Manage Civil 3D Dependencies

We are dependent on Autodesk Civil 3D to get our project work done and to execute our work and produce our deliverables. The number of formal data Dependencies inside Civil 3D and our civil engineering and survey projects appears to do nothing but increase and become more complex. Dependencies are trending and dependencies also tend to explode.

Software code-based dependencies are a significant, growing concern in modern software development. There are security checking data dependency apps for that. Perhaps we don’t realize that many of our current social media privacy concerns are directly related to these code dependencies.

We Manage the Dependencies or They Manage Us

Dependencies in Civil 3D are good news until they aren’t.

Most, if not all, production Civil 3D workflows are reference and dependency based. The fact that Civil 3D Features that talk to other Features is a major part of the powerful magic that makes Civil 3D work better and faster. We call that the Civil 3D Dynamic Model.

We learned the Civil 3D skills and workflows to manage this drawing-level set of dependencies. When to use and/or end a dependent reference or not, is an important Civil 3D user skill. Many Civil 3D Features include special dependency (reference) related properties to help us manage dependency behavior in more detail. For example: the dynamic or static data dependencies can be employed in Civil 3D Profile and Section View Features.
We ignore these property details at our own peril.

Who Manages Dependency

A Managed Dynamic Model is a mission critical Civil 3D user accountability.
The ManagedDynamic Model is practically all about how users manage these dependencies for better or worse. Some form of systematic plan is needed to accomplish that.

We recognize that our management attack plan pretty much hangs on what we call The Power of Names. Simply put, when we plan and manage the names and the structures of the dependencies in our drawings the entire process becomes much easier to execute in practice.

Civil 3D doesn’t technically care about the specific names we choose to use. We can choose to wing it on the fly and employ no naming convention at all. We get what we do whether we like the results or not. Denial is a wonderful thing.

Dependencies Creep Around the Project

The dependencies creep and leap beyond a particular drawing into entire Civil 3D projects filled with drawings. Project Data Reference (DREF) and Data Shortcut mechanics come to mind. The management of the dependencies in the DREFs is more than essential. DREF Naming conventions and consistent DREF structures make Civil 3D project management much easier.
See the Civil 3D Project and Setup video page for the essentials to create, manage, and maintain better DREF structures in Civil 3D Projects.

More Dependency in Our Future

The Autodesk leap into the Autodesk cloud apps should clarify to all of is how ubiquitous project dependencies in Civil 3D have become. Porting a Civil 3D project to the Autodesk Docs or Collaboration for Civil 3D Cloud provides great instruction about the webs we weave in Civil 3D.

The on-going Autodesk/ESRI partnership and the Autodesk Connector for ArcGIS certainly means new sets of dependencies to create, manage, and maintain for many civil engineers and survey folks.

The managed nuances of dependencies of the increased levels of software interoperability clearly matter.

How to Avoid Civil 3D Co-Dependency

We can build good behaviors into our workflows to save us from the curses of Civil 3D co-dependency. What are these dependency curses? We know them well.
Many of our Civil 3D whines and complaints center around them:

• Civil 3D projects that are chaotic - Civil 3D Models tend to become spaghetti
• Drawings and projects that require the user who did the work
• Drawings and projects that cannot be easily upgraded
• Project performance issues for design and publish tasks
• CAD Standards inconsistencies
• Lack of deliverable flexibility

Pick any poison from the above list.

We can do something about that. See these three important posts on DREF dependencies:

• Styleless Data References in Civil 3D
• Styleless DREF Mechanics in Civil 3D
• Surface Data References and Civil 3D

Dependencies in Civil 3D are good news until they aren’t.
We often want to preserve the Civil 3D data behind dependencies in our project. The time comes when we don’t. Our Civil 3D users need to know the answer to the Why, When, and How of those processes.

Identify Change of State Benchmarks

We’ve posted before about how Civil 3D user identified benchmarks based on when drawings and models change State are the key to playing the dependency reference game well in our Civil 3D drawing and project-based models.

Revisit Our Heuristics

We must recognize that our design, survey, and QAQC heuristics (Rules of Thumb) do not, and cannot, always translate very well into procedural programmer speak and the resultant software code. Heuristics are general and specific rules and methods we discover and pass around to help us make common decisions quicker.
See the How to See More in Civil 3D Tools post for more about why understanding the importance of the relationship of heuristics and identified benchmarks matters.

Civil 3D user identified benchmarks and our heuristics coupled with the capabilities and nuances of the Civil 3D Object Model help define the boundaries for our managed dependencies in Civil 3D. Meanwhile…

Most design and survey folks get this basic Surfaces example…
Employing file-based point file references in a Civil 3D Surface (in lieu of Point Groups) and exported XML-based Surfaces are a classic dependency reduction examples.
Note that the removal of the different dependencies should occur at different benchmarks in our Surface delivery workflow. When a Surface is ready to be employed in the larger project model, we typically want to prune the dependencies and favor more static sources.
See the Surface Data References and Civil 3D post above for the details.

 

Manage the Synergies of Project Dependency

We can see in this classic Civil 3D Project Template construction video that it is not rocket science to create, manage, and maintain a functional and very practical synergy of the many types of Civil 3D dependencies in our projects. A clear-headed review of a few of our recent projects should produce a reasonable list of things to work on.
Do the do.

Beyond the Data to the Work and the Deliverables

We can all probably agree that one of the best and worst things about Civil 3D production work is Civil 3D’s dependency on Style. Civil 3D Style dependency is a challenge that Reference Templates (TREF) coupled with Civil 3D Project Templates and project Placeholders can help us simplify, manage, and maintain. A mastery of dependency management in Civil 3D allows us more adaptability and a more robust production solution for our project work.

A Managed System for Civil 3D is a fact of life.

Get The Best Managed System for Civil 3D
Get the Framework for Civil 3D

 

Data Relationships in Civil 3D

Updates, additions, and fixes to the posts in this series are on-going.