The Building Coder

VSTA to Stay and Updater to Go

As you may have heard from Kean, we have safely arrived in Munich, Germany for the next developer conference, the biggest one in our European series. Actually, he only talks about his own arrival, but our arrival worked all right as well. One topic that we are discussing at these conferences is cloud computing, so it was a funny coincidence to run into a nice big tangible cloud when we went out to have a dinner with our developer partners... Read more →

Snow and Woe with Manifest Files

I am still on the road toward Paris. The departure of our flight in Moscow was delayed, so we missed the connection to Paris in Vienna. In addition, I heard that the Paris airport was closed all day until five in the afternoon due to snow. We are still booked to fly and arrive Thursday night, though, so the Paris conference scheduled for Friday is not yet endangered. Right now, the ETA is quarter to twelve, so it will be... Read more →

More Kevin Filtering Benchmarks

I caught a germ yesterday in Moscow, maybe travelling on the subway to the office, or at the developer conference itself. I suffered through the night with a pain in the bones of my face and a headache, and yet I was able to catch up on lots of sleep in the end, getting up much later than normal today. The whole morning has also been very unpleasant inside my head, but the rest of me feels fine, and it... Read more →

Find Intersecting Elements

Right now I am sitting in the Tel Aviv Ben Gurion airport, which very friendlily provides free public wifi Internet access, unlike the also very friendly staff with an unfortunately less generous wifi policy in the Sheraton hotel we stayed at, who (try to) charge USD 20 per day for the same service. Yesterday we looked at the XML family usage report from Kevin Vandecar's filtering and optimisation presentation at the AEC DevCamp conference in Boston in June, which formed... Read more →

XML Family Usage Report

I spent a pleasant weekend here in Tel Aviv, mostly preparing for the upcoming developer conferences. I did take time for a walk along the beach to Jaffa and an early dinner in a neat little restaurant in the port, Container. Here it is, behind the fishing boats, seen from the other side of the port, with old Jaffa in the background: I also found out that you can get really good coffee in Israel, and wonderful ice cream, for... Read more →

The Revit API Track at AU 2010

I finished my three Revit API classes at Autodesk University and am heading off to the airport to return to Europe and on to further conferences starting in Tel Aviv. There is such a huge amount of really important and valuable information here, and such a shame that it is rather hard to get at it efficiently. You can obviously search the AU class catalogue, but it is hard to filter out all of the interesting Revit API topics. For... Read more →

Access to Sketch and Sketch Plane

I just presented my first Revit API class here at AU 2010, CP228-2, on the optimal use of the Revit 2011 programming features and the Idling event. I already posted my AU class descriptions and materials. The presentation went well and was good fun. The next one, CP234-2, on Revit 2011 programming optimization and filtered element collectors, is scheduled in an hour's time. Right now I am sitting in on Matt Mason's presentation on Revit parameters. Meanwhile, here is another... Read more →

Autodesk University 2010 Class Materials

I submitted the materials for my three Autodesk University classes yesterday. I checked the enrollment numbers at the same time and was a bit surprised: CP228-2 Optimal Use of New Autodesk Revit 2011 Programming Features, on Revit 2011 API features in general and the Idling event in particular: 154. CP234-2 Exactly What You Want and Faster: Autodesk Revit 2011 Programming Optimization, on optimisation and benchmarking, especially filtering: 135. CP316-3U All Systems Go in Autodesk Revit MEP Programming, an 'Unconference' together... Read more →

Level Filter Benchmark

Yesterday I published Kevin Vandecar's handout document from his AEC DevCamp presentation on filtered element collectors, and right away an interesting case cropped up which motivated a closer look at one of his samples. By the way, many of his samples are very interesting to have a closer look at, which I plan to do soon as well. For now, let's start off with an analysis of the ElementLevelFilter, based on the following question: Question: A quick question this time:... Read more →

Filtered Element Collectors

One of the most important enhancements made in the Revit 2011 API which is guaranteed to affect almost every single conceivable Revit add-in is the new filtered element collector mechanism, and we have already looked at numerous aspects and examples of using it in various ways. It represents the one and only way to access elements in the Revit database, if you disregard a number of dedicated Document properties providing direct access to specialised collections of various types, which can... Read more →

Autodesk University 2010 Classes

Kean's post on AU 2010 classes yesterday reminded me that I might mention my upcoming classes here as well. The catalogues of both physical and virtual classes have been posted to the AU website: My classes are the following: CP228-2: Optimal Use of New Autodesk Revit 2011 Programming Features, a lecture on Revit 2011 API features in general, on Tuesday 2010-11-30 14:00-15:00. CP234-2: Exactly What You Want and Faster: Autodesk Revit 2011 Programming Optimization, a lecture on Revit 2011 API... Read more →

Voting Open for AU 2010 Sessions

Shamelessly copying Kean's lead, here is an overview of the classes I have submitted for this year's Autodesk University: Session ID 5977 – Optimal Use of New Revit 2011 Programming Features A 60 minute lecture teaching everything you need to know about the new Revit 2011 programming features and how to use them, with many code examples, making use of all new API features in all types of Revit add-ins. We also present the one and only complete overview of... Read more →