Every engineering document is assembled from somewhere: a design basis carries values from an upstream package, a data sheet copies conditions from a balance workbook, a selection report cites clauses from standards. The document is the surface. The values, and where they came from, are the substance.
Most document work is therefore data work done by hand. Engineers find the value, carry it across, normalise it, and keep it consistent through revisions. Each hop is a chance to mistype, to miss a revision, or to leave a stale number in circulation.
The register view
Our platforms start by inverting the relationship. Values live in revision-controlled registers with provenance: which document, which revision, which field, who confirmed it. Documents are generated views over those registers, rendered into the native template a company already uses.
Once documents are views, properties follow that hand assembly cannot offer:
- Reproducibility: the same inputs produce the same document, every time
- Traceability: every table row can show the source behind it
- Change propagation: when a value moves, the affected documents and sections are known, not guessed
What stays human
None of this removes the engineer. Values enter the register through confirmation, conflicts between sources are decided by a person, and a document issues only after review. The machine does the carrying; the engineer does the deciding.