The Building Coder

Auto-Run an Add-In for Design Automation

Still at the Forge Accelerator in Rome and looking further into the Forge Design Automation API for Revit. Althpough it is not yet available or documented, you can still start preparing your add-in for the day when it comes – Aspects to consider – Accessing the Revit Application object – DB application add-in manifest – Next steps... Read more →

Swallowing StairsAutomation Warnings

One important step to take before trying to run your Revit API code fully automated and unattended is to ensure that it does not create or modify UI in any way. For example, you must ensure that it does not cause Revit to display any warnings. This can be achieved with a warning swallower. Let's implement one for the StairsAutomation SDK sample... Read more →

Magic Number, Magic Automation and Magic Season

Time to wind down for the year... Here are some last things to share before signing off – Magic number for schedule instance bounding box margin – Using PostCommand with the Windows Automation API – Programmer jokes – Season's greetings... Read more →

Element Selection Changed Event

Many add-in developers are interested in being notified when the current selection changes in the Revit user interface. Among other things, it led to the implementation of the selection watcher using the Idling event and was one aspect of the discussion of element level events. Checking for Selection Changes in Idling Event Handler Ken Goulding submitted a comment on that, saying: When you mentioned "Element Level", I was hoping that included element selection events, but that does not seem to... Read more →

List and Switch Design Options Using UI Automation

Yesterday, we discussed a Revit add-in using .NET UI Automation to retrieve the current state of the Revit thin lines setting. Today, let's look at another application demonstrating use of that functionality to determine, list and set the Revit design options from a stand-alone executable application. Once again, this sample is presented by Revitalizer, aka Rudolf Honke of Mensch und Maschine acadGraph, who already contributed numerous other examples making use of the .NET UI Automation library to hack the Revit... Read more →

Thin Lines Add-in Using UI Automation

Revit add-in developers have repeatedly requested access to the Thin Lines setting provided in the Revit user interface, leading to Revit API discussion forum threads on view thin lines, exported image line weight (thin line) and rendering setting and a Revit API wish list item CF-192 – As an add-in developer, I need the API ability to detect and modify the "Thin lines" setting, so that the user can automatically get the environment configured in the way they like. Happily,... Read more →

Automation, Ribbon Panel, ItemExecuted and Vacation

Here is an interesting exploration of using UI Automation to traverse the Revit ribbon items and subscribe to an event enabling you to determine when certain commands are executed. I'll leave you to ponder this while I take a vacation in the snow next week. Happy Revit add-in programming! Question: I would like to keep track of all add-ins that are started on a given Revit installation. We currently keep track of all our own using specific routines in the... Read more →

Moving an External Command Button within the Ribbon

I recently presented Frode Tørresdal's unofficial custom ribbon button implementation showing how you can add a custom button that Revit knows nothing about to the ribbon and hook it up with the Idling event to perform some action requiring access to the Revit API. It would be much simpler, safer and more effective if we could implement a normal official Revit external command instead and create a button anywhere we want in the Revit ribbon to drive that. Well, happily,... Read more →

Room Editor Live and Unofficial Custom Ribbon Button

I spent a wonderful weekend and yesterday's Whit Monday holiday enjoying high summer in Swiss nature with no electricity and a Chäschessi, the Swiss variant of a Jacuzzi or hot tub. Today I am leaving for a ten-day camping vacation in nature in Sweden. Here are two topics I would like to address before leaving that will hopefully keep you occupied and entertained during my absence: Room Editor Live Adding a custom button to the Modify tab Vacation time Room... Read more →

Using Balloon Tips in Revit

Here is another tip from Rudolf 'Revitalizer' Honke of Mensch und Maschine acadGraph, who provided most of the tips in the past making use of undocumented .NET and Autodesk API functionality provided by the UI Automation and AdWindows libraries, on using .NET Balloon Tips in a Revit add-in. First, however, let me mention some dates for the international AU events. International Autodesk University Event Locations and Dates Some Autodesk University international and AU Extension locations and dates for 2014 have... Read more →

Adding a Button to Existing Ribbon Panel

Here is an interesting user interface contribution from Eduardo Teixeira of Autodesk: Question: I am building a Revit add-in using the Revit API. I would like to add a button for it to an existing out-of-the-box Revit ribbon panel using the Revit API in C#. I could not find any documentation that shows how to do that. Is it possible at all? Answer: Yes, this can be done. I am not certain whether it is officially supported, though. You will... Read more →

URL and Other Buttons, XYZ Points and Vectors

Let me summarise a very few of the topics I have been chatting with people about in the past few days: Ribbon button identification Opening a URL from a ribbon button XYZ comparison and point and vector behaviour Autodesk API overview The Green Building Studio GBS REST API Actually, to tell the truth, it is just one day, so far, this week. Wow, my days are too full. I am getting nothing else done! Ribbon Button Identification Here is a... Read more →

Happy Bhai Dooj!

Happy Bhai Dooj to you! This greeting comes from my colleague Sandeep Kumar in Bangalore, who explains: Bhai Dooj is a festival of prayers from sister to brother, brother's protection for her sister. May we all celebrate this Bhai Dooj with even more love and protection for our sisters and brothers. Best wishes on this Bhai Dooj. Thus fortified, let us turn to a Revit API issue, based on this excerpt from a useful little chat I had yesterday that... Read more →

Video Animated Ribbon Item Tooltip

We already discussed a number of interesting things you can do with the Revit ribbon and user interface, many inspired by Rudolf Honke's exploration of uses of the .NET UI Automation functionality. Here is a related contribution by Victor Chekalin, or Виктор Чекалин, fleshed out from his answer to Rudolf's question on animating a ribbon item tooltip, discussing the retrieval of embedded resource images: It is possible to add your own video to a Revit ribbon button tool tip, and... Read more →

Modeless Forms in Revit

Today the moon is full. I celebrated it last night already, sitting with a friend and having a fire on a hill with a 270 degree view to the east, west and south. Very beautiful! This full moon is special, because it is the occasion of the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival. It "parallels the autumnal equinox of the solar calendar, when the moon is at its fullest and roundest". This Chinese festival will even be celebrated in Switzerland tonight, as the... Read more →

Translate Revit Tooltips

Kean Walmsley recently started exploring the exciting and useful idea of hooking up machine translation to AutoCAD, initially to auto-translate tooltips. As Kean points out, you can get all AutoCAD tooltips translated into one of 35 different languages, which is a great help for people learning or using the product in regions for which we don't currently localize. Here's a tooltip in Arabic, for instance: Kean quickly followed up the original proof of concept with an improved implementation including caching... Read more →

Ribbon Panel Title Conflict

Here is another exploration into the inner workings of the Revit ribbon by Rudolf Honke of acadGraph CADstudio GmbH. He says: If you try to add a new Ribbon panel whose title is already used by another Add-In panel, it will throw an exception. You therefore have to ensure that no other third party panel uses the same text as you do. The Revit API method GetRibbonPanels will not find panels that are not yet loaded, and there is no... Read more →

Pimp my AutoCAD or Revit Ribbon

Here is another fun possibility to access and manipulate the Revit ribbon explored by Rudolf Honke of acadGraph CADstudio GmbH. He says: I've played around and found a possibility to modify the appearance of the AutoCAD and Revit ribbon bars. This is the Revit ribbon bar in its usual colour scheme: Now let's change the panel background image and panel headers: What about using a gradient fill and changing the tab header font: The style is persistent, even if you... Read more →

Explode a DWG

After yesterday's very practical note on creating a pipe cap, here is another slightly less practical note from Rudolf Honke of acadGraph CADstudio GmbH, who picked up on Sami's comment on subscribing to UI Automation events. Sami asks: Question: Is it possible to explode an imported DWG file using the API? Answer: After showing the mechanism of invoking commands twice, I do think this can be achieved. Just like all other ribbon elements, also the 'Explode' buttons are accessible via... Read more →

Command and Conquer When Switching Views

Today, February 3, is the first day of the Chinese New Year and the beginning of the spring festival, which lasts for fifteen days. This is a year of the Rabbit zodiac sign. Here is a duilian, a pair of lines of poetry, or actually a special form called chunlian, used as a New Year's decoration that expresses happy and hopeful thoughts for the coming year sent us by Joe Ye from Beijing: The meanings of these lines are: Top:... Read more →

Automate DesignOption and 64 Bit Add-In Templates

Let's start off the week with another idea from Rudolf Honke of acadGraph CADstudio GmbH. He recently presented his results of exploring the Revit ribbon internals using UISpy, driving Revit using UI Automation, subscribing to UI Automation events, and switching between different projects and views. Here is another of his ideas of making use of UI Automation: This screen snapshot shows the design options dropdown list: When showing elements programmatically using the app.ActiveUIDocument.ShowElements( elementSet ) method, it might occur that... Read more →