Bluebeam vs. NoteVault

As stated before, the mobile application is a great companion to the desktop version. Either one works great in viewing, editing and saving documents. While the measurement tool is handy to have, we have found the precision to be lacking when measuring scaled drawings (construction design drawings). While it is a good rough place to start for measurements, we wouldn't recommend relying on the precision of the measurements taken on something with a very large scale.

Incentivized

NoteVault helps to reduce the amount of time to produce a daily report and makes the typically burdensome task easier to accomplish. Our Superintendents are able to craft their daily reports as they see the work activities being performed as opposed to trying to remember what happened during the day and then writing down those activities with accuracy after a long day in the field. NoteVault also allows our Superintendents to keep accurate manpower counts, material deliveries, equipment on site and weather reports.

• Overlaying pdf drawings to identify changes made by architects.
• Scaling dimensions when the architect has not provided required dimensions to proceed with work in the field.
• Hyperlinking construction documents with required information makes it much easier to look through multiple sheets in less time.

Incentivized

• Enhances safety; instead of writing notes, with my head down buried in a notebook, I am aware and looking around. I work on highway repair projects next to live traffic and all types of construction equipment moving in all directions and overhead.
• Documentation; I got in a dispute with a contractor recently and won it immediately by showing my Notevault notes with time stamped photos of the disputed work.
• Communication; I can keep other support staff back in the home office up to date with project developments and they get to see what is going on .

Incentivized

• If you have several tabs open and you try to drag one out for a side by side view then you do not have all the modification options and you have to combine them back together.
• There is a lag time when hitting the print option.
• There is also a lag time when opening files, sometimes I think the window is frozen.
• I wish the basic version also had basic file editing, as in editing a document as Adobe does.

Incentivized

• The website for administrators setting up projects and users could be improved. It's hard to find where things are located. I would like it in more of a Office (Word) template, with tabs up top. Some things are in Settings, some are in tabs, some are on the right side.

Incentivized

Bluebeam is a powerful PDF viewer and mark-up tool. We are more familiar with it than Adobe Acrobat Pro or other viewers, and it has more features geared towards construction document managers than Acrobat Pro does.

Incentivized

It flat works and has paid for itself quickly.

I'm constantly finding that Bluebeam Revu does more than I knew it could. And when I find something that it can't do, I've found that Bluebeam truly listens to its user base and will work to incorporate any good suggestion when feasible.

Incentivized

Simple use of functions. Majority of people can become familiar with this product fairly quick

Incentivized

Its hard for me to give a rating on this one as we rarely have to use the support feature for Bluebeam. However, when we have used it, they have been ultra supportive in helping us get exactly what we needed. I know another engineer was trying to figure out a feature and the rep gave a detailed tutorial on how to complete the task

Incentivized

Bluebeam is a diverse program with many functions and tools, whereas competitive programs only specialize in one or few tasks. Although there are many tools within the program, users can still quickly learn how to use the program to best fit their needs. There is always a help tab for any assistance needed.

Incentivized

Notevault is who we decided to use, for the simple fact that it is the easiest on the market for our foremen to use. Make it easy, and they'll actually do it. Make it bulky and cumbersome, and they'll do a way less accurate job of daily reporting. This is why Notevault works for us... IT'S EASY!!

• A major positive aspect is being able to take your computer home without taking the entire set of paper drawings. They have made it so easy to navigate a set of drawings that I can work at home using only the digital drawings.
• Collaboration with owners and architects has been a great feature. Setting up a Bluebeam studio and having everyone get in and mark things up, then having the architect be able to go in and see what markups have been added, has made the constructability review process much much better.
• Even when not working on drawings, Bluebeam is a very good tool for working with standard PDF documents. The markup tools are very easy to use.
• The negative aspect is the takeoff function because some people would like estimators to use the Bluebeam takeoff because it would make their job easier down the road; however, the actual act of doing a full scale takeoff in Bluebeam would require much more time.

Incentivized

• It has made it easy for our guys out in the filed to report all that is needed for daily reports so there is no scrabbling to remember and report at a later time.
• NoteVault has had no negative impact for us at all.

Incentivized