Sawadee krap Kom Sim,

1.) I think the .IFC file format is, at the moment, the best way to transfer a building model from a different program (like Archicad) to another like Allplan. But the .IFC format has also still some restrictions. For instance in Allplan you can select how you like to define the height of an architectural element:

- as an absolute height
- Relative to a plane
- or by adopting the values from an existing architectural element

But you cannot transfer the relative height setting of an architectural element to a plane, using the .IFC interface. So what you receive are architectural elements with an absolute height, even after you imported an .IFC file (for instance from Archicad) in Allplan.

Anyway, Allplan allows you easy to change the height settings of architectural element just by double-click on the element or by using the function Change Archit. Properties for many selected elements at the same time. And you can combine this method with the powerful filter wizzard of Allplan.

2.) With Allplan you can cover many different aspects of planning using the same software family. Of course this makes the Building Information Modeling Process more easy and efficient. But Allplan is also Open for Exchange with other programs and supports more than 40 different file formats. So in many cases it is not necessary to use the same program for different aspects of planning, but it can be useful of course.

I hope this information will help you. If you like to do the architectural design plus the civil engineering using the same platform, you should try to start your next project directly in Allplan.

Regards, Martin Terfloth