Demonstration documents are the documents that are being used in the verification process to demonstrate that (designed/built) solutions are compliant with the client’s requirements. Examples of demonstration documents are: test and inspection reports, floor plans, calculations, specification sheets, and compliance certificates.
Typically, verification is the responsibility of the project’s design team or the involved contractor. So, this part of the model is most intensely used by them, and not so much by the client. The client’s role is often limited to reviewing the uploaded demonstration documents to decide whether they are happy with the delivered documentation or not.
Example: Let’s say that you are responsible for the verification of all the acoustic requirements in a project. In that case, you may want to link your verification outcomes to some kind of test report (e.g. a report from an acoustic simulation). That test report is what we call a demonstration document and it is placed in the demonstration documents tree.
Please note that demonstration documents come with their own permissions. You need to have a role with a dedicated ‘edit’ permission for demonstration documents to be able to work with them. Contact the project’s requirements manager to update or amend your role if necessary.
In this article, we will explain in further detail how you can work with demonstration documents in BriefBuilder.
Demonstration document tree
Like pretty much else in BriefBuilder, you capture the demonstration documents in a ‘tree’ or breakdown structure. The access to this tree is located under the Verification heading in the navigation bar.
In the demonstration documents tree, you can find and create demonstration document objects. These objects are not the files themselves, but database objects (a kind of placeholders) that can hold one or more actual files.
The actual files can be found on the object’s detail view, in the table Uploads. The files might have been added manually or they may have been automatically placed there in case you are uploading files from your device or a document management system (DMS) in the verification table.
In the demonstration documents tree, you can also create folders to organize your demonstration documents, e.g. by discipline and/or project phase.
One and the same demonstration document is often used for multiple verifications. For example: a test report for the acoustic quality of a room may be relevant for all the room’s acoustic requirements (reverb time, contact noise, sound insulation etc.). It is therefore handy to create only one document for this, and then refer to this document from multiple verifications. When working with a DMS, this will be done automatically.
Creating demonstration document objects
The objects in the demonstration document tree can be created in two ways: automatically, when using a DMS, and manually, when not using a DMS.
Using a document management system (DMS)
When performing verifications, you will probably work with the verification table or on the detail view of an object. In both instances, you can use the column Demonstration documents (see images below) to directly select a demonstration document from your DMS (assuming you have set up a connection between BriefBuilder and your DMS).
When doing so, the selected file is automatically added as a demonstration document in the demonstration document tree.
Each selected document will be represented in the Demonstration documents tree, in a dedicated folder so you can easily see where the document originates from.
If you select the same file multiple times, the BriefBuilder application will check whether it concerns the exact same document. If that is the case, the verification will point to the earlier created document to avoid unnecessary duplicates.
Working with Autodesk Construction Cloud or BIM 360? We have a dedicated video for that. See below. For a more generic explanation on the use of a DMS, take a peek at this article.
Uploading manually
If you are not working with a DMS, you must create your demonstration documents manually in the tree, and then upload the files piece-by-piece.
In that case, you must click on the icon on top of the page to add a demonstration document or a folder in which you can group such documents. You can then upload the accompanying file(s) in the table Uploads for each demonstration document object.
Please note: in this option, you must first create a demonstration document in the tree before you can select it from the verification table. So, the recommendation is to start with creating a tree with all the relevant demonstration documents, and only then start doing the actual verifications.
Implications for workflow
The two options above, each come with a different way of working:
With a DMS
- In the verification table, you select documents directly from the DMS
- Those documents are automatically added to the demonstration documents tree
- You only use the demonstration documents tree for if you want to organize/structure all the documents that have been created
Without a DMS
- Before doing your verifications, you create all the relevant demonstration documents in the tree and upload the relevant files.
- Once you have done so, you use the verification table to link these to your verification results.
Working with file URLs only
If, for some reason, it is not possible to set up an automatic connection between BriefBuilder and your DMS, you can also refer to a document in your DMS by hand with a URL. You will not be using the Demonstration documents tree in this case.
For this way of working, we recommend to add a standard property called “URL to file” to the general set-up of your Verification results.
When doing so, you wil get an extra column in the verification table where you can paste the URL that refers to a particular document.
The disadvantage of this way of working is that the URLs in BriefBuilder will no longer work if the DMS is taken offline. Another disadvantage concerns change management: depending on the DMS that you are using, it could be a possibility that the design team is allowed to edit documents after they have been selected for verification results. This is tricky from a procedural point of view.
To create a standard property for this purpose, you have to:
- Go to Settings in the lower part of the navigation menu
- Go to Verification settings and select Standard properties
- Select Verification Result
- Create a standard property
- Add a name (e.g., “URL to file”)
Please note that this option is a bit of a workaround. When adding an URL property, you will still be able to see the Demonstration document column (with the ‘Select’ option), which can a bit confusing for users.