As topic says.    Haven't used it a ton.    A shake my head at a lot of stuff and say to myself wtf this is stupid way of doing it.   Probably cuz idk what I'm doing idk.  I can make proposals and I've had the software since like 2011 but haven't used it a ton.   I upgraded to the 2017 version.   The themes still blow.  And now my business name gets cut off.  Plus when I print proposals now it prints a blank sheet between every page.  The proposals look ugly too.  Too much space now between things and they don't like up on pages well.   Second page of proposal is just blank except for my web address.   Looks ugly.   Also the library setup seems stupid.   I have the data subscription now so I figured the sidebar would populate with all the manufacturers now instead of the free ones. Nope. Why?  I had to search library.  Then extended library.  Then portal just to find a damn device.   Then half the stuff is wrong.   Plus you have to retype or paste the damn search text every search.    Omg then downloaded devices.   I bitched to them about this in 2011.  Still no change I see.   Max products u can see is 50 devices per page.  So you have to spend a half hour downloading 46 pages worth of stuff for lutron let's say instead of truly being able to just "download all" like the download all button says.  Increase the products per page to like 250 or 500.   Or just let download all grab them all.   It's way to time intensive to build your library.  Anyways I made a proposal last night for like 13 grand of stuff for an upcoming job.  It took me 7 hrs and I was up until 4am.   I feel like I'll need 5 weeks of 8hrs a day classes to learn d tools and I wonder if I'd walk away still saying this software is just too damn hard to use.     Portals web proposals go pretty damn fast of course more limited.      Then I tried to make a Visio drawing.  Clueless as to how to do it.   I added some the products it showed on left sidebar from my proposal into an elevation view.  Half the stuff didn't work because no dimensions were loaded.   Some didn't show images just a box with text like Sony tv.  Then I go back to the proposal and all the stuff I put on the elevation view it added to my damn Proposal.   No clue how to just make one quick with existing products in quote and  not have it add more.

Anyone have some quick tips on the Visio thing?
Anyone a pro at dtools and think it's a stellar product or really good or do you think it blows?



End of rant lol.

Sounds like you are making some fundamental mistakes due to a lack of knowledge of the software. Your page setup may be mismatched to your printer, and it sounds like you dragged product into your drawing from the product library (stuff that can be added to the proposal) rather than the project editor (stuff that is in the proposal). If you drag a product from the library onto the drawing it will add it to the project, this is a feature lol!

Go to Youtube and search dtools, there are many tutorial videos on there that will help.

The most important point though is that your data library is the key to how successfully you will use the software. The more info you ensure is filled in for each product the more useful the software manipulation features (drawing tools, reports, etc.) will be.

Like most things in life you get out what you put in.....

I hear ya. Is there any way to sync my cost with vendors rather then having to manually enter it in for every single product. I could see that being time intensive having to edit cost all the time when prices change.

A couple dick things, since that's been my mood lately.

One, don't dictate your posts to your teenage daughter, paragraphs are important. Two, I don't know why anyone would do a 13k bid in D-t00ls rather than Portal. Three, for Visio, maybe check out a Community College or Community Ed class. I don't use it at all, so others will have better ideas...

Lmfao.

Don't download every part a manufacturer makes. You aren't going to use all 500 of their products. Take it slow and only download what you use/need on that proposal. As times goes by you'll fill your database with the parts you use.

A 13k proposal should take only a few minutes, with most of that time being the setup of the proposal ( locations etc ).

It really is simple and fast. Drawings take longer because it's more involved and you need to have all the dimensions for the device for an accurate drawing.

As mentioned the reason you have double the items in your quote is because you dragged items from the wrong window.

You can build a proposal then drag THOSE items into a drawing. OR you can drag items into a drawing and it will build the quote for you!

Take the time to watch some of those tutorial videos, they help a lot.

Will do. Was just frustrating but I'll get there.

As a UK customer most online pricing links are not relevant to me as they tend to be in dollars. I use the Excel export import features to import price data from vendor supplied spreadsheets when i need to update a product line. Otherwise I just do it individually. If you want to put in items that would use the same basic structures, enter up the first one and then use the clone feature, and just edit the cost pricing, descriptions, and picture. i.e. a range of 160mm speakers where dims/IOs/margin/discounts will be pretty much identical.

The first few months with the package can be frustrating as it seems that every proposal you need to do needs you to download and/or enter product into the data library, and as Murphys law dictates, the number of items that need to be added will be inversely proportional to the time you have to prepare the quote!

As time goes by your database will grow to encompass 98% of what you use on a regular basis, and the quoting process will get quicker.

thank you for the good info. i appreciate it.


Also I just figured out how to fix my proposals. I had to enable using A4 paper size in setting and waaalah!!!! fixed!

need some help. After upgrading to the 2017 version (this used to work fine in dtools dtools 6 2013) my proposals will not show sales tax.

In reports settings show sales tax in summary is enabled. Sales tax is entered in dtools at 8%. Items have the taxable box checked.

Even my old projects created in older version no longer show sales tax in proposal.
All i get is a project subtotal on all reports. No sales tax, no project total. My contract doesn't display deposits either.

I get this error too on client software load everytime. It's probably related.
"dtools reporting center attempted to upgrade the standard reports but failed. Object reference not set to an instance of the object. "

Tried a complete remove/reinstall. No resolution.


right now i'm deleting server and client. deleting sql server and going thru entire registry and deleting any instance of dtools or d-tools,siserver,siclient,integrator.
plus the program files folders for sql server and dtools. gonna try reinstall after and hope it fixes.

full reinstall didn't fix. Bummer

Check your report definitions.

Reports>Right click on the one your using and go through the list of definitions. Might be set to not breakout tax?

Dtools got it figured out. If anyone has this issue delete the cache file in dtools folder and delete the reports folder.