This video shows how to add multiple alternatives in Trace 700. It also distinguishes the difference between ‘Use alt.’, ‘Create based on alt...’, and ‘create new...’ options when adding or copying alternatives.
In the next exercise we will compare two Alternatives. While we have mentioned Alternatives already, we have not discussed how to enter them in TRACE 700. It’s really quite simple. To do so, you can either go to Alternatives Setup, Select New Alternative or Copy Alternative, or you could right click on Alternative 1 and select New Alternative or Copy Alternative. I would say under most cases you are going to Copy an Alternative, but if you only copy an Alternative and do nothing more, you’ll have an identical replica of that Alternative which makes it pretty pointless. I prefer to click on the corresponding button, for instance, Templates, select Templates. Here we specify whether or not to Use Alternative 1 or to Create it based on Alternative 1. While it appears to have the same results as copying Alternative 1, creating something based on Alternative 1 makes a duplicate copy that is fully editable. This means that though it is based on Alternative 1, any changes made to Alternative 1 after the duplicate copy is created will not apply to Alternative 2.
Let’s take a look at what happens when you go to Create Rooms that are set to Use Alternative 1. When we try to make a change to these rooms, we'll find that we can't type anything into the parameters. This is because it is set to Use Alternative 1 and no changes can be made. If we set it based on Alternative 1, we get a warning that the source alternative will no longer be reflected, which means that any changes made on Alternative 1 will no longer apply to Alternative 2. Now when we go to make changes we can type the parameters successfully.
Typically, you are going to copy Alternative 1 or Alternative 2 and you will set up the latter Alternative to either Using Alternative 1 or Based on Alternative 1. In most cases, you will have many based on Alternative 1. Sometimes, if for instance, the Plants were completely different, you would click Plants, and instead of setting it to Use Alternative 1 – Create based on Alternative 1, we would set it to Create new plants for this alternative so that we can start from scratch. In the following exercise, I will give you a hint: you will not use Create new for any of the options. Instead, you will leave everything set to Use Alternative 1 except for Systems and Plants, which are going to be set to Create plants for this alternative based on Alternative 1.
One more important thing to know is that if you try to copy Alternative 2, you will not be able to, as you cannot copy any Alternative that has anything set to Use Alternative 1. So if we wanted to copy a similar Alternative, we would have to copy Alternative 1 once again. Also note that TRACE 700 is limited to four Alternatives per file. That's pretty much all you need to know about Alternatives.