CAD Forum

What do you use for markup? Do you use your CAD native tools or a 3rd party application? Is it part of your PDM workflow, or a manual/email workflow?

No PDM here. I save the drawing as a PDF and send it to the engineer and/or sponsor, who will either:

1. Mark it up with the tools in Adobe or Bluebeam and email it back to me . . .
2. . . . or print it out, mark it up by hand, scan it, and then email it back.

matt wrote: ↑Thu May 27, 2021 4:41 pm What do you use for markup? Do you use your CAD native tools or a 3rd party application? Is it part of your PDM workflow, or a manual/email workflow?

Edrawings is a good tool for markups

Nearly all my markup is done with screen shots on Snagit. Then I can paste images directly in the chat apps that dominate my workplace communication.

Most of my cohorts and clients are not interested in installing additional software to view 3D markups.

kawuser wrote: ↑Fri May 28, 2021 8:20 am Edrawings is a good tool for markups

@kawuser I think you may have forgotten to use the SARC button.

eDrawings works so well for us that I get regular comments that reviewers do not trust it.

We do not have a good method although several things have been tried, we are looking for something to fill this need. We have used:
- The age old pdfs to review meeting marked up and scanned, then saved and almost never looked at again except an ISO audit. This is still the common method
- We were using Bullclip (I think that's what it's called) as a stop gap in early 2020 when some people were not in office. We only needed about 20% of it's functionality and it meet maybe 90% of what we needed.
- as I mentioned eDrawings makes a hash of the automated revision table and we had other issues with it so most reviewers use Solidworks to open the drawing as they don't trust what eDrawings is displaying.
- I've seen screen shots of web based review meetings where the markup tools in the web meeting were used.

@matt I'd also like to know what are people doing with the files that the markup tools create? Are they stored next to the drawing file? What if in PDM? is there a straight forward process to to keep the markup file linked to/references a specific version of the drawing? If not how is it obvious what version of the drawing is being marked up so it's clear at a later date?

bnemec wrote: ↑Fri May 28, 2021 11:08 am @kawuser I think you may have forgotten to use the SARC button.

@matt I'd also like to know what are people doing with the files that the markup tools create? Are they stored next to the drawing file? What if in PDM? is there a straight forward process to to keep the markup file linked to/references a specific version of the drawing? If not how is it obvious what version of the drawing is being marked up so it's clear at a later date?

I think it depends on if people are using a configurable workflow for ECO/ECN or approval process. I implemented ProductCenter (a long time ago) and we used digital workflows for approval. The markups were created electronically and were routed around along with the rest of the package.

We use......ahem....a pen and paper.

[running and ducking rotten tomatoes]

mike miller wrote: ↑Fri May 28, 2021 11:24 am We use......ahem....a pen and paper.

I get a lot of that. An engineer will print out the pdf, mark it up with a pen or pencil, scan it, and email it back to me.


Sometimes it's even legible when I get it.

I use Glenn's method with most of my clients. Most of our customers do not understand 3D. We consult several people to understand the drawings that some of our customers have sent. unable to understand, I have to invite the client to the company. sometimes hilarious Autocad drawings come in and make me laugh all day long. some of my customers do not accept drawing and just mark on the sample. (usually those over a certain age.)

All of our drawings are in PDM. When released on an ECO, we create PDFs of all drawings and documents.

When a change is needed, an ECO is created. The users can search for drawings (pdfs), right click and select "Markup" via a custom api add-in. They then select their ECO from a droplist of open ECOs and it copies the PDF to a "Markups" subfolder under the selected ECO folder. It prefixes the PDF with the word "Markup" as well. The markup file data card still has the number, description, and revision and inherits the folders ECO number.

Users then use Bluebeam to redline the PDF. BB beats the hell out of Adobe Acrobat for this task...... In fact it beats the hell out of Adobe for most tasks. And no subscription.