JOCWorks JOCWorks Project Estimator Online Tutorial RSMeans Company, Inc. Printed: June 2010 Online Tutorial Online Tutorial This Online Tutorial guide will be a great reference for us anytime we would like a refresher in the basics of our project estimator. We will walk through everything we need to create a new project, find and add line items to our estimates, as well as print out and import and export those estimates. We will just touch the surface of each of these areas here. See the Training Guide and User’s Manual for more information on each of these features and processes. Before we get started, let’s do a quick maneuvering lesson. There are a few ways to navigate in the program: You can use the window’s program button, which is located at the bottom left of the window. Or you can use your mouse to right-click in the window; this brings up the same menu of options as the program button. There are times you can press a specific key on the keyboard such as ENTER, INSERT, or DELETE. You can use your mouse to single-click; this sets focus and selects that item. You can use your mouse to double-click; this generally selects and opens that item. Some windows have toolbar icons as well as hotkeys that reduce the steps needed to perform common features in the program. Throughout this document, we will see some tool icons to call attention to information on the page. This symbol will let us know that we are learning a key process or piece of information in Project Estimator. This symbol will let us know that there are other available tools or options in our Project Estimator to accomplish some of the processes we do. Copyright © 2005-2010 by RSMeans Company, Inc. All Right Reserved Portions Copyrighted © 2001-2010 by 4Clicks Solutions, LLC. All Right Reserved JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 2 of 14 Online Tutorial Creating a Project When we open our Project Estimator, we see the Projects window. To create a new project, we simply right-click in the Project browse and select Insert new project after Selecting a Performance Period . This brings up the Select Performance Period window. A performance period simply helps identify our contract vehicle and sets up our new project with our standard markups and default information. We then highlight the performance period we would like and then click on the Select button . (If we do not want to select a performance period, we can also click the Select None button to add our project without any default information or totalling components.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 3 of 14 Online Tutorial This brings up the Inserting New Project window. There are two fields that need to be filled in order to add the new project, Project Number and Description . There is one other key field that we may want to verify, the Default Schema field . This determines the default totalling components applied to new estimates. When we have completed filling in the information that we desire for this project, we can click the OK button on the bottom right of the window. This returns us to the Projects window with our new project . highlighted (TOOL TIP: Our Project Estimator will automatically check for duplicate project numbers. For more information on our options for this, see the User’s Manual.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 4 of 14 Online Tutorial Creating an Estimate Now that we have a new project, let’s see how we can create a new estimate within that project. To open a project, we simply doubleclick on it. From the Estimates tab of the Update Project window, we can simply right-click in the Estimate browse to bring up our menu options . The first option, Insert Estimate after Selecting Totalling Components, allows us to select our totalling schema for the new estimate. The second option, Insert Estimate (With the Default Totalling Schema), inserts the new estimate with the project’s default totalling schema. The Inserting New Estimate window will open after either option. Now we can enter a name for the estimate in the Description field . After we finish adding any other information we would like, we can click the OK button on the bottom right of the window. This returns us to the Update Project window with our new estimate highlighted. (TOOL TIP: By default, your project will already include an estimate. Therefore, you may not need to add any estimates to your project.) (TOOL TIP: Our Project Estimator allows us to create and then Import Default Estimates under our Estimate Tools menu option. For more information on this command, see the User’s Manual.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 5 of 14 Online Tutorial Searching an RSMeans Guide Selecting an RSMeans pricing guide, we can see that there could be literally hundreds of thousands of line items available. Project Estimator provides us with the most robust searching options available. If we already know all or part of our line item number, we can simply begin typing our number, and our numbers will automatically fill in the Locate field (found at the top left of the window) and incrementally find the number in the guide below. (The dashes will automatically be included for us.) We can also select from a number of different utilities geared to help us search our guide. Each utility approaches searching from a little different angle to allow us the greatest efficiency in finding our line items. They can all be accessed through our right-click menu options . . The Index is The most intuitive option is the Index exactly what we would guess. It is just like opening the back of a hard copy pricing guide to search for our items. We simply begin typing in our word. Our words will automatically fill in the Locate field and incrementally find the index description. We can double-click on our desired description to go directly to that line item in the pricing guide. The Navigation Tree is basically a detailed table of contents . This option allows us to drill down through a division looking for a specific area of the pricing guide. Clicking on the plus sign opens a section, and then we can highlight the item we would like and click the Locate Item button on the bottom left of the window. The most powerful option is the Search . This is looking for a word or set of words in the description of all of the guide’s line items. We can type our words into the Search field, and click the Get Results button in the center left of the window. This will cross reference our exact words in the line item descriptions to find only those line items containing all of the words we typed. We can then highlight our desired line item, click on the Line Item button on the bottom left of the window, and select Locate the selected item in the current pricing guide. This takes us directly to that line item in the pricing guide. JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 6 of 14 Online Tutorial One additional powerful searching option is the Favorites function . Favorites are commonly used line items that our team can access quickly. This takes a pricing guide from hundreds of thousands of line items and shows us just our list of favorites. To access this option, right-click, select Favorites, and select Favorites again . Searching through our Favorites works much the same as the Index. The Locate field searches alphanumerically through either the line item number of description depending on the tab we are using. The Query field will look for the letters/words provided throughout the full line item descriptions. The result will filter out all other line items without those letters/words. If a line item is in our Favorites, an “F” icon will appear next to the line item number in our Guide. All of these search utilities are designed to provide us options to find the line items we desire . We can try them all and use the ones that are the most comfortable to us. (TOOL TIP: The guides in our Project Estimator provide an incredible number of options and resources to us. For more information on this command, see the User’s Manual.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 7 of 14 Online Tutorial Entering Line Items Now that we have found the line items that we wanted for our estimate, we need to add them to it. We have two basic options. We can add line items one at a time or in groups. To add a single line item, we simply highlight the line item and rightclick on it. Our first menu option is Add Currently Highlighted Line Item . When we select this option, the Update Line Item Details window opens. We can simply type in a number in the Quantity field . We can also type in Notes for the line item as well as a Takeoff Formula to help us determine our quantity. (TOOL TIP: We fill in the Takeoff Formula just like we would in Excel™ without the initial equals sign. The number pad on our keyboard is the easiest way to fill in this field. For more information on this command, see the User’s Manual.) (TOOL TIP: We can update any of our estimate line items on our Updating Estimate window with the Update Line Item Details window.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 8 of 14 Online Tutorial We can also add multiple line items at one time. We can click the checkbox at the left side or each line item to tag the line item. (We can also press the Space Bar on the keyboard to tag the items.) Then when we right-click in the browse, we can choose the second menu option, Paste Tagged Line Items to Estimate . This brings up the Default Line Item Values window. Here we can add a quantity, notes, or a takeoff . We can also use the UM field to ensure we are adding the line items with the unit of measure we want. (See more about Unit of Measure Conversions in this manual.) When we close the pricing guide, we are returned to our Updating Estimate window. We can see the line items that we have added . We can also see the notes and takeoffs for the highlighted line item . (TOOL TIP: These options to add our line items to our estimate are similar regardless of the pricing guide we are using.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 9 of 14 Online Tutorial Printing Estimates When we are done adding line items to our estimate, we can click the OK button on the bottom right or the Updating Estimate window to return to the Estimates tab of the Update Project window. Now let’s print out our estimate. The first thing we need to do is tag the estimates that we would like to print. We can click the checkbox or press the Space Bar on the keyboard to tag our estimates. We have used the right-click menu extensively. Now that we want to run a print report, we need to use the Reports button at the bottom left of the window. So, let’s click on the Reports button and select Print Estimates . JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 10 of 14 Online Tutorial This brings up the Estimate Report Options window . On left side of the window, we get to choose which Estimate Report we would like. In the center of the window, we get to choose the Options for the specific report we chose. (We can take some time to look through these and see what our options are.) On the right side of the window we find our Output options . If we choose Excel™ or PDF™, we see additional tabs. The Destination Options tab allows us to choose where to save the report, and the File Naming Options tab allows naming the file how we want. Now, let’s look at the Order field . If we had multiple estimates, these options would allow us to print the estimates separately or as one. We can also customize our estimate with the User Text field . We can choose from the pull down list to further describe the organization that accomplished the estimate. We can now click the OK button to print our report . In this case the program exports it to Adobe™ PDF and shows us the Export Completed window . We can click the Open File button to see our estimate. JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 11 of 14 Online Tutorial Exporting Estimates There are two more useful tools that we may need to use quite often. Exporting allows us to save a backup of our estimate as well as share that information with another person or organization. Importing then allows us to access that file by bringing it into our project. So now that we have finished our estimate and printed it, let’s export it. We need to tag the estimate(s) we would like to export. Then we right-click, select Import/Export, and select Export/Backup tagged estimates . This opens the Export Estimates window. Here we can choose our Destination Options , Naming Options ; Export Security options , and add notes to the Export Description . After we have determined our options, we can click the OK button on the bottom right of the window to finalize our export. This will bring up the Estimate Export window showing us where our file was saved. (TOOL TIP: We can use the Copy (Explorer) button to copy the file into our Windows™ clipboard. This can then be used to attach the file to an email or copy to another location if desired.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 12 of 14 Online Tutorial This brings up the Import Complete window . (A difference in the original and new totals usually indicates there is a difference in totalling components.) Clicking the OK button will return us to the Estimate Import window. We are done with the window; so we can click the Close button in the bottom right of the window. We are then returned to the Estimates tab of the Update Project window where we can see our newly imported estimate . (The new estimate will have a clipboard icon to the left of the estimate description to denote that it has just been added and has not yet been edited.) JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 13 of 14 Online Tutorial Contacting Support Technical Support 781.585.7880 or 800.334.3509 softwaresupport@rsmeans.com Our technical phone support hours are Monday - Friday 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM Eastern Time Zone. To provide feedback on this product, you can put it in writing, send us an email, or call us, and let us know what you are thinking. RSMeans 63 Smiths Lane, Kingston, MA 02364, USA Corporate Office 781.585.7880 or 800.334.3509 Facsimile 781.585.3558 www.reedconstructiondata.com/rsmeans/jocworks JOCWorks Project Estimator Page 14 of 14