Consolidating Interdepartmental Review Comments

When a drawing or document undergoes interdepartmental review, each reviewer opens the document and marks their comment on the document. For each reviewer a different document is generated automatically while opening the document for commenting. The reviewer then attaches this commented document to the main document. If five reviewers open the document for commenting five separate comment documents are created. Each of the document is attached to the main document by the reviewer as Attachments. The different comments files can be consolidated to a single document. This consolidated comment document can be further reviewed and the reviewed document can be attached to the main document.

The following operations is available in the comments window of the Attachments tab. Using these options, you can attach comments, consolidate client comments, review consolidated comment documents.

Open for Commenting

This option is for opening the main file or attaching specter and commenting on it.

To open a file for commenting

Click the smart folder in which the document is stored.

List of documents is displayed.

Select the document that you want to open for commenting and double-click.

Document Details window is displayed.

In the tab strip click Open for Commenting.

You can also open the document for commenting by clicking Files>>Comment>>Open For Commenting from the document details window.

Once you click this option system checks for an auto attached specter file. If the file exists it is opened for commenting. If auto attached specter file is not present, system checks whether the main document is PDF. If so, the file is opened for commenting. If the main document is not a PDF file, system searches for manually attached specter files. If manually attached specter file is found it is opened for commenting. If multiple file exists, the following window is displayed.

Figure: Opening documents for commenting

Select the document that you want to open for commenting and click Open.
In the document enter your comments and save the document.

Attach Comments

This option is for attaching comment file stored in the local system to the server. Comments can be attached from the Attachments tab in the document details window and smart folder.

To attach comments

Select the document to which you want to attach comment.
Click Attach>>Comment.

Comment dialog box is displayed.

Click the field Select a file.
Open File window is displayed. Select the comment file from the location where it was saved.

Figure: Attaching Comments

Enter the purpose of attaching the document in the Purpose of attachment field.
You can also select the purpose of attaching the document from a drop-down list.
Click the down arrow next to Purpose to choose a purpose from the drop-down list.
Select a Type. Options available are Private, Public and Shared.
Enter your Remarks. This is not mandatory.
Click OK to continue.

Your comment file is attached successfully.

Consolidate Comments

Comments entered by different reviewers in the attachment have to be consolidated to one single comment file. Consolidate Comments option helps you in carrying out comment consolidation.

To consolidate comment file

Click Comment>>Consolidate Comment.

Consolidate Comment window is displayed. Here details of comment files attached by different reviewers are displayed.

Select the type of attachment from the drop-down list next to Items to be displayed. Options available in the list are Comments, Client Comment, Consolidated Comment and All.

Figure: Consolidate comment window

Select the check box next to the files that has to be included for consolidating.
Click Preview to view the consolidated file.
Click Attach Consolidate to attach the consolidated comment file to the document.
Click the Cancel button if you want to discard the consolidation operation.

If the operation is successful, the following message is displayed.

Click OK to continue

A single consolidated comment file is created as shown in the following figure. This file will contain comments marked by different users consolidated.

Figure: Consolidated comment file creation

Open for Review

The consolidated comment file can be opened for commenting. Consolidated Comment file can be opened for review from Attachments tab in the document details window and from the smart folders menu.

To open for review

Click Comment>>Open for Review.

The consolidated file is opened for Review.

NOTE: The file opened for review will have the tag CONSOLIDATED_REVIEWED for the purpose of identifying the review file.

After reviewing the consolidated comment file, the file is saved.

Attach Review

The saved review file can be attached to the document.

To attach review file

Click Comment>>Attach Review.

Comment dialog box is displayed.

Figure: Reviewing consolidated file

Click Select a File, to choose the reviewed consolidated file.
Enter the review purpose or select the review purpose from a drop-down list that would contain a list of pre-defined review purposes.
Click OK to continue.

Comment files, consolidated comment files and reviewed consolidated file would be listed under the comments sections in the attachments tab.