No need to go into Door Properties for an existing door.
Just double click on the doorswing and the doorswing dialog will appear.
Click the same doorswing again to change orientation or choose another type.
Very neat.
When we used to draw these on tracing paper, scratching out the doorswing and redrawing it was a real pain :-)

A strange but very occasional problem has been reported across old (v16) and new (v2003) versions of Allplan.
If you suddenly find that all lines are being drawn in construction line format - even plot layouts - so that nothing will plot and 3D elements do not display in the animation window, the answer - and this is the only thing that will cure the problem - is to click on the drop down list of line styles and reselect a linestyle.
What seems to be happening is that Allplan has no line style, or possibly pen, selected internally and is drawing everything in 'no linestyle' - or possibly just alerting you to the problem.

Why it happens is not clear but this is the only way I have found so far to fix the problem when it happens.

Plot layout Windows are really useful - allowing you to group drawing files brought into the Layout editor and so move them all around as one unit on the sheet.
What is not so obvious is how to change the size of the 'window' on the drawing files included.
The tool required is 'Modify layout window' (fairly obvious!) and from the offered list of sub-commands choose 'Scale Layout Window'.
Then indicate a corner of the layout window you wish to resize and Allplan will immediately give a 'rubber band' on the corner allowing you to drag the window size in and out. Place a point for the corner and repeat as often as necessary.

Allplan v2003 introduced many helpful touches - one of them seems to be remembering the last input value.
When you select the circle command it is now common to find that a value already exists for radius in the command line box entry. This has the slightly unfortunate effect of making the circle radius jump to that value and although it can be overriden by snapping a point, to have the 'rubber band'-ing of radius available as it used to be in previous versions, you need to change the input value to zero from whatever was already there.

I had a problem recently where the top of the window created in the Smart Symbol Designer would not align itself with the top of the window opening in a wall.
The solution was to set the lintol height to zero in the Reveal settings in the Window Properties.
No idea why this works but lintols are probably best omitted from anything other than very standard types of walls.

After importing a dwg file if you find that circles and other elements cannot be selected by the filters in Allplan, right-click on a circle and check if the line, colour or pen is assigned to 'From Layer'. While you can then press the Layer button in the dialog to individually switch this off by unticking the check boxes in the Layer dialog, it is best to use the Option button when importing to check the box in the bottom right of the Advanced Import Options->Explode 'From Layer'. This removes this feature from the elements when imported.

Although listed in the standard Allplan colour library RAL is not included - a pop-up says a licence is needed. Well, at the moment [August 2005] it is possible to download the RAL, and also the Pantone colour libraries from the wonderful resources page at Nemetschek Hungary. (Note..Internet Explorer ONLY)
(Under the Button LETOLTESEK/KIEGESZITOK)
Just download and double click the self-extracting files - the default location is c:\Allplan\2003\.... Then navigate in Windows Explorer to that folder and find the Setup file which will install the colour library in Allplan.
Then you can find RAL listed - with a list of plotters to choose from for colour matching.
The Pantone library is installed under the 'Custom RGB' heading in the drop down list of colour libraries in Allplan (available when using the Paint or any colour commands).
Wonderful :-)
< Click for larger image


Note some of the other downloads on nemetschek.hu - the Velux installer looks very interesting - it is a much requested feature in the UK.

If you find that a Roof Plane Properties dialog shows correct bottom level but walls or other objects being controlled by the roof plane seem to ignore this setting - typically when you have a dormer on a roofplane - try using 'Move Plane' from the Roof Modeller tools to individually move parts of the roof (make a marker so that you can put the plane back afterwards) then individually change the bottom level and then back again using the Properties dialog. Altering each plane on its own should correct the problem.
Note that if you change one Roof Plane when there are several planes working together - as in a dormer situation for example, then Allplan seems to default the bottom level of All Roofplanes to the lowest level of any plane in the combination - this is normally visible in the Isometric view window.

Here is a neat feature I did not realise existed.
If you create a Saved view using the icon on the viewport toolbar...

When you Load the view - or just double click the saved name in the list...

then as long as the icon in the viewport toolbar remain active, double-clicking the middle mouse button or Keying F5 will always zoom the screen view to this saved view.
Very nice :-)

Here is a neat tip from UK tech support...
To keep text visible at all zoom levels - i.e. so that it does not become just a box when you zoom out - click Tools->Options->Text and set the option 'Text legibility threshold' to 0 (Default is 1).

On larger monitors particularly this is a great help.

In Allplan 2004 if you wish to stretch or extend a section line you must have created the section line with the option box ticked that says ' Show interactive solids (as construction lines)'.
You find this option by clicking the Options button on the dynamic toolbar whichh appears onscreen after clicking the Define Section tool.  It is on the right side of the dialog that appears.

In Allplan 2004 onwards - for some daft reason, Bitmap areas seems to be turned OFF by default in Plot elements / options - it is the first dialogue you are presented with when you click 'plot' - in the right-hand pane.
Just enable this by clicking the option to highlight it and then bitmaps should plot OK.  If having trouble with transparency try the advanced option in plotter preferences to set plotter driver to 'avoid out of memory errors' - in earlier HP drivers this used to be called something like 'do plotting in PC' - it means the same thing - the PC does the rasterising (turning into dots) of the image rather than the plotter so that it does not run out of memory.

It has been a while since I did any 3D work in Allplan since v2003 and I notice some nice enhancements to the animation window in v2004. This may have been possible before and I just did not notice...
Maximise the animation window, set up your view the way you would like it and then just click the button on the window toolbar (bottom right by default) 'Copy to Clipboard'.
Open Photoshop or any similar application, click File->New to create an empty new document and then just Ctrl+V or Edit->Paste and the screenshot will appear in Photoshop or other application for editing/printing.
I use this sort of technique for client presentations at the design stage - very quick and can be plotted quite large.

A tip from CAD Ltd ...
There does not seem to be a way to save a view set up in the animation window in Allplan 2004. However a quick workaround is to use an isometric (i.e. 'normal' 2D view) view window... click on the '3D view' icon on it's window toolbar (the icon looks a bit like an envelope).. when the dialogue box pops up use the double chevron arrow button... clicking it will make the dialouge disappear temporarily.. just click in the animation window and then when the dialouge box reappears click 'OK'. Now your isometric view matches the animation window view and this can be Saved using the next folder icon on the toolbar. To reinstate an Animation Window view, just do the reverse.
Very neat.