July 2012 » Page 2 of 4 » What Revit Wants

Accepting a Primary Option results in Deletion of Drafting Views – explanation

July 26, 2012May 7, 2017 Luke Johnson

I saw this tweet and I thought I would look into the problem:

I created a Drafting View and then applied a Secondary Option to its Visibility / Graphics:

Then I used the Design Option dialog to Accept Primary – and guess what:

So, even though Drafting Views theoretically can contain NO Model Elements and thus can’t display variances in relation to Design Options, IF an Option is selected in Visibility / Graphics, Revit will prompt you to delete the Drafting View when the selected Option is removed.

How can you get around it? Just don’t tick the check box when the dialog comes up – the Drafting View will remain.

EDIT: There are situations where the Checkbox will be ‘forced’. In the example below, I created a Callout Drafting View from one Drafting View that had a Secondary Option applied. Even though there was no Option set applied in the new Callout Drafting View V/G, the Callout Drafting View checkbox is still grayed out when Accepting Primary …

What is the PRC File Format? Used in 3D PDF …

July 25, 2012May 8, 2017 Luke Johnson

It “is an accurate, highly compressible 3D data format optimized to store, load, and display various 3D data, metadata, assembly structure, graphics information and Product Manufacturing Information (PMI). The PRC file format can be viewed within the free Adobe Reader when encapsulated with the Protable Document Format (PDF). It can be stored within PDF as either accurate BREP geometry or tessellated data. Because of this, it can be extracted from a PDF for use years later in CAD, CAM, CAE systems.”

Read more, including the history of PRC development, at:
The PRC File Format
The most recent publically available, free for access documentation on the PRC format can be found here. NOTE: This version is the version submitted to ISO, and is behind the ISO Draft International Standard currently in circulation; this must be purchased from ISO here. The Consortium does not have the rights to reproduce ISO documentation.

RevitPythonShell in Action

July 24, 2012May 7, 2017 Luke Johnson

I have previously posted about RevitPythonShell a number of times. In this post Dima Chiriacov gives a real-world example on using the shell to change the case of text.

There are quite a number of free add-ins which can easily change case too, like this one or this one (which also allows merging of text).

Read how to use RevitPythonShell at:
DP stuff: Convert Revit Text to Upper Case

Webinars on today – register quickly if you want to attend

July 24, 2012May 7, 2017 Luke Johnson

	2013 Building Design Suite Overview

	Time:	10:00 AM – 10:45 AM AEST (25th July 2012)

	Space is limited.
	Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
	https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/437056550

	Curtain Walls; application and design of systems

	Time:	12:30 PM – 12:50 PM AEST (25th July 2012)

	Space is limited.
	Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
	https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/512899574

	Autodesk Revit 2013 Materials Editor

	Time:	1:30 PM – 2:00 PM AEST (25th July 2012)

	Space is limited.
	Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
	https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/978771838

When to Upgrade Revit and Adopt a new Revit version

July 24, 2012May 7, 2017 Luke Johnson

Now that Update 1 for Revit 2013 is out, some of the larger firms will be deploying Revit 2013 for the first time across their corporation. Some of the smaller firms perhaps started using the new version as soon as it became available – they can live with doing some updates on a PC-by-PC basis, and they can live with some minor crashes.

What does your firm do?

Most (IT & Project Teams) agree that they will wait until the first service pack…re-patching an installed release is disruptive.
via
What is the Best Timeline for Upgrading Revit Software | Bradley BIM

Print Set = View/Sheet Set

July 24, 2012May 7, 2017 Luke Johnson

You can Filter Sheets in the Project Browser by the “Print Set” – that is, by saved sheet selection.

I can’t believe I didn’t know this before…

Update 1 may cause contextual Finish buttons to disappear

July 23, 2012May 7, 2017 Luke Johnson

I received an interesting email from fellow Revit professional, Kale Munster – see below:
Mate,
Something that you might like to add to your blog. I have done a pretty severe stress test on the sketch edit mode overnight with approximately 5000 edits and it was stable (Revit Structure). One unfortunate thing that is back to happening is that the contextual “finish sketch” buttons decide to disappear again. This is as a result of double clicking on a family. Once the family opens and you return to the main file, they disappear. Easiest work around I have found is in the blog post below:
http://do-u-revit.blogspot.com.au/2011/08/missing-panels-in-contextual-modify-tab.html
Kale Munster
www.rmaeng.com.au

The workaround from Do-U-Revit that Kale links to should help in the short term. Here’s a quote:
“The second method makes the panels reappear so you can continue editing the sketch or finish/discard; here’s how you do it:

Start a new family, pick any one;
Load it into your project;
Once you get the error that it cannot be placed in this mode, hit Ctrl+z to undo.

For some reason the panels come back. Obviously, do not switch back to the open families or you’ll lose them again!”
Alternatively, you could use my method, which is to apply a Keyboard shortcut to all of the ‘Finish’ commands. See link and image below:
Disappearing ‘Finish Sketch’ or ‘Finish Mass’ Ribbon Elements

Revit Hardware and Performance tips (mid-year 2012)

July 22, 2012May 7, 2017 Luke Johnson

Here are a few interesting (and in some cases controversial) quotes from new Revit blogger, the Pragmatic Reviteer.
”
CPU – single threaded speed is the most important thing.

In my experience, the main key is that there is simply no need or value in “professional” grade cards like the Quadro and FireGl/FirePro series.

For the next few years, Windows 7 x64 is a safe bet for all non tablet needs, especially for Revit use.

Gigabit Ethernet is a must
“
Read more at:
Infrastructure Requirements Increase | the Pragmatic Reviteer