, 90%, Bid Call issues). It also eliminates the need for the "This Page Left Intentionally Blank" pages after the End of Section (this has always made me laugh, as the page is OBVIOUSLY not blank because it has the header/footer and above noted text on it!!) Personally, I add password security when printing each Section to disable editing but allow high resolution printing. Once I have each volume assembled, I apply the same security settings to the volume. The only word of caution is depending on which Portfolio layout you choose the printing of Entire PDF may not be available. Typically I use "Revolve" or "Sliding Row" Ride it like you stole it!!! Liz O'Sullivan Senior Member Username: liz_osullivan Post Number: 14 Registered: 10-2011 Posted on Friday, December 09, 2011 - 01:13 pm:    Paul, thanks. I didn't realize I didn't need to send 2 separate files! Paul Gerber Senior Member Username: paulgerber Post Number: 84 Registered: 04-2010 Posted on Friday, December 09, 2011 - 01:43 pm:    Liz...you're most welcome. That's what makes this place so great...the little tidbits you get from a variety of sources that make life easier! Ride it like you stole it!!! Christopher Borcsok Senior Member Username: ckb Post Number: 14 Registered: 06-2013 Posted on Thursday, November 14, 2013 - 11:53 pm:    In Adobe Acrobat, View->Page Display->Two Page Viewing AND check View->Page Display->Show Cover Page in Two Page View so the first page gets shown by itself, and enabling you to see left (even) and right (odd) paging as it would be for a book hard copy set. I do not have a similar trick for MS Word, I wish I did, so Word always displays left leafs on the right and right leafs on the left in two page view. In my automated procedures for setting up automatic "Page Deliberately Left Blank" notes to keep new sections starting on odd leafs, I use only a page break, which mean all of my Sections have an even number of pages (but as a result the deliberately blank page uses the same headers and footers as the page that preceded it). Thoughts on a better approach? Chris Grimm, CSI, CCS, SCIPa, LEED AP BD+C, MAI, RLA Senior Member Username: tsugaguy Post Number: 300 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Friday, November 15, 2013 - 12:37 am:    Does your page number in the footer have the page count as well? E.g. Page 3 of 4? If so then the footer could conceivably cause confusion if the blank page is done in Word. Maybe not much chance of confusion but someone will surely receive sections individually at some point even though we'd like to think it doesn't happen. You might find it works better to insert blank pages in Adobe Acrobat Pro after you've combined individual spec PDFs into a single file for each volume. You can quickly run through the bookmarks using down arrow then spacebar, watching for any that begin on an even number. If so, leave bookmark view by clicking the one for page thumbnails, and drag a PDF of your blank page in from a file folder. It sounds complicated but it's not after doing it a few times. But if you don't have page count in the footers,e.g. it is just shown as page 3 there should be no confusion, you're not saying end of section while saying also that there is another page. An autotext entry and a simple macro can help make your blank pages quickly and consistently. I use ctrl-enter, enter about 6 more times, and the words "THIS PAGE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK", required by some agencies. A macro with an empty dir() command and examining the page count in final view can apply it to multiple files in a folder. I wish there were an easier way but I haven't found one yet. Chris Grimm, CSI, CCS, SCIPa, LEED AP BD+C, MAI, RLA Senior Member Username: tsugaguy Post Number: 301 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Friday, November 15, 2013 - 12:41 am:    I'll have to try Liz's and Paul's idea of using the portfolio method. Ronald J. Ray, RA, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: rjray Post Number: 125 Registered: 04-2004 Posted on Friday, November 15, 2013 - 09:37 pm:    WordPerfect allows one to shut off the header and/or footer at any point in a document. I am surprised that MS Word has not copied this feature like they did all the other features of WordPerfect. Chris Grimm, CSI, CCS, SCIPa, LEED AP BD+C, MAI, RLA Senior Member Username: tsugaguy Post Number: 302 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Saturday, November 16, 2013 - 08:33 am:    There must be a way, because some sections in a certain client-specific master say Header Section 1, 2, 3 etc. and have different headers/footer in each of those sections. I've never attempted to create those myself though. Mostly they add to the challenge of getting headers consistent and are often not noticed until reviewing the final resulting combined PDF. But this could be used to stop the header/footet, by making a Section 2 and leaving them blank. J. Peter Jordan Senior Member Username: jpjordan Post Number: 641 Registered: 05-2004 Posted on Saturday, November 16, 2013 - 11:09 am:    In MS Word, you can insert a section break and then create a page format for that section. Go to Page Setup and select the Layout tab. at the bottom, you can "apply" the different stuff to the Whole document or "This point forward." The default setup for footers and headers is that they are linked to the previous section. Find the Headers & Footers tool and look at the "Link to previous" selection, you probably want to deselect this option. Chris Grimm, CSI, CCS, SCIPa, LEED AP BD+C, MAI, RLA Senior Member Username: tsugaguy Post Number: 311 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Thursday, December 19, 2013 - 09:18 pm:    OK, I got the chance to try the portfolio method a few people have been talking about. The simplicity of it is good for sending out to a printer for hardcopy so they can choose print all and they will get the documents sent in order as individual print jobs. What I still like about the single PDF "binder" method: - An excellent final quality control step. You can maximize the window, zoom to page level (Ctrl-0) in single page view, and watch for any sort of anomalies while holding down or tapping the page down key. Even if you use portfolios, you could still combine a draft this way for QC purposes and throw it away when you are done. I use comments to flag problems if any, which are easily found in the Comments List. - You can set initial view so the bookmarks will be on, maximizing user-friendly navigation. None of the portfolio views offer anything close to this. The bookmarks are derived from the filenames, e.g. section number " - " section title. It leaves off the extension. You can instantly page down through the bookmarks and you see full section names. Portfolio views either don't show the filenames or they are cut off after a few letters. You have to put up with animation that slows things down. - The resulting file size is much smaller. Portfolios seem to have a lot of bloat, even with all other things being equal. - The person printing hardcopies doesn't need to look around for how to "print all" because it is the default behavior. The settings I use are in File > Properties (or Ctrl-D) > Initial View tab -- Navigation tab: Bookmarks Panel and Page. Set page layout and magnification as you prefer. I like Single Page Continuous, 100%. Seems to be the least surprises to users while navigating the document because it doesn't jump ahead when scrolling. You could use Fit Width for the magnification because that is what the bookmarks themselves are by default, and I'm not aware of a way to change them all. Open the bookmarks before you save, make sure the width of the bookmark pane is good, and collapse to top level bookmarks with the options button at top left of the bookmarks pane. It only takes a few seconds to do all this once you are familiar. I have finished developing a pretty good macro to add the blank pages, works 98% of the time. Hangs on documents that have a table at the end. Some day I will fix that, as well as use J Peter's suggestions and David Lorenzini's from another thread, to make it drop the header/footer too. It is way fewer documents that need blank pages manually inserted now but I do it in the combined PDF (to follow sections by outside consultants, existing conditions reports, Excel files, etc). I just quickly run through the bookmarks to jump to page 1 of each document (down arrow key, space), watching the page number flash by in the toolbar. When I see an even number, I slip in a blank page. For projects with only a few sections I skip the macro and just use the bookmarks to help drop in blank pages. Christopher I tried your two-page view idea and it is pretty cool. If your sections are very long, it is a lot more pages to look at though. Chris Grimm, CSI, CCS, SCIPa, LEED AP BD+C, MAI, RLA Senior Member Username: tsugaguy Post Number: 312 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Thursday, December 19, 2013 - 09:22 pm:    By the way, I don't use different odd/even headers. Too easy for someone to try changing the header and not know to do it TWICE so things can end up going out still having incorrect information. So much better things to do with our time. Anything is better than lurking problems. Tony Wolf, AIA, CCS, LEED-AP Senior Member Username: tony_wolf Post Number: 60 Registered: 11-2007 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 09:45 am:    Does everyone still insert blank pages at the end of even-numbered sections? Does this have a benefit other than to allow contractors to split-up hardcopy sections? It seems a practice that will go away as hardcopy becomes less used. Ronald L. Geren, FCSI, AIA, CCS, CCCA, SCIP Senior Member Username: specman Post Number: 1169 Registered: 03-2003 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 10:24 am:    The printer does it at the time of printing. I don't intentionally add blank sheets in the PDFs or MS Word files. Ron Geren, FCSI, AIA, CCS, CCCA, SCIP www.specsandcodes.com David J. Wyatt, CDT Senior Member Username: david_j_wyatt_cdt Post Number: 53 Registered: 03-2011 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 11:33 am:    Actually, the slip sheets are added to odd-numbered sections so the first page of each succeeding section is on the right-hand. This will seem silly when we finally evolve into a paperless world. I put "slip sheet" pages in my pdfs because it saves time on the printer's end. If they know my pdfs are print-ready, then they just run them and send them out, usually the same morning, even on large jobs. Robin E. Snyder Senior Member Username: robin Post Number: 492 Registered: 08-2004 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 11:41 am:    I don't add them. As far as I know, the printer charges the same fee whether they add blank sheets or not, and, so do I, so why spend my extremely valuable time doing it? Over hundreds of project manuals, I have been requested to add blank sheets on maybe 5 projects. Ronald J. Ray, RA, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: rjray Post Number: 126 Registered: 04-2004 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 12:26 pm:    I add blank pages, without footers, within the original word processing file. It is very easy using WordPerfect. Robin E. Snyder Senior Member Username: robin Post Number: 493 Registered: 08-2004 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 12:31 pm:    Ronald Ray - I have done this on a couple of occasion. Then, the specs get modified and what was an odd numbered section is now even, and vice versa, so now I have to double check again to make sure all is correct. Again, why duplicate an effort that the printers do as part of their service? Lisa Goodwin Robbins, RA, CCS, LEED ap Senior Member Username: lgoodrob Post Number: 231 Registered: 08-2004 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 01:17 pm:    I'm with Robin on this. Why waste my time? But we still have clients who insist on it, especially government agencies. It's just added stress on the final day. - John McGrann Senior Member Username: jmcgrann Post Number: 107 Registered: 03-2002 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 01:53 pm:    Normally I don't bother, but I do have one client that handles their own printing in-house. Being a highly valued client instead of a reprographics vendor means that I spend some quality time using Bluebeam to add the appropriate blank pages. John T. McGrann, Jr., AIA, CSI, CCS, LEED AP Ronald J. Ray, RA, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: rjray Post Number: 127 Registered: 04-2004 Posted on Friday, December 20, 2013 - 08:02 pm:    Robin. I don't add the blank page until the specification section is finished and I know I won't be opening that file again. It probably takes me no more than 10 seconds to add the blank page and discontinue the footer. I doubt that I have had to modify more than one section per project after I thought the section was completed. Since most Project Manuals that I prepare are seldom printed, when they are printed, it is usually by a company that is inexperienced in adding the blank page.