Dynamo Simple, Practical Examples: Export Coordinate info to Excel

Dynamo Simple, Practical Examples: Draw a Revit Floor

Dynamo Simple, Practical Examples: Draw a Revit Wall

Learning Dynamo is hard. Is it worth it? Yes, it offers great potential in a number of areas. Here are a few things that Dynamo can help you with:

• Importing and Exporting Excel data very easily. Beside being able to use this data in Excel, this provides a bridge to other software like Inventor, Solidworks and more. For example you could export points from a curtain wall in Revit to Inventor or vice versa. 
• Automating the placement of Families. Good example is auditorium and stadium seating. 
• You can connect parameters from one Family to another. For example connect the floor thickness to the wall top offset.

Because it's hard to learn I would like to provide a few simple (practical?) Dynamo examples. Here's my first...a Dynamo Graph which shows you a way to draw a wall in Revit using Dynamo.

Floors Auto-Attach to Walls Bug

This is not new. I want to blog about this because it needs to be made clear. Floor sketches will lock to Walls regardless of using the Align and Lock tools or Pick Walls Tools. What this means is that Floor edges will move with Walls if the Floor sketch referenced an Osnap on a Wall or was Aligned to a Wall (without Lock). Autodesk, please fix this. We need to be sure that the edge of a Revit Floor will not move (unless we move the Floor sketch line). Floor Slab edge drawings are critical to a construction project and must be 100% reliable.

Revit Doors with FRAMES in Revit 2016

Good news, Autodesk has provided us with Doors Families with frames. Seems like a small detail but isn't that what counts? I had one client use the 'Single-Flush' door families extensively in a design with very tight constraints. When the design was developed further he realised that he needed to swap the frameless 'Single Flush' door family with a door with a frame. Like I mentioned, tolerances were tight and you cannot compromise on egress requirements.  This caused much frustration, wasted time and a mark on my reputation for not advising him on this issue. A small detail which caused problems for all involved. 

You may be thinking 'why don't you just make a Door with frame or download one from ARCAT or Autodesk Seek'? The person who is using Revit at the time will use what Family is immediately available for the immediate need. So from that time on I recommend to NEVER use the 'Single-Flush' Door Family and provide a door with frame Family. But that dreaded 'Single-Flush' door still rears it's ugly head after a reinstall or a new new versions etc.

So, thank you Revit Development team for paying attention to this seemingly small detail. Now there are both commercial and residential folders with doors with frames installed with Revit.

There is also a separate hardware folder which contains a variety of hardware Families which can be loaded into a Door Family.

Revit Scratchpad: Fake Revision Clouds in Revit

Revit Scratchpad: Fake Revision Clouds in Revit: Nice little workaround to get Detail Clouds. Make a Revision cloud, cut and paste the Sketch Lines, Paste as Detail Line or Filled Region. Thanks Joe and Nat!

Favourite Standard Revit Keyboard Shortcuts

Favourite Standard Revit Keyboard Shortcuts

f2: Rename View

WT: Tile Windows
ZA: Zoom All Windows to Extents
ZE:  Zoom Extents
ZZ: Zoom Region

CS: Create Similar

WA: Wall
DR: Door
DL: Detail Line

SL: Split
TR: Trim Corner
AL: Align

SE: Snap Endpoint
SM: Snap Midpoint

VV: Visibility Graphics Overrides

Model Beams Underneath a Complex Roof

This is an excerpt from a 2011 article written by Marcello Sgambelluri. Even though Marcello has figured out a way to do this with Dynamo, this technique is still quite simple and valid. You can find the entire article here: https://www.augi.com/library/methods-for-modeling-complex-geometry

1. Make a Wall which intersects the Roof.
2. Join the Wall to the Roof
2. Use the 'Pick Lines' tool in the Beam command. Turn on 3D snapping. Select the intersecting line of the wall and roof.

Revit (2016?) Wish List

First of all, making software is very hard and complicated and I am very grateful of the hard working and caring people at Autodesk. This is mostly a re-post from 2011, yes that long ago. Since then I have trained over 1000 people in Revit and consulted on over 1 million sf of Revit projects, many now constructed. Along the way I have observed certain questions/issues/requests/frustrations that come up repeatedly. I am re-posting this to emphasize where Autodesk has improved Revit and what they still need to do in my opinion. I am aware that there are apps and bits and pieces of software which do some of what I'm asking for but this needs to be thoughtfully integrated into Revit. I have not seen the Beta so maybe some of this is already done, which would be great. Please add to this list in the Comments.

Open the Revit Database Already!

Most of my wishes revolve around opening up the Revit database, some specific examples:

-Schedules which can query anything from any category. i.e. list everything in a particular room.

-Tags which are able to read data from other objects and categories i.e. Doors reading Room numbers.

-Universal Search. Search by multiple conditions and save searches. Or just start typing a find anything. (you can search the Project Browser now)

Automated Project Browser and View Tools

-Project Browser makes and manages Phase and Design Option views automatically.
-Automated 3D Section Box views which are linked to the extents of plans, sections and elevs.

-View Folders (not parameter). Drag and drop views between folders.

-Automated naming of views i.e. Room 101 South Elevation

Connections

-Please provide linking of Excel, Word and PDF files into Revit.

Schedules

-Schedules to include Family thumbnails.-They checked this one off the list. Maybe the next improvement is to combine Legend views with Schedules, add tagging to Legend Components while you're at it :-)

Other Stuff 

-Edit Family button for Annotation i.e. Levels and View Titles.

-Walls which have a 'centreline' built in for various uses ie.fire rating plans

-Automated lineweight control based upon distance

- Site tool enhancements.(Did they give us this one? Sorry but the Eaglepoint stuff is just too complicated)
-Two Click Revision Bubbles (Yay, we have this)
-Spell check that checks all of the spelling
-Phase filters that show multiple phases backward. Allow for more Graphic Control over previous and future Phases.
-Universal Annotation Settings Interface

Set Default Viewport

When you drag a view onto a Revit sheet the default Viewport is 'Title W Line'. Although there is no 'Set Default Viewport' button you are able to set one default Viewport. You can do this by renaming and editing the properties of the current default Viewport (Title W Line).