Automating Reference Standards

Overview

In many specification sections, Part 1 - General includes a Reference Standards article.

This occurs when the section includes RIB Master Reference Standards (those the RIB Specs team updates) somewhere in the body of the section. 

If the need arises to add a reference standard to a section, RIB Master References can be dragged and dropped into the desired location from the Reference Standards tool of the Document Manager. Learn more about Reference Standard Basics here. 

Custom reference standards can also be created through the Reference Standards tool of the Document Manager. Learn more about Creating Custom Reference Standards here. 

The automation of these Reference Standards can be seen by the RT and RS tags added to the Report Column in SpecLink Cloud. Learn more about the Understanding Reference Title (RT) and Reference Text Segment (RS) Tags here.

Steps for Automating Reference Standards

If a section does not have a Reference Standards article, it can be manually added (text entry) and through the use of Summary Info options and specific tags, the article can be automated to work as the RIB article does.

Follow the steps below to create a new Reference Standard article and automate is using tags.

1. Automating Reference Standards begins with selecting the Include References in Each Section option within the References options of the project Summary Info. 
   
   
   
   
2. Next, in the appropriate location within Part 1 - General, add a user paragraph at level 2 and type Reference Standards.
   
   
   
   The Reference Standards article is normally located after the Related Requirements and Price and Payment Procedures articles.
   
   
3. Apply the RT (References Title) tag to this new user paragraph.
   
   
   
   Doing so will automatically tag any added (level 3) Reference Standard with the RS (Reference Standard) tag within this branch. The actual standards do not need to be added here. In the next step, they will be added to the body of the section.
   For more about the RT and RS tags, please see this related guide article.
   
   
4. Drag and drop any reference standard in the Reference Standards tool of the Document Manager into the body of the section.
   
   
   
   As this is done, these standards will be added to the Reference Standards article in Part 1. 
   
   
   
   This process works for both RIB Master Reference Standards as well as any custom user created standards.
   
   As reference standards are added to the section and activating to be included in the project, they will be activated automatically by linking in the Reference Standards article.
   
   

Watch the video below to see the steps of automating Reference Standards in SpecLink Cloud.