Construction Tech of the Week | Threshold, Combining Plans and Photos

Project documents in the cloud are nothing new. Any decent software that deals with plan files should allow upload, download, and sharing capabilities entirely through a web-based plan room. But Threshold, a new service from San Francisco-based 383 Studio, has added another incredibly valuable step...attaching photos directly to plans to illustrate various spaces/conditions and tagging the photos by service or trade for easy reference and search. 

"When a shot is pinned to a point in the plan, a "room" is created with a click and the image dragged to it. Images are tagged by trade or with custom labels. Items tagged "electrical" show up on electrical plans, "plumbing" on MEP, etc. They show up on multiple plans if several tags are used. Clicking a room shows all photos tagged to that place, in order of upload." 

Click here to learn more about Threshold project plan and photo technology

May Events | SmartBidNet

May 22 - 6pm, SmartBidNet President James Benham speaking to ASPE Chapter 26 in West Orange, NJ about Cloud Technology in Construction
Click here for more details 

May 30 - 2:00-3:30pm AGC TechBrief Webinar: The Must-Have Technology Toolbox, presented by SmartBidNet President James Benham 
Click here for more details 

Version 11.5 | SmartBidNet

LOGIN: The system login page has been updated to show more resources for GC and subcontractor users. We sincerely appreciate any and all feedback submitted via the user surveys.

COMPANIES: Users can now find a company in Show/Search/Export by indicating which custom fields have no value currently on record.

COMPANIES: A check box for "No fax number" has been added to company profiles to prevent companies with no fax information from showing up on the Incomplete Profiles report.

COMPANIES: Under AdminGeneral Settings users can opt to turn off the following fields: IRS EIN, DUNS, qualification status, contract limits, organization type, shipping provider, shipping account number, and rating.

COMPANIES: Check boxes have been added to the Email and Website fields on company profiles to select when a subcontractor has no email address or website, preventing them from showing up in the Incomplete Profiles report.

BID PROJECTS: Users can now assign multiple internal offices on the Project Info tab of any bid project.

BID PROJECTS: GCs can now delete files they have uploaded to proposals.

PLAN ROOM: Two features have been added to improve plan file viewing and navigation. When a file is open, the header of the file viewer will identify the folder origin and path of the current document. The number of pages in the document as well as the page number of what is currently being viewed is now shown.

PLAN ROOM: When ordering plan files, the screen will automatically populate values with 0 instead of the previously ordered values and after the order values have been edited, the system will fill in a 0 for any field left blank.

ADMIN: In the Update My Info preferences, users can select whether they want to be notified every time a company is deleted or removed from their projects.

COMMUNICATIONS: Users can now cancel scheduled communications from the list in the communications widget on the right hand side of the screen.

COMMUNICATIONS: A popup warning has been edit to the Edit Mail window notifying users that copying and pasting for Word may result in formatting issues.

COMMUNICATIONS: A ##BidProjectEmail## merge tag now allows users to automatically add the project managers email address to a communication and can be added to users' Global Template.

COMMUNICATIONS: Date Read and Time Read data have been added to the printer friendly version of all communications.

Construction Tech of the Week | Two New Must-Have Mobile Apps

Do we have any fellow Star Trek fans out there? Did we just lose any blog followers by asking that? (Hey, we're a tech company...) To the point: the universal translator - used on the show to translate conversation in real-time for effortless communication across the galaxy. Well, the day has come. You can now have one on your smartphone with the SayHi Translate mobile app. "Become bilingual...instantly," they say. 

Speak into your phone in one language and have it write out and say your words in any other supported language. Essentially, language barriers on the jobsite can be a thing of the past.  A general contractor can speak French into the app and have it spit out German for their subcontractor. Who can reply in German and have the app translate into French again for the GC. It really is that simple and we can't wait to see it transform business, travel, and language learning programs around the world. 

Click here to learn more about this universal translator app

And because we can't wait until next week to show you another of the coolest new apps...let's talk about the MagicPlan mobile app. This app allows you to measure and draw a room plan by scanning a room with your mobile phone camera. Start in one corner and scan the perimeter of the room with your phone and get an instant layout with measurements. This should come in pretty handy for preconstruction...

Click here to learn more about this automatic floor plan app 

Scheduling Tech of the Week | Tungle.me

So this week's tech is used less on the jobsite than to get everyone to the jobsite. Or office. Or conference room. Or Skype conference. Wherever project owners, GCs, subs, and any other stakeholders require a meeting. The question is always, when?

"Eliminate the back of forth of finding a time to meet. Easily share your availability with anyone. Prevent double bookings and forget about time zones." 

You can sync almost any type of calendar you have (see list here) to Tungle.me and only share as much info and details as you want with those viewing your profile and availability. Meetings can be proposed and requested directly from your profile and synced back to your calendars. 

Click here to learn more about Tungle.me's technology  

The Must-Have Technology Tools

AGC TechBrief, April 2012
By James Benham, President of JB Knowledge Technologies, Inc., Makers of SmartBidNet

Depending on your age, the technology on your desk has probably evolved quite a bit since your first day there. Whether your beeper was going off at your hip or you were punching away at an encyclopedia-sized laptop, technology today makes those days seem archaic in retrospect. But the best part is there’s a good chance you haven’t even seen the best of today.

Every day, an innovation emerges with the potential to propel your work day into the Jetsons’ era faster than you could have predicted. Many of these developments will be bought by the likes of Google or Facebook, who will then find a way to incorporate them into something you already use or an unreachable luxury for high-class nerds. But some will find their way into what I will call your "Tech Toolbox." These are the technologies that can and will impact personal and corporate bottom lines and whose value far outweighs the minimal capital investment required to employ them. Most are cloud-based, some are free, some are $1.99 in the app store and some are business suites with annual subscriptions well worth the price tag, but all of them can transform your work day.

Click here to read the full article from TechBrief

SmartBidNet Android Mobile App Now Available in Beta!

Our SmartBidNet Google Android app is now available in beta form for download in the Google Play marketplace. Please go here to download and remember that we're still ironing out some kinks: http://sbn.cc/I9z6fp

But we would love to get your feedback, you can contact us here. 

Construction Tech of the Week | The Space Elevator

Alright so this may be month's old news to some - but we just discovered it and had to post. By 2050, the Japanese construction firm famous for the Tokyo Sky Tree claims it will be possible to build a 22,370 mile tall elevator into space. And it will only take you a week to get there. 

"In Obayashi’s plan, a carbon nanotube cable would stretch one-quarter of the way from the Earth to the moon, about 60,000 miles (96,000 km) and attach to some type of spaceborne counterweight. The other end of the tether would be anchored at an Earth-based spaceport...The elevator car could carry up to 30 people and would travel at 125 MPH for a week. Tourists could stay at the waystation at 22,370 miles up, and scientists and researchers could go all the way to the end of the tether."

Before you start packing, you should know there are no estimates on minor details like buildling or passenger costs yet...but still, pretty cool to think about. And Obayashi Corp? Please let us know if you need a bid software for that.

Click here to read more about this space elevator technology 

April Events | SmartBidNet

April 12 - 10am & 3:30pm webinars with the Presidents of both SmartBidNet & Cloud Takeoff on how to seamlessly integrate bid management and estimating takeoff 
Click here for more details 

April 12 - Construction Industry Advisory Council Awards Banquet and Drinks Reception Hosted by SmartBidNet 
Click here for more details

Collaboration, Integration And Interoperability Through The Cloud

Featured in the April 2012 Jobsite123 Newsletter
Written by James Benham, President of SmartBidNet

The evolution of technology in your office probably looked something like this: copy machine, fax machine, microwave-sized personal computer, inter-office email, bulletin board systems, really slow websites with lots of blue hyperlinks, loaf of bread-sized cell phones…until finally instant messaging, laptops, smart phones, printer/scanners and now the occasional tablet came to save the day. No one wants to remember the black screen and green letters – but it’s important to understand how far we’ve come.

Now what exactly made it possible for you to abandon that pager and flip back and forth between your Angry Birds app and this article on your smart phone? Internet? Laptops? Steve Jobs? What if I told you they were all a part of this term everyone is throwing around as if it’s brand new… The Cloud?

Click here to read the full article