DavidJPotter

The features you wish do not exist in any Home Designer title; they do exist in Chief Architect Premier, sorry.
 
DJP

Your deck room is probably following "Edit - Defaults - Floors and Rooms - Second Floor - Floor Height". The probable reason that caused its floor to be higher than the house's floor is you did not change the ceiling height of the first floor in  "Edit - Defaults - Floors and Rooms - Second Floor - Floor Height" but just changed the first floor's ceiling height in your Room Specification Dialog Box - Structure - Ceiling height of the rooms of the first floor.
          The software can be counted upon to robotacilly follow its settings, right or wrong. When wrong you get results like yours. Carefully find and set the intended defaults for each floor and only then will all be well.
 
DJP

I looked at your file. What version of Home Designer do you have? Only if you have Pro will you be able to accomplish this roof geometry I believe. The auto roof generator is not really "automatic" but rather a mechanical routine with boundaries.
 
DJP
 

Symbols can be slightly resized but otherwise not customized or cannibalized for parts. You can by manually locating multiple symbols relative to each other and then "block" them into a manually enforced new group object of symbols but individual symbols cannot be customized without exporting that symbol to a 3D editing program for symbols, like Sketch Up.
 
DJP

You enclose the porch with railing walls as I  already  suggested, then using the "Break Wall"  tool  you use  it to divide  a small section of that railing wall to detach that segment from the rest of that wall and program that detached segment as "Invisible" thus creating a closed room  with an opening it the outer wall.
 
DJP

Roof plate heights follow what YOU set in Room Dialog boxes-Ceiling Height.
 
DJP

On the walls that are defined by the roof planes you will need to set those walls ON the roof plane edges and set the walls to "Roof Cuts Wall at Bottom" on the wall's Roof Tab of its Spec Dialog.
 
DJP

A dormer does not have a "Material Tab" so what can be done is to create a camera view (full or overview), then using the "Material Spray Can" tool select the roofing material you wish and then apply it to the dormer roofs and ridge trim. Or you can "explode" the dormer symbol into its parts and then the roof planes of the dormer can then be accessed using the dormer roof plane dialog-Materials Tab like any other roof plane.
 
DJP

A dormer does not have a "Material Tab" so what can be done is to create a camera view (full or overview), then using the "Material Spray Can" tool select the roofing material you wish and then apply it to the dormer roofs and ridge trim. Or you can "explode" the dormer symbol into its parts and then the roof planes of the dormer can then be accessed using the dormer roof plane dialog-Materials Tab like any other roof plane.
 
DJP

Home Designer comes with an 8" CMU block material. You can use that 8" CMU block material to then save-as/rename and reconfigure the default material to create new versions of that material. Those will be stored in the ".plan" file you created them in, you then should export them from that ".plan" file and then reimport them into your Library Browser for future use, so you do not have to make them over and over again.
DJP
 

Yes, your User Catalog is located in C/My Documents/Home Designerxxx/Libraries/User Library. You can copy paste that file from its old location to the new location of HD Pro 2024
 
DJP

Library Browser - Lighting - Cabinet Lighting - Above Cabinet
 
Then you manually locate the height above floor you want the light to be.
 
DJP

The software is programmed in certain ways which creates some rather arbitrary situations. Part of learning the software is learning by trial and error what works and what does not. I am not sure but it probably lies in how you created your custom wall types and their layers. I have never heard of this being a problem in thirty years until  your post. Such error messages are merely annoying and unimportant, you can check "Do not show me this message again during this session each time it appears and just drive on. I would not spend much time on that, the important thing is to obtain your product!
 
DJP

I also looked in X14 and X15 to see if this functionality is possible, it was not in Pro or Premier.
 
But what you can do is to create your cabinets and then create a one inch thick cabinet of what ever type so it emulates  a door or doors, that you can then locate on the back of cabinets as a work round to get that look you wish. It may be possible to do this in Pro and Premier but I could not find it if it exists as a function.
 
DJP

While a Dollhouse view is open, it has a controlling dialog box that you need to open and uncheck "Show Lower Floor" so all you then see is the floor on which the camera view was ordered/created. This isolates the view to only one floor and not other floors as well.
 
DJP

I recommend that you consider upgrading to Home Designer Pro, that has manual roof tool manipulation and creation. It is more money and more learning curve but will enable you to do anything, roof-wise you wish to create.
 
DJP

I downloaded a trial version years ago and was unimpressed.
 
DJP

You probably turned off "Temporary Dimensions" see image
 
DJP
 

DJP

Send the view to a layout page where you can control how much of the elevation you wish to show.
 
DJP

With Architectural you go-to tool for that kind of create is found under Cabinet Tools - Custom Backsplash. Using an  elevation camera you can then, using the Custom Backsplash tool to draw a closed polyline that is editable and adjustable to whatever shape and material you wish, check it out!
 
DJP

That cursor icon appears when in the Terrain Specification Dialog you uncheck "Auto Rebuild Terrain". Place a check mark there and then the cursor icon goes away. Such icons appear by  your cursor when certain default tools or conditions are turned OFF by the end user (to remind you to turn them back ON).
 
DJP

Such specialized conditions take additional manual adjusting of wall polylines and specialized settings (Shelf Ceiling) to achieve.
 
DJP

They must be manually saved or all work in the "saved" camera is lost, sorry. The first thing I do when detailing an elevation or cross section camera is to mark it "saved" in its dialog box, otherwise you are just screwed.
 
DJP

In plan view, in the garage "room" the part of that room where you wish to have a higher ceiling (by raising the ceiling when you build roofs, that will cause the roof planes to be higher due to the higher ceiling height). You divide the garage in to two areas, one with a lower ceiling and the other set to a  higher ceiling to accommodate your tall garage bay door and ceiling. This software only does what it is "told" to do by way of settings only.
 
DJP