Review blueprints or specifications to determine work requirements
Most of the output can be produced by software today.
An agent can find, read and summarise the sources this work depends on, and it can cover far more of them than a person would ever open. What it does not do is decide which sources deserve trust, or what the findings mean for your situation.
| How automatable | Mostly automatable |
|---|---|
| Kind of work | Research and retrieval work |
| Jobs that do it | 23 occupations |
| Tool categories that apply | Web, data and docs, Generalist agents |
| O*NET activity | Getting Information (4.A.1.a.1) |
What this looks like on the job
Not our paraphrase. These are real task statements recorded against this activity, spread across the 23 occupations that perform it.
- Read blueprints, schematics, diagrams, or technical orders.
- Read specifications, such as blueprints, to determine construction requirements or to plan procedures.
- Study blueprints to determine locations, relationships, or dimensions of parts.
- Interpret blueprints and drawings to determine specifications and to calculate the materials required.
- Study specifications in blueprints, sketches, or building plans to prepare project layout and determine dimensions and materials required.
- Take measurements and study floor sketches to calculate the area to be carpeted and the amount of material needed.
- Study blueprints and examine surface to be covered to determine amount of material needed.
- Read plans, instructions, or specifications to determine work activities.
- Talk to clients and study instructions, plans, or diagrams to establish work requirements.
- Read blueprints or other specifications to determine methods of installation, work procedures, or material or tool requirements.
- Read and interpret blueprints or specifications to determine size, shape, color, type, or thickness of glass, location of framing, installation procedures, or staging or scaffolding materials required.
- Read blueprints, and select appropriate insulation, based on space characteristics and the heat retaining or excluding characteristics of the material.
- Read blueprints and specifications to determine job requirements.
- Read work orders or receive instructions from supervisors or homeowners to determine work requirements.
- Measure surfaces or review work orders to estimate the quantities of materials needed.
- Review blueprints, building codes, or specifications to determine work details or procedures.
- Determine quantities, sizes, shapes, and locations of reinforcing rods from blueprints, sketches, or oral instructions.
- Determine project requirements, such as scope, assembly sequences, or required methods or materials, using blueprints, drawings, or written or verbal instructions.
What we would actually use
One recommendation rather than a shortlist, because a shortlist is just your problem handed back. This is what we would buy for research and retrieval work, and what it costs.
Research is the one shape of work that needs no integration at all, so a single $20 assistant with browsing is the whole stack. Add a crawler only once you are pulling hundreds of pages on a schedule rather than reading a few.
Chosen for the cheapest thing that does the job, not the best funded. Nothing on this site is sponsored, and the full landscape is there when you want to disagree with us.
The rest of the category
Context, not alternatives to weigh up. We name the layer rather than promise a named product does your specific task.
Generalist agents
Matched from the kind of work, not from vendor marketing. Check any of them can reach the system your records actually live in — that connection, not the model, is where these projects stall.
How people actually do it
No workflow names this activity yet, but these automate the same kind of work, with the prompts to paste and what to keep for yourself.
Who does this work
23 occupations in the O*NET database perform this activity. Each one has a full breakdown of its other tasks.
- Boilermakers
- Brickmasons and Blockmasons
- Calibration Technologists and Technicians
- Carpenters
- Carpet Installers
- Construction and Building Inspectors
- Construction Laborers
- Drywall and Ceiling Tile Installers
- Earth Drillers, Except Oil and Gas
- Elevator and Escalator Installers and Repairers
- First-Line Supervisors of Construction Trades and Extraction Workers
- Glaziers
- Insulation Workers, Floor, Ceiling, and Wall
- Insulation Workers, Mechanical
- Operating Engineers and Other Construction Equipment Operators
- Painters, Construction and Maintenance
- Paperhangers
- Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters
- Reinforcing Iron and Rebar Workers
- Sheet Metal Workers
- Solar Photovoltaic Installers
- Structural Iron and Steel Workers
- Tile and Stone Setters
Work that goes with it
O*NET groups these under “Read documents or materials to inform work processes”. In practice they tend to be done by the same person, in the same sitting.
Method. The activity, its taxonomy placement and the occupations that perform it come straight from the public-domain O*NET 30.3 database. The automatability band is ours: we map each of O*NET’s 41 generalized work activities to how much of its output current software can produce, assuming a person still reviews and owns the result. It is a coarse three-way judgment on purpose. A precise-looking percentage here would be invented.