14 Apr 2023

AutoSpecs API in Autodesk Construction Cloud

Last month, Autodesk announced the availability of AutoSpecs in Autodesk Construction Cloud (ACC) unified products. 

AutoSpecs intelligently reads construction specification documents and automatically extract submittal information. AutoSpecs helps users to generate comprehensive submittal logs and identify potentially missing submittal requirements, resulting to save time & money, and help mitigate risks.

AutoSpecs in ACC is seamlessly integrated with Autodesk Build. You can publish submittal logs directly to Autodesk Build, as well as store and upload project specifications from Autodesk Docs. It allows you to identify QA/QC requirements, mockups and closeout submittals. You can compare versions of the project specification to quickly assess if any additions or modifications have been made. 

AutoSpecs in ACC is sold as a part of Autodesk Construction Operations Bundle*1, and available for sale in north America only. 

For more information about the product feature, please refer to the product help. You can also try out the feature with the trial version of Autodesk Build.

*1)  Construction Operations Bundle includes: Autodesk Docs, Autodesk Build, Pype AutoSpecs and Pype Closeout. cf. www.autodesk.com/construction-operations 
 

API 

Good news for developer community is that the release of AutoSpecs in ACC comes with API! In this first release, the following four (4) read endpoints are available:

  • GET project metadata
        retrieves AutoSpecs specific project information. e.g., if the extractions have been completed, and the available versions of specifications.  
  • GET smart register
        retrieves all the submittal logs, such as submittal type, division code, and spec number.
  • GET requirements
        returns the number of submittals for each section and group.
  • GET summary
        returns the number of submittals for each group and each type.

GET smart register endpoint provides raw data about submittal. GET requirements and GET summary give you statistics or count data.

Additional notes about AutoSpecs in ACC API are: 

  • The AutoSpecs API supports 3-legged authentication only (i.e., user context required) 
  • Some of the data you see in the Smart Registry UI (i.e., subcontractor, source version and pdf link) are not accessible through API in this release.
  • The version id for specifications is a string data type with a number generated by AutoSpecs (e.g., 2268). It is not a sequential order of uploaded file (like v1, v2, …) which we typically expect in Data Management API.  
  • In the response of GET summary, only when submittalGroup is “Action And Informational”, an additional field submittalGroupTypes are included. We intend to support for other groups in future.  

Documentation 

Code Samples on GitHub: 

Note: at the time of this writing, AutoSpecs is not yet listed in the "Development Software and Web Services Request Form" on Autodesk Developer Network (ADN) portal. In the mean time, you can try, using the trial version of Autodesk Build.   

If you have any question, feel free to contact us through our APS support channel.

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Posted By

Mikako Harada

Mikako Harada

Mikako Harada works as an AEC technical lead and Americas manager for the Developer Technical Services (DevTech) team at Autodesk. She provides API (Application Programming Interface) technical support to the members of Autodesk Developer Network worldwide for AEC products. Prior to joining Autodesk, she worked as a researcher for the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich. While at ETH, she...

Xiaodong Liang

Xiaodong Liang has been with Autodesk since 2007, focusing on providing programming support, consulting, training and evangelism to external developers. He started his career China and now lives in Beijing, China. Xiaodong is currently a developer consultant in the team Developer Technical Services (DevTech), the worldwide team of API gurus providing technical services through the Autodesk Developer Network. He...