Architect, you must be good at math

There is more to architecture than just math. When you get a chance, take a look at any architecture program near you. Mathematician, author and professor John Allen Paulos has said, "Mathematics is no more computation than typing is literature." If there is something deterring you from an architecture career, let it not be math.You can do it with the help of a calculator too.

Haiti

It's been over a month since the fatal earthquake and aftershocks in Haiti. Global support has come to the rescue, while Haitians try to recover physically, morally, and emotionally.
Design competitions are now coming to surface. Already google-able:
http://www.spontaneousarchitecture.net/
http://www.e-architect.co.uk/haiti/music_studio_design_competition.htm

Any lessons learned for the design sector? We will look back and reexamine current emergency facility planning and infrastructure, soil analyses, and seismic design systems to avoid repeats.

What the AIA can do

I have ran into an article about the AIA Minnesota chapter and their efforts to respond to the current times in the profession. http://www.downtownjournal.com/index.php?&story=14973&page=65&category=0

Can we turn this into a national effort?

The Minnesota chapter is giving a few great ideas. A step into responsive change. An excerpt from the link above reads:

In response to such challenges, AIA Minnesota has mounted an unprecedented strategic campaign to get architects back to work. In the winter of 2009, the organization launched its Members in Transition Group, a monthly gathering aimed at providing resources for the unemployed. Continuing education is its prime concern, and the group hosts free software training sessions, sponsored by product vendors and smaller firms. The Members in Transition arranged a deal with BWBR architects, a St. Paul firm, who over a two month period allowed unemployed AIA Minnesota members to come in and train on the firm’s computers.

Aside from software training, the group has brought in the chief AIA economist from Washington, D.C., for small group financial consultations, as well as invited high-level industry people from Minnesota’s Council of Firms to meet face-to-face with job-seekers. Other resources include interview preparation workshops and an online “skills matrix,” which allows employers a more efficient way to find talent for contract work and short-term projects.

A “Recovery Task Force” has been formed at the state level as a sort of think tank to address the larger issues facing the industry. AIA Minnesota President Rich Varda, who is also Target’s Chief of Design, has arranged for a graduate class at the Carlson School of Management to research the changing nature of the profession.

But with the outcome of these measures as uncertain as the employment picture, the only thing that local architects are certain of is the need to evolve.

How do you think the AIA can help you?

Selecting All

The Select All Instances tool does in fact select all similar elements in your ENTIRE model. If you are modifing model elements (stretchers, lavatories, windows, walls, etc), or annotation elements (dimensions, keynotes, tag, etc) and decide to ‘select all instances’, you will be modifying elements in the entire file, all floors and all sheet views.

Sure it'd be nice to Select All Instances in this view only, but that's not the case... yet.

In AutoCAD terms, Select All Instances is like CAD’s Quick Select tool across the board. Quiet useful... and potentially harmful.