NEWSLETTER

Are You Sacrificing Updating For Control?

Two other articles about the SpecLink updates appear in this newsletter.  Because the type and volume of the updates may seem intimidating, we thought we’d write something that might help you be more comforable as you update your projects. Maintaining control of your text doesn’t mean you have to give up SpecLink’s comprehensive updating.  Many users assume that in order to completely control what goes in their specifications they have to prevent or avoid updating.  This would be true if SpecLink were word processing-based, but it isn’t—updating and control are completely compatible when you use SpecLink.

ARE YOU AFRAID OF UPDATES? 

There is no need to fear SpecLink updates.  The updating process won’t change the text of a project that is underway.  Updates will never overwrite customized text under any circumstances.  In addition, updates will never change text, delete text, or add text—unless you, the user, specifically choose to have that happen.  You can also choose whether to update a particular project or not. Many users update their office master project each quarter but don’t update the projects made from it—this is a reasonable compromise.  Wouldn’t you rather keep your office master up to date so all your future projects will be current?

HAVE YOU ALREADY UNKOWINGLY THWARTED THE UPDATE FUNCTION?

Many users copy SpecLink master sections to make minor modifications and import whole sections instead of editing the corresponding SpecLink master section.  These are poor practices that will quickly lead to obsolete documents. We strongly urge you to use our sections as the basis for your customized specifications. Why? Because copies of
SpecLink master sections ARE NOT UPDATED when the master section itself is updated.

It’s true that importing existing word processing sections is the easier course of action when initially developing an office master.  If you’re happy with using SpecLink only as a word processor, OK.  But if you wish to take advantage of BSD’s updating (not to mention the linking and specifier notes), the better approach is to edit the appropriate SpecLink section to suit your practice, rather than importing whole sections.

HAVE YOU MADE MULTIPLE VERSIONS OF THE SAME SECTION?

The tendency to do this is another carryover from the word processing world — the idea is to pick the appropriate section, pre-edited for the applicable project conditions.  While this technique does work, it transfers the updating function to you, the user, for the copies.  A better use of SpecLink would be to use the original SpecLink section but add all your options to it.  Adding links to exclude mutually exclusive options helps avoid contradictions. feature can make this a very powerful and time-saving tool.

DO YOU COPY SECTIONS TO CHANGE THE  SECTION NUMBER?  

Perhaps the section is referred to by a different number in documents under the control of others, such as Divisions 00
and 01.  That situation may be unavoidable, and if you want to use different numbers (from the 1988 edition of MasterFormat, perhaps?), you certainly can.  But you could get both a different number and updating by simply putting the different section number in the title of the original master section and setting the print format for Level 0 to print the Section Title only.