Plan review documents undergo a rendering process that starts immediately after upload. Documents uploaded or routed to EPR for plan review are automatically converted from PDFs to images through an automatic “rendering” process. These images are then displayed to users within the Review page while conducting plan review.
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What is Rendering?
The rendering process creates several PNG images for each page in within a plan review document: two full-page images at differing sizes, images for each page quadrant, and thumbnails for navigation and OCR. These PNG files are served forward to the workstation's browser window when the document or document record is viewed. On the Review page, thumbnails are called as they are needed.
The rendering process is performed on AWS using LAMBDA services. Follow the instructions below to open the render log for your portal.
Files in the Attachments page are not rendered because no plan review is expected.
Opening the Render and Print Render Log
To inspect the success or failure of a render or print render process, open a new browser window, copy your URL (https://[yourdomainname].eplansoftreview.com) and append this string /#!/configuration/renderStatus to the end. This URL string is case sensitive.
Locate the document in the renderStatus page.
Evaluating Rendering time per document
The screen shot below displays the rendering status for a five page PDF document named: PLMB_Water Heater Project v2.pdf
To the right of the filename, the total time to extract the 5 page PDF into individual pages required 1.268 seconds.
Following the page extraction, each page was asynchronously rendered. Page 4 requiring 14.833 seconds and page 5 requiring 6.313 seconds.
We can calculate that a total of 16.101 seconds (1.268+14.833) was required to complete rendering of page 4, the most complex page in the document (36 x 24 paper size).
About Print Rendering
In addition to converting a PDF page to a PNG image, print rendering is also performed to create a PDF deliverable. See Preparing Document Deliverables.
During a print render, the sketches, comment annotations and stamps created during plan review are embedded and flattened onto a copy of the PDF. This 'deliverable' PDF document is then downloaded/exported for return to the customer for corrections and/or to a long term retention/EDMS application.
Print rendering is available for an individual document using the printer icon on the Review page.
Triggering a Document Re-render Manually
If a document fails to render either a thumbnail or review page image, users with rights (typically an Admin or Project Coordinator) can trigger a manual re-render of a document using the ‘Render’ function built into the e-PlanREVIEW® (EPR) DOCUMENTS > Submittals section. To rerun the render process:
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a small image (used for thumbnails) and larger-resolution images (used within the EPR Review page window). When a user first opens the review page for a new document assignment, EPR will load a page image for the first time. This image may appear blurry or fuzzy at first while the initial loading completes, but should become clear momentarily. The image is then stored in the user’s disk space, meaning that the next time the user has to open the same page it will reopen much more quickly.
As noted, when a file is uploaded or routed over to EPR, rendering occurs automatically, but there is also a secondary manual rendering method available if the automated rendering fails.
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Files uploaded or routed over to EPR as ‘attachments’ are not rendered because they are not opened in the review page window. |
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If a page image remains blurry after a minute or so, try reloading the browser tab to see if this is the result of a momentary internet issue. If that still does not resolve the problem, consider downloading the PDF to see if the PDF page itself is unclear or consult EPR Service Desk for support. |
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Manually Re-render a Document
If a document or document page fails to render automatically, staff with rendering permissions can use a secondary, manual re-render option to try and fix the issue before contacting support. (If you do not have rendering permissions, you will not see the menu with the render option. Consult an agency Admin or Project Coordinator as they usually have rendering permissions and may be able to help.)
To manually re-render a file:
Select a project within EPR.
Click on the DOCUMENTS tab.
For the desired file, click on the Go To arrow icon
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(
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) to navigate
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into the document Details sub-tab.
Click on the Submittals sub-tab to switch to that view.
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The existing rendered files will be discarded and regenerated in a matter of seconds.
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will list all of the linked document submittal versions.
For the desired document version, click on the three-dot expand menu (
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- ) on the far right.
Click on the Render button that pops up.
EPR will then try rendering the file using another method (different than the initial automatic rendering) to see if it can create the rendered images.
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If you have re-rendered a document or document page but other users report they cannot see the new renders, ask staff to clear their disk space to remove the cached image and get the updated view. If this still does not result in a rendered image, contact the EPR Service Desk for support. |
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Deliverable Documents
When ready to return deliverable documents to a customer at the end of a plan review cycle, EPR will create a copy of the original PDF, any markup layers added during plan review, and combine them into a final copy to be returned. The rendered images are not used as part of this deliverable process.
See Preparing Document Deliverables for details.
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