Aruba Airwave - Correctly Scaling Floor Plans for VisualRF

In a previous post about setting the origin correctly in an VisualRF floor plan I mentioned scaling the floor plan correctly and thought I should explain how I obtain this information. Now obviously the best practise is to take your measuring tape or laser range finder and measure the actual building (remembering to take a measurement across the longest possible distance to minimise errors), however, this is not always possible. For new builds and remote sites you can get the size information from a correctly scaled PDF file.

The following instructions are for Adobe Acrobat Reader DC but equivalent functions may be available with other tools.

1. Open the file in Acrobat Reader DC
2. Determine the scale of the drawing, in this case there is a information box shown in the lower right corner of the drawing stating that the scale is 1:100
   
3. Select Tools - Measure
4. Click on "Measuring Tool" in the menu bar - then right click on the image and select "Change Scale Ratio and Precision" to set the scale

5. In the window that appears set the scale according that of the drawing, in this case 1:100 i.e. 1cm on the drawing is 1m on the ground

6. Then click on two points diagonally opposite on the plan to measure the size

7. This length can then be used in VisualRF to set the size of a building floor plan