Expert High-Trust and Low-Trust Collaboration Using BIM Collaborate Pro

During the 2023 BIMup free online training conference session “Effective Collaboration Using BIM Collaborate Pro,” Applied Software, Graitec Group Consulting Services Director Matt Dillon discussed high- and low-trust environments, team management tools, design and scale overviews, and model coordination.

Matt described how to expertly handle the two types of collaboration environments you will encounter in your projects when using BIM Collaborate Pro on the Autodesk Construction Cloud (ACC) platform.

In this VIDEO, you can watch Matt Dillon’s entire presentation, including his demos, then download it for your video library.

BIM Collaborate is one of the products in the ecosystem of Autodesk Construction Cloud. In addition to document management, design collaboration workflow, and model coordination with clash detection, the “Pro” version includes Revit cloud collaboration. As Matt explained, if you need to edit your model in Revit, and you’re working in the cloud, you need BIM Collaborate Pro.

High-trust environment

When you’re working in a “high-trust” environment, there are advantages. It’s easy to set up your project, and there are minimal permissions to manage. Everyone gets full access to the project.

The disadvantages include:

• No control over access to potentially sensitive information.
• Minimal to no notifications when changes are made to design models.
• More difficult to take advantage of Model Coordination, which is a complex space with avenues for error when manually updated.

A high-trust environment is best when all project members are in the same organization, notifications of model changes are not necessary, and Model Coordination is not being used for clash detection. Permissions that are set for folders can only expand in the subfolders.

Low-trust environment

When you’re working in a “low-trust” environment, the advantages are that access to potentially sensitive information is controlled, notifications can be set up for design model changes, and you can better utilize Model Coordination. Both the coordination space setup and updates when changes are made are automated.

A low-trust scenario is best used when you have multiple teams from different organizations collaborating on an ACC project, and you want to control access to design models. In this case, automated notifications about design model changes are important.

Watch Matt’s presentation beginning at 13:30 to see a full demo of how to set up a low-trust environment and how design collaboration works.

The three types of sharing are:

1.  Live linking – Linking directly to another team’s live model, where they are actively making changes. Live linking is possible when the users consuming the model are added to the Team associated with that model and have ‘view + download’ permissions.
2. Shared linking – When a package is shared, a copy of the model will automatically be created (or updated to a new version) in the ‘Shared’ folder. If you want to automatically have the newly-shared model linked in, you can link directly to the ‘Shared’ folder location.
3. Consumed linking – Controlled sharing using packages. You publish your model and make it shareable by creating a new Package, choosing which views and sheets you want to include. Once the package is shared, teams can choose whether to consume it or not.

Whether your project involves a high-trust or low-trust environment, BIM Collaborate Pro helps you deliver better projects through effective collaboration.

Discover how to deliver better projects in the free guide, “Ways to Deliver Better Projects Using BIM Collaborate Pro.”