The Building Coder

Virtual AU and AEC Hackathon, Units and DAS Job

Lots of exciting items to share – No cost for Autodesk University 2020 – AU voting suggestion – Modeless Revit add-ins – Virtual AEC and BIM360 hackathon – Do not print by category – Using the new unit API to display length of multiple lines – Job opening in Developer Advocacy and Support – Intro to synchronous versus async programming... Read more →

BIM 360 Hackathon and Bounding Boxes

Topics for today – BIM 360 and Forge Hackathon and Webinar Series – IsCreatedLocal versus IsLocal – Getting the building height – FamilyBoundingBox enhanced taking instances into account... Read more →

Family Bounding Box and AEC Hackathon Munich

I briefly mentioned the AEC Hackathon in Munich yesterday. Here is some more information on that, highlighting the exciting speaker line-up and target topics, plus a solution for determining the bounding box of an entire family – AEC Hackathon Munich Topics and Speakers – Family bounding box – Continuous integration for RevitLookup? Read more →

Events, UV Coordinates and Rooms on Level

A lot of interesting solutions were shared in the Revit API discussion forum and private email messages during my absence last week, and several exciting events are looming – Forge Accelerator in Gothenburg – AEC Hackathon in Munich – Autodesk University in London – Retrieve and map texture UV coordinates exporting geometry and material – Collect all rooms on a given level... Read more →

1500 Posts, DevDay and Storing a Dictionary

Welcome to The Building Coder post number 1500! I returned safe and sound to Europe from Autodesk University 2016 in Las Vegas and recuperated from jetlag over the weekend. Today I discuss upcoming events, new simple samples to embed a Forge viewer in a web page or blog post, and strategies to embed a dictionary into the Revit database – DevDay Europe in Munich – AEC Symposium in New York – Embedding a Forge viewer – Storing a dictionary in the Revit database... Read more →

Forge Formats, Webinars and Fusion 360 Client API

I updated the WebGL and Forge introduction for BIM programming and its GitHub source for the presentations in the coming days at the RTC Revit Technology Conference Europe and the ISEPBIM Forge and BIM workshops at ISEP, in Porto, implemented two little curl wrapper scripts to help me list the supported file formats, explored why they changed and updated the hackathon webinar overview. Before getting to that, I'll also highlight a helpful note by Christian on how to access the 'Symbolic Representation' setting – 'Symbolic Representation' setting parameter – Forge intro for BIM programming – cURL wrapper scripts to list Forge file formats – Updated Forge file formats – Forge hackathon webinar series and Fusion 360 Client API recording... Read more →

Token Expiry and Online Revit API Docs

My vacation ended and I am now in Porto, putting the last touches to my presentation material for the RTC Revit Technology Conference Europe and the ISEPBIM Forge and BIM workshops at ISEP, Porto University. Here are today's Revit API and Forge news items – Updated Online Revit API Docs – Handling Forge token expiry... Read more →

Forge Webinars on Design Automation and BIM360

The Forge webinar series continues. The recording of session 5 on the Design Automation API held by Albert Szilvasy is now available. For code samples on Design Automation, please refer to Albert's tutorials and the Developer-Autodesk Forge Platform samples on GitHub, filtering for Design.automation... Read more →

Solid From Bounding Box and Forge Webinar 4

I submitted the handout for my presentation on connecting the desktop and cloud for the RTC Revit Technology Conference Europe in Porto next month. I still have to finish my work on the roomedit3dv3 sample to demonstrate connecting the desktop with the cloud by enabling a real-time round-trip modification of the BIM via the Forge viewer; yesterday I integrated the transform viewer extension; now I have to hook up the socket.io messaging back to the Revit add-in to update the BIM – Create solid from bounding box – Forge webinar series 4 – Viewer... Read more →

Warning Swallower, Roomedit3d Viewer Extension

I continue my work on the roomedit3dv3 sample connecting the desktop with the cloud by enabling a real-time round-trip modification of the BIM via the Forge viewer, mention a neat solution enabling a Revit add-in to swallowing warning messages, and point out the Forge webinar session on the Forge Viewer later today – Warning swallower – Roomedit3dv3 transform viewer extension – Forge webinar series... Read more →

Roomedit3d Broadcast, Teigha BIM, Forge Webinar 3

My discussion with Philippe on integrating roomedit3dv3 with the rest of his Forge node.js boilerplate samples continues, as does the Forge hackathon webinar series. Furthermore, the Open Design Alliance made an interesting Revit related announcement – REST vs WebSocket and Roomedit3dv3 broadcast architecture – Teigha BIM announcement – Forge webinar series... Read more →

Flipping a Section View and Forge Webinar 3

I already created a starting point for the new roomedit3d incarnation last week, in its own repository. This week, I agreed with Philippe to retain the new project in an own branch within the Forge boilerplate code sample collection. Hopefully, that will simplify keeping my BIM sample synchronised with any future updates make to that. Now I need to get started implementing and testing the actual viewer extension functionality itself. My main topic today is something different and purely Revit API oriented, besides the next Forge session – Flipping a section view – Forge webinar series... Read more →

The Birth of Roomedit3dv3 and Forge Webinar 2

I made my choice on the starting point for the new roomedit3d incarnation, and the second Forge webinar was successfully held – The birth of Roomedit3dv3 – Forge webinar session 2 on OAuth and the Data Management API... Read more →

Forge Webinar Series and Roomedit Starting Points

I am still in the initial steps of preparing for my upcoming presentations on connecting the desktop and the cloud and exploring more Forge sample starting points. At the same time, we are in the midst of the Forge and AppStore online hackathon webinars, with one down and nine more to come – More Roomedit3dv3 starting points – Forge webinar series... Read more →

Forge and AppStore Online Hackathon Webinars

For the fourth year in a row, we are hosting an online hackathon. In fact, it already started: the Autodesk App Store Forge and Fusion 360 Hackathon is running from September 1 until October 31. This time, the focus is on building apps using Forge APIs and Fusion 360 and extending the Forge ecosystem. Forge is a development platform – a set of cloud services that connects design, engineering, visualization, collaboration, production and operations workflows for all domains. At this early stage of Forge, many people may be interested in learning more about the Forge APIs with no obligation to publish an app; you are more than welcome to attend the free API webinars... Read more →

Forge and Autodesk University Call for Proposals

In the beginning of the week, I listed my things to do next, including the most important and exciting one, attending and presenting at the Forge DevCon developer conference in San Francisco June 15-16. My to-do list also includes the Forge accelerators being held in Barcelona May 16-20 and in San Francisco June 19-24. Now the calls for proposals have opened for both Autodesk University and the Forge accelerator in San Francisco... Read more →

What Can Revit on the Cloud Do For You?

Dear Revit API Add-in Developer Community, this is The Building Coder Post nr. 1400! 1400 is the number of different arrangements of four non-attacking queens on a 4×10 chessboard. I am using this happy special occasion to ask you an important and hopefully very popular question: What Can Revit on the Cloud Do For You? Would you like to run Revit on a Server? Are you looking for a Revit I/O, similar to AutoCAD I/O? What does Revit on the Cloud look like in your dreams? Could you make use of RealRVT, something similar to RealDWG, to programmatically access, create and modify a complete BIM without installing Revit? Read more →

Kids@Work and AEC Technology Symposium Videos

I am busy preparing my presentations for Autodesk University. In spite of that, I spent the day yesterday taking my SON (significant other's nephew :-) to the Kids at Work event in the Autodesk Neuchâtel offices – AEC Technology Symposium Videos... Read more →

Markdown, Fusion Accelerator $$$, Revisions and Bulk Upgrade

Today, I discuss my new Markdown blog post format, Fusion 360, the Fusion accelerator and a couple of Revit issues: Using the Markdown blog post format; Fusion 360; Fusion 360 for game artists; Fusion 360 accelerator; The Revit Revision API; Running a background bulk upgrade batch, Banksy's Dismaland bemusement park... Read more →

AngelHack Athens, Sustainability and Export Precision

AngelHack Athens is in full swing, Autodesk has committed to 100% sustainability, Scott Conover explains some Revit export precision and tolerance aspects, and I am leaving on vacation next week: AngelHack Athens hackathon Autodesk commits to 100% renewable energy Revit export precision and tolerance Vacation time AngelHack Athens Hackathon We held the second I love 3D – Athens meetup yesterday with 19 interested and enthusiastic participants: I posted the full details and links to all the important View and Data... Read more →

How to Retrieve Dimensioning References

Several cases recently came up asking how to obtain references to programmatically create dimensioning elements. These hints expand on the recently discussed topic of creating dimensioning between family instance insertion points. They were raised by the following queries on how to retrieve suitable references for dimensioning: Dimensioning to family instance centre reference planes Dimensioning between a grid and an edge of a face Dimensioning to the wall opening wrapping location Before getting to that, I'll just add that I returned... Read more →

Cloning a Solid, AngelHack, 3D Web Fest and Dubai

The Revit 2016 offers a whole host of exciting new functionality that I am dying to try out, e.g.: Custom exporter supports 2D output Improved ReferenceIntersector linked model support DirectShape supports curves, points and references Cool new Geometry API functionality And much, much more... Too little time! At least I can mention one useful aspect of the new geometry API that came in handy for an issue that came up yesterday. I am in Dubai right now, preparing for the... Read more →

Gross and Net Wall Area Calculation Enhancement

We make further enhancements to the on-going project to determine gross and net areas and volumes, obviously a fundamental issue to BIM. And I have more news to share as well: Playing with my WebGL viewer WebGL Developers meetup in NYC April 21 AEC Hackathon in Dallas May 1-3 Angelhack in Dubai May 7-9 Angelhack in Athens June 5-7 Wall area calculation handling multiple openings in multiple walls in multiple rooms Playing with my WebGL Viewer My last post was... Read more →

Keyboard Shortcuts and Other News

A couple of questions on stackoverflow and the Revit API discussion forum prompted me to pick up the age-old issue of keyboard shortcuts again. Plus, I'd like to point out some news from the AEC Hackathon in New York and the AECbytes newsletter: AEC Hackathon in New York AECbytes newsletter How to programmatically retrieve keyboard shortcuts How to assign a keyboard shortcut to an external command How to programmatically create a keyboard shortcut AEC Hackathon in New York I attended... Read more →

Picking Pairs and Dimensioning Family Instance Origin

We looked at various aspects of creating dimensioning in the past. There is still one glaring omission, though: how to dimension to a family instance origin point. Let's take a look at that, after quickly mentioning the official announcement of the movie matching game that we created at the recent Berlin hackathon. Actually, coincidentally, I discuss two topics today that are both completely and utterly dedicated to picking pairs: the Movie Match MasterY game, matching pairs of cards representing films,... Read more →

Berlin Hackathon Results, 3D Viewer and Web News

We completed the Berlin hackathon last weekend, and many other noteworthy and exciting things are going on, concerning the Revit API, the 3D web viewers, web services and more: Berlin hackathon projects and winners Avoid unnecessary unit conversion 3D viewer news AutoCAD as a web service Collada STL ADVA export settings RvtVa3c update Berlin Hackathon Projects and Winners The Berlin hackathon completed and the winners were announced last weekend. I took notes of four teams' project presentations: US4, us four... Read more →

Attached Detail Groups and Inverse Relationships

I am still at the Berlin hackathon, working with the MovieMemory team... In between other tasks, let me mention the interesting discussion and solution by Revitalizer on the Revit API discussion forum to check for attached detail groups: Question: Can someone tell me, please, how I can find out if a Group (Type) has an Attached Detail Group (Type) via the API? Answer: A group of category OST_IOSAttachedDetailGroups has a BuiltInParameter.GROUP_ATTACHED_PARENT_NAME. This way, you will find matching Model groups. Response:... Read more →

Berlin Hackathon Begin

I arrived safe and sound for the Berlin hackathon. Topics for today, three on the Revit API and three not: Traffic jams and too many cars Intro to functional programming in JavaScript Aligning multiple elements Render to PDF Displaying transient graphics in a preview control Berlin hackathon beginning Traffic Jams and Too Many Cars Yesterday, on a Friday afternoon – bad timing – my colleague Peter Schlipf and I travelled from Darmstadt to Berlin by car, about 600 km. It... Read more →

Autodesk Open Source All Over – Germany and Japan

Here are some notes on Autodesk Open Source involvement from AU Germany, the Japan hackathon, and two other nice topics for today: Autodesk University Germany Japanese View and Data API hackathon projects CAD Term Translation Cool presentation gimmick Autodesk University Germany In the keynote session, Carl Bass introduced Spark, Autodesk's new 3D printer and total commitment to open source: Connected – Spark connects digital information to 3D printers in a new and streamlined way, making it easier to visualize and... Read more →

Worksharing and Duplicating Element Geometry

I had two more interesting email conversations on Revit API questions, on add-ins in a worksharing environment and duplicating element geometry for detailing and fabrication. Actually, both of these topics have been discussed in the past, so a lot of the work I did was to dig out the existing material again to make these developer partners happy. Today I therefore have an opportunity to talk about the Revit API and nothing but the Revit API again for a change,... Read more →

Autodesk View and Data API Notes and Samples

Here is a summary of my notes from three presentations on the Autodesk View and Data API given by Cyrille Fauvel and Philippe Leefsma, in the two introductory workshops at HackZurich on Friday evening, October 10 and at HackaBxl in Brussels on October 17. Philippe also presented a very nice and absolutely minimal basic viewer sample in node.js demonstrating how to implement a private web service to obtain the authorisation token without exposing your key and secret in your JavaScript... Read more →

PoiPointer, View Depth Override and Destination BIM

Three topics for today: Brussels hackathon and PoiPointer View depth override Destination BIM contest Brussels Hackathon and PoiPointer I returned from the Hackathon Open Data Brussels that I mentioned last Friday, promoting the use of the huge amounts of open data, cf. this impressive list of available data sets. As said, I participated in the PoiPointer project, with a goal of implementing an app pointing out points of interest of various categories in Brussels, e.g. museums, cultural places, monuments, sculptures,... Read more →

Brussels Hackathon, Pipe Wall Thickness and Voids

I received an email asking whether it is possible to determine the Revit MEP pipe element wall thickness, and also about the API access to voids in the family editor. Before getting to that, let me mention that I am now in Brussels at the Open Data Hackathon. Hackathon Open Data Brussels I arrived in Gent last night and returned to Brussels this morning for the Hackathon Open Data Brussels taking place today and tomorrow, October 17-18 2014. It is... Read more →

Hackzurich, Fluelisee, Memento, Jobs and Books

Cool topics for today: Zurich hackathon projects and winner: Immersive Solitude and relaxation at the Flueseeli Lake Project Memento and a webinar More job opportunities My favourite books Zurich Hackathon Projects and Winner: Immersive The Zurich hackathon completed with 101 new projects submitted. The winner, both overall and of the Autodesk 'best 3D app' challenge, is Immersive (GitHub repository). Congratulations! It uses regular smartphones and inexpensive devices like Google Cardboard to create an immersive stereoscopic virtual reality impression. Scenes are... Read more →

Past, Future, Frameworks, RevitLookup and Hackathon

Today, let me ask you to test my RevitLookup future-proofing update and mention a discussion on the use of the .NET 4.5 framework for Revit 2013, 2014 and 2015. I am sitting here writing this among the swans and gulls, squinting in the autumn sunshine on the shore of the Zurich Lake. Later, I visited the nearby Kronenhalle, a rather exclusive restaurant highly praised year in and year out by gourmet Christian Seiler, e.g. 2011, 2012 and 2014. With all... Read more →

Events, Again, and Creating an Extrusion Roof

Jon and Scott Wilson discussed some issues creating extrusion roofs on arbitrary planes in the Revit API discussion forum in the past couple of days. One neat spin-off is a simple little external command that shows the basic use of the NewExtrusionRoof method, so I took the opportunity of adding that to The Building Coder samples. Before getting to the details of that, here is a little update on the upcoming events: October hackathons and AU Germany Autodesk University in... Read more →

Hackathon, the Climate and my CO2 Footprint

Last week, I attended an interesting and rather sobering presentation on sustainability by Niko Paech entitled Befreiung vom Überfluss – liberation from excessive abundance – the German title is shorter and sounds better, for a change. That prompted me to have a look at my own CO2 footprint. This just happened to coincide more or less with the People's Climate March taking place simultaneously all around the world, including ten thousand participands in Berlin, Geneva and Zurich. Before getting to... Read more →

Job Opportunities, Events, Plans and Planes

Lots of stuff is going on and we have an exciting heavy duty weekend ahead of us: ADN API evangelist job opportunities Autodesk Exchange Apps hackathon this weekend October events and travel in Europe Comparing a plane and a face ADN API Evangelist Job Opportunities I recently mentioned an ADN API evangelist job opening in San Francisco. We are actually looking for other talented new people to join the ADN DevTech team as well. The main openings right now are... Read more →

Autodesk View and Data API Webinar

I listed a whole bunch of upcoming events last week. Now I have yet another one to announce, a webinar introducing the Autodesk View and Data API, immediately preceding the exchange apps hackathon. Autodesk Exchange Apps Hackathon – September 20-21, 2014 There are less than two weeks left before the Autodesk Exchange Apps Hackathon, a two-day virtual web based coding 'festival' that will run from September 20 through to September 21, 2014. This year's event is bigger and better than... Read more →

DevDay, Meetup and Hackathon Event Calendar

Here is a list of upcoming events, most of which I will be involved in in one way or another: DevDays 2014 DevDay & DevHack in Las Vegas Meetups and Hackathons DevDays 2014 Here is the list of cities and dates where our DevDays events 2014 will be held around the world later this year. These events are accessible to ADN members. If you are not an ADN member and still would be interested in learning more about application development... Read more →

Three.js AEC Viewer Progress on Two Fronts

Along with our everyday workload, my colleagues and I are busy playing with the View and Data API and the powerful WebGL based viewer that is on the verge of release. Meanwhile, very significant progress has also been made on the public domain and open source vA3C three.js based AEC viewer. The Autodesk View and Data API WebGL Based Viewer I mentioned that I presented the Autodesk View and Data API and viewer technology at the July basel.js meetup. My... Read more →

Autodesk Exchange Apps Hackathon

I am having a nice break. Here is a little news item on an exciting and profitable upcoming event to let you know I am still alive. Let's start with a brief historical flashback: Autodesk Exchange Apps Portathon September 13-14, 2013 Last year, we held the first Autodesk Exchange App Portathon: Earn $100 submitting an Autodesk Exchange app Exchange App Videos and DevTV YouTube Channel Portathon Reminder Cloud and AppStore Usage Growth Portathon Day One Portathon Day Two This year,... Read more →

Views Displaying Given Element, SVG and NoSQL

I am slowly getting back to normal working mode after the AEC Hackathon last weekend and the neat project that we worked on there, so I finally get around to publishing this post that I started working on last week. The only remaining issue is of a physical nature: my feet are still swollen after flying to New York on Friday, sitting and working non-stop at the Hackathon from Saturday morning until Sunday afternoon, standing for a couple of hours... Read more →

AEC Hackathon – From the Midst of the Fray

The New York AEC Symposium and Hackathon is nearing its conclusion. The end and final result demos are scheduled for Sunday noon, coming up all too soon. A bunch of us have been working non-stop through the night since Saturday morning. It is now early Sunday morning, and coffee is eagerly awaited by all. I am participating in a pretty big project to implement a general-purpose 3D AEC model viewer. It is designed to consume models defined in three.js JSON... Read more →

New York Travel Preparation and ADN Job Opening

Friday – travel to New York to spend the weekend at the AEC Symposium and Hackathon. Before leaving, I revelled briefly in nature, celebrating a couple of hours of moderate weather after the cold and wet spell lately, before spending the entire following weekend indoors staring at computer screens in Big Apple: I celebrated the full moon on Wednesday evening with a nice fire on a nearby hill with a grand view: I arrived safely in New York and just... Read more →

AEC Hackathon, DevGuide URL and AppStore Webinar

As mentioned, I registered for the upcoming AEC Symposium and Hackathon in New York this coming weekend, May 16-18. You can learn more about both at http://core.thorntontomasetti.com/aec-technology-symposium-2014, and especially check out the interesting projects proposed for the AEC Hackathon. I'm looking forward very much to that and would be happy to meet you there! Revit API Developer Guide Shortcut URL The Revit API Developer Guide shortcut URL has changed and is now www.autodesk.com/revitapi-help. To my utter shock and chagrin, the... Read more →

Hackergarten Meetup

In order to become more immersed and fluent in web and mobile technologies, I participated in the Hackergarten meetup in Basel last week. We were a dozen people, mostly experienced in large-scale modern web and database technologies. The suggested topics were legion, including WebRTC, Spike/Chatapp, Node Webkit, JS tools, CouchDB, Ionic Framework, High scalability, Guice, Gradle plugin, Android slide show, Polymar JS (similar to Angular). I sat down with three other guys with the goal of exploring PouchDB. It is... Read more →

RevitLookup for UR1, ADN, AEC and AU News

Here are some of the non-confidential items from the new confidential April 17 Autodesk Developer News newsletter, plus one or two additional items of interest from myself and elsewhere: AEC Technology Symposium Migrate Autodesk Exchange Apps and publish 2015 versions Proposals for Autodesk University 2014 Proposals for Autodesk University Germany 2014 Autodesk ReCap Connect Partnership Program RevitLookup for Revit 2015 UR1 Happy Easter! AEC Technology Symposium I already pointed out the upcoming AEC Technology Symposium in New York City on... Read more →

No DevCamp – Better – NY AEC Technology Symposium

I have some good news and some bad news for you. The good news is that Autodesk and ADN will be supporting the AEC Technology Symposium taking place in New York City May 16-18. The bad news is that we are not holding an Autodesk AEC DevCamp this year, as we did on a bi-annual basis on the North American West Coast in 2008, 2010 and 2012, and out of sequence in Moscow, Russia, last year. However, the AEC Technology... Read more →