The Revit Clinic

Revit Customize Alphanumeric Sequence - Copy and Paste

Revit 2016 added the ability for more complex, comma-separated revision sequences to deal with specific requirements.  As part of this change you can also copy and paste your sequences into this field.

Quick tip - if you wanted to pre-populate an entire custom sequence,  it might be easier to keep a text file and edit the list in another application.

Revit will do some basic reformatting of the data - for example if you copy and paste this:

Revit will reformat it into this after you click OK:

Process for upgrading files from Collaboration for Revit 2015 to 2016

If you have used A360 Collaboration for Revit 2015, when you install and open A360 Collaboration for Revit 2016, your 2015 projects and their associated Revit models will not be visible. To access 2015 project data in A360 Collaboration for Revit 2016, you will need to create a new project and upgrade the data. 

Follow these steps to upgrade your projects and Revit models before you start working in A360 Collaboration for Revit 2016.

1. Open Revit 2015.

2. Browse to the A360 project that you want to upgrade.

3. Open each Revit model and save it to your local workstation.

4. Create a new project to be used with A360 Collaboration for Revit 2016 in your A360 team hub.

5. Open Revit 2016.

6. Open each Revit model that was saved to your local workstation in step 3 and save it.

A 2016 version of the model is created.

7. Initiate collaboration on each model and specify the 2016 project name that was created on A360 in step 4. 

When you initiate collaboration, the model is associated with the new A360 Collaboration for Revit 2016 project. 

8. Re-link the Revit models as needed.

9. Communicate to project team members that they should use the 2016 project. 

There are now two separate and distinct projects (2015 format and 2016 format). Project team members must use the upgraded project and models when collaborating. 

10. On A360, rename the 2015 version of the project or deactivate it.

See Also:

2015 Help

2016 Help

 

Unexpected Text behavior when exporting from Revit to CAD

Al’aaeldin Alsahli (one of our Revit support specialists) recently discovered this issue:

Unexpected Text behavior when exporting from Revit to CAD

Examples

+415 123 4567                                                       7654 321 514+

 

If you find your text is unexpectedly changing (as seen above) when exporting from Revit, this article could have an answer for you.

Revit could not load C:\PROGRAM FILES\AUTODESK\REVIT 2014\ARRAYELEMSDB.DLL

If you receive the following message after installing the Hotfix for Revit Server 2014, you may have installed the Hotfix onto a version of Revit with Update Release 3 (build 20140709_2115):

We have recently found that the client-side portion of the hotfix is already included in UR3, but some of the DLLs were further changed with UR3.

This can lead to a situation where installing the client-side hotfix after UR3 will load an older version of three DLL files (DesktopMFC.dll, EssentialsDB.dll, RevitDB.dll), and the other changes in UR3 were not meant to work with those older DLLs. This is where we see the error above when launching Revit.

To clear the issue, restore the DLL files by renaming the 391388 appended version (e.g. DesktopMFC.391388.dll) back to the original file name or replace the DLL with the ones below:

Download DesktopMFC (File version 2014.0.2014.709)

Download EssentialsDB (File version 2014.0.2014.709)

Download RevitDB (File version 2014.0.2014.709)

Revit Server 2014 Hotfix

I wanted to pass along the link for the Revit Server 2014 hotfix, for anyone that has experienced the following:

• Poor performance with Revit Server due to excessive calls to locateModel logic.
• Inability to save models to Revit Server 2014 due to a condition where "An item with the same key has already been added."

The direct link is included here:

Hotfix - Autodesk Revit 2014 – Revit Server

Multi-Segment Grid Bubble Removed by Crop Region

Here’s a quick tip should you run into the following scenario:

You have a custom shape multi-segment grid visible in your view.  You also have the crop region enabled for the view.  You notice that one or more of the mutli-segment grids are not displaying the end symbol (bubble).

Initially the crop region looks like this and all the bubbles are visible:

You adjust the crop region, and the top symbols no longer display:

This issue is specific to multi-segment grids, where there is only 1 sub-segment visible within the crop region (and that 1 sub-segment is cut by the crop).

The workaround is simple:

• Edit the grid sketch
• Use the Modify > Split Element tool
• Click somewhere within the crop (to create a second sketch segment)
• Finish the sketch.  The multi-segment grid line should display the end symbol now, since there is no longer only 1 sub-segment visible & intersected by the crop region:

Revit 2014 Schedule Footer Alignment

The behavior of Revit 2014 schedules containing a column footer has been updated to match Revit 2013 (or earlier behavior).  If you upgraded a project to Revit 2014 you may have noticed the schedule footer justification always set to column left:

After applying Revit 2014 Update Release 1 and opening the same project, the footer alignment should follow the column horizontal alignment:

Revit 2014 allows you to format columns using either the Schedule Properties > Formatting > Alignment setting, or by selecting the column index in the schedule view and using the ribbon Appearance > Align Horizontal tool:

Don’t forget you can first align the column by selecting the column index > Align Horizontal, and then override the column header alignment (by clicking inside the header cell and using the same tool) should you need both the header and column to vary.

Revisions & Keynotes & Worksets & Revit 2014

I want to update and elaborate on our previous post:

When Adding a Keynote Tag the User Borrows a Sheet Workset

For Revit 2013 or earlier there are 2 common scenarios where sheet view worksets can be borrowed working with keynotes or revisions.  The first was mentioned in the original post:

1. There is a sheet in the project A101.
2. Several project views have been placed on this sheet.
3. UserA is in one of the views that appear on sheet A101.  UserA has not opened or edited sheet A101 directly.
4. In this view UserA adds a keynote.
5. Because this view appears on sheet A101, Revit needs to borrow the view workset for sheet A101 to update keynote data.  There could also be a keynote legend on this sheet for example.
6. If UserB attempts to add a keynote to one of these views before UserA syncs with central & relinquishes they would receive the expected “Can’t edit the element until UserA…” message.

The second is applicable only for Revit 2012 \ 2013, where tagging linked model geometry with keynotes is possible:

1. There is a host model containing a Revit link.
2. Keynotes are added (in the host) attached to link geometry.
3. At some point the link geometry changes (such as deleting a wall) causing the keynote tag to become orphaned.
4. When a keynote tag is orphaned, it is removed from keynote legends when filtering by sheet.
5. The next user to create a new local file, or reload the link will load those changes (which orphans the keynote tag).  This in turn borrows every sheet view workset that tag previously appeared in.

For Revit 2013 or earlier the original post provides some additional information around this behavior.

For Revit 2014 keynote and revision functionality has been improved.  Sheet view worksets are no longer borrowed during the same process, which should give larger project teams additional flexibility (especially during documentation-heavy project phases).

Corruption in Revit LT 2014 project after upgrading from 2013.

The following is another great guest post from Product Support Specialist Lance Coffey.

We are starting to see a number of users reporting "Data in file is corrupt" error messages after upgrading a project to Revit LT 2014.

After some investigation, we have found that this can happen when saving an upgraded file on top of a previous version. The reason is that some of the prior version elements remain unchanged in the file, which then puts the project in a state which cannot be used by Revit LT, and when reopening the project, Revit LT will report data in the file is corrupt.

If this happens, recover a backup copy of the project before it was upgraded.

To avoid the issue, when upgrading a project in Revit LT 2014, use Save As to save to a new filename.

Once upgraded and saved to a new name, you can save the 2014 project normally.

Our developers are aware of this, and are currently working to address the issue.

Model Elements on View Worksets

Revit has 4 main categories for worksets:

User-Created
Families
Project Standards
Views

The only category directly accessible to users (to change the workset assignment) is User-Created.

In Revit 2013 or earlier you may occasionally notice a model element (such as a wall, door, family, etc.) on a View workset.  View worksets are not user selectable and are instead managed by Revit internally.  So how did this happen?  This could occur under the following scenario: 

1. The user selects and enters an edit mode for an element on a view workset.  Some examples include plan regions, detail groups, or filled regions
2. Instead of using ‘Finish Edit Mode’ or ‘Cancel Edit Mode’ the user instead clicks Undo to exit edit mode
3. Now back in the project, the user starts adding model elements, such as walls.  The walls are placed on the current View workset instead of the active User-Created workset (until the user opens the workset dialog or changes the active workset):

This behavior was improved in Revit 2014.  Using Undo to exit edit mode will correctly reset the active workset.

For earlier releases you can easily isolate elements that may be on an incorrect View workset and assign them to a specific User-Created workset.

First to isolate model elements on view worksets:

1. Create a new 3D View and turn on all categories in Visibility / Graphic Overrides
2. Set the view ‘Discipline’ to ‘Coordination’
3. In Visibility/Graphic Overrides > 'Worksets' tab, set every workset ‘Visibility Setting’ to ‘Hide’ > OK to close the dialog
4. Any element that is visible should be on view workset.  This makes it easy to identify inconsistencies in workset assignment

To move the elements to the desired User-Created workset:

1. Set the Active Workset to the workset you wish the model element onto
2. Cut to Clipboard
3. Paste Aligned to Same Place.  The model element should now be on the active workset.  If it worked correctly you should not see the element again until you adjust the Visibility / Graphic Overrides > Worksets tab, and set ‘Visibility Setting’ back to not use ‘Hide’