Revit 2011 DevTV

The Revit DevTV recordings are probably the absolutely most efficient learning resource for quickly getting a hands-on experience of programming Revit. They include

• Overview of the SDK
• Installation of samples
• Creating your first add-in
• Iterating over database elements
• Selecting an element
• Extracting element parameter data
• ... And much more!

The first version was created for Revit 2008, and that was reused for the Revit 2009 training material as well. Augusto Gonçalves of Autodesk Brazil created an updated version for Revit 2010 in December 2009, and he also created the wonderful DevTV add-in templates for Revit 2011.

Now we have a vastly improved version for the Revit 2011 API. It is split into two parts to make it more manageable. Part 1 was again created by Augusto, in English and Portuguese, and Part 2 by Adam Nagy. They are hosted on the Revit Developer Center site and also accessible through the following links which I copied from there:

• DevTV: Introduction to Revit 2011 Programming - Part 1:
  A short video tutorial demonstrating the basic steps to start developing with Revit .NET API.
  View online – Download

• DevTV: Introduction to Revit 2011 Programming (Portuguese):
  Introdução à Programação Revit
  Uma videoaula de curta duração que mostra as etapas básicas para começar a programar com a API Revit .NET.
  View online – Download

• DevTV: Introduction to Revit 2011 Programming – Part 2:
  A short video tutorial demonstrating selection and filtering API through a room renumbering application.
  View online – Download

Here are the detailed tables of contents:

Part 1

1. Introduction
2. Hello World
3. Add-In Manager
4. External Command
5. Selection
6. Revit Lookup
7. Database
8. Filters
9. Parameters
10. Learning More

Part 2

1. Introduction
2. Add-In in Action
3. Add-In Framework
4. Picking Objects
5. RevitLookup Tool
6. Element Filtering
7. Testing the Add-In
8. Add-In Manager
9. Learning More

Part 2 Expands on Part 1

There is a certain apparent overlap between the two tables of content, because the two presentations cover related materials using different examples and highlighting different important aspects. Part 2 is a significant expansion over Part 1, however. As Adam puts it, the difference is that Part 2 discusses how to use what you learned in Part 1:

1. Introduction – Part of the DevTV framework.
2. Add-In in Action – explains what the add-in will do.
3. Add-In Framework – refers back to Part 1 without going into details.
4. Picking Objects – Part 1 talks about iterating the currently selected objects, Part 2 talks about picking.
5. RevitLookup Tool – Part 1 has a quick look at it but does not 'use' it, whereas Part 2 does.
6. Element Filtering – Part 1 presented the OfClass and OfCategory shortcuts; Part 2 goes further by showing WherePasses and ParameterFilter.
7. Testing the Add-In – just a very quick test this time.
8. Add-In Manager – Part 2 actually shows how to use it, while Part 1 just mentioned it.
9. Learning More – Part of the DevTV framework.

DevTV Template Update

By the way, it is extremely easy to edit the DevTV Visual Studio Wizard templates included with Part 1. Simply unzip the files to the hard disk, edit them just as you see fit, and zip them back up again. For example, here is my personalised C# DevTV template which generates an absolutely minimal C# Revit add-in skeleton with all comments removed and some additional copyright information added to the assembly properties.