iPad & Sketch Support

Route: /mobile (or via native PWA on iOS/iPadOS)
Purpose: Nurture early-stage ideas and capture on-site constraints using Apple Pencil and touch gestures, then instantly convert scribbles into graph-native BIM elements.

Purple8 AI Architect is natively designed for mobile and touch workflows. It extends the rigid boundaries of traditional CAD/BIM tools into the ideation and construction phases by treating freehand sketches, onsite photography, and touch annotations as first-class citizens of the Purple8 Graph.

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1. Freehand Spatial Sketching (Sketch-to-Graph)

The biggest barrier in conceptual design is the friction of CAD. The Sketch interface lets you use an Apple Pencil to draw spatial diagrams exactly as you would on butter paper.

Bubble Diagrams

• Action: Draw rough circles or blobs and write a word inside (e.g., "Living", "Core", "Cafe").
• Conversion: The multimodal AI interprets these as space / zone entities. The written text maps to the function and name properties.
• Adjacency: Draw lines or arrows between bubbles. These are converted directly into has_adjacency or requires_access edges in the graph.

Block Plans & Massing

• Action: Sketch rectilinear shapes over a site map or blank canvas.
• Conversion: The LAD Engine recognises bounding boxes, snaps them to an orthogonal grid, and instantiates them as space nodes with precise coordinate properties and calculated area_sqft.
• Dimensions: Scribble "12m x 6m" or "72 sqm" next to a block, and the graph automatically updates the required dimensional constraints.

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2. On-Site Context & Markups

Take an iPad directly to a site visit or client meeting to contextualise the design live.

Camera to Graph (DocIntel Mobile)

• Snap photos of existing conditions, site boundaries, or hand-drawn client sketches.
• The built-in Vision models automatically transcribe whiteboards, identify structural grids, and extract written dimensions, streaming the data directly into your project's DocIntel queue.

Viewport Markups

• Enter the BIM Viewport on your tablet and use standard touch gestures to pan, zoom, and orbit the live 3D graph.
• Redlining: Tap the markup icon and draw directly over the 3D model.
• Pinning: Drop an annotation node onto a specific element (e.g., a wall or system) to flag an RFI, design change, or client comment. This annotation is permanently tied to the element in the graph via a has_annotation edge.

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3. Gesture & Apple Pencil Controls

The interface is tuned for iOS-native interactions:

Input	Action	Effect
Apple Pencil	Draw	Freehand linework for walls and boundaries
Apple Pencil	Scribble (Handwriting)	Text forms fill automatically (e.g., in the ArchitectPurple Chat)
Pencil Double-tap	Tool switch	Toggle between Draw and Eraser/Select tool
1-Finger Drag	Pan	Move across the 2D spatial canvas or LAD Engine
2-Finger Pinch	Zoom	Scale the BIM Viewport or LAD canvas
2-Finger Rotate	Orbit / Rotate	Rotate the 3D BIM Viewport or re-orient a sketched room block
Long Press	Context Menu	Open the property editor for a specific graph node

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4. Live Collaboration & Sync

The iPad app operates as a real-time client to the Purple8 Graph.

• Instant Sync: Thanks to the real-time Change Data Capture (CDC) and EventBus, as soon as you commit a sketch to the graph on your iPad, it instantly appears in the BIM Viewport for your colleagues working on desktop browsers.
• Offline Resilience: If you lose 5G/Wi-Fi on a construction site, markups and notes are queued locally. They automatically replay and sync to the main WALEngine (Write-Ahead Log) once connection is restored. This ensures no data loss during basement site visits.

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5. Workflow Recipe: Client Concept Meeting

Goal: Co-create a room programme and initial massing with a client over coffee.

1. Journey: Open your iPad, tap ArchitectPurple and say, "Create a new project for a 4-bedroom house in Cornwall."
2. GIS: Pull up the Site & GIS map using the site address.
3. Sketch: Use the Apple Pencil to circle the buildable area and define the site boundary (creates the site node).
4. Ideate: Draw 5-6 rough room bubbles over the site. Link the Kitchen and Living bubbles with an arrow.
5. Commit: Tap Commit to Graph. The AI converts your sketch into a structured room programme with adjacency constraints.
6. LAD Engine: Feed the constraints into the LAD Engine to instantly generate 3 rigid, optimised layout options to show the client on the spot.