The Building Coder

Accessing and Modifying Settings in the Ini File

Some interesting settings are stored in and can be modified by editing the Revit ini file. Peter @pgerz pointed out yet another possibility in his answer to the Revit API discussion forum thread on adding a project template to 'New Project' via API. Question: I noticed the UI method for adding a project template to the 'New Project' dialog on the Start Window by going to Options > File Locations and clicking the little plus symbol... Read more →

Preparing a Revit Add-in for Design Automation

Today I discuss the next step in my IfcSpaceZoneBoundaries project, how to prepare a Revit add-in for use in the DA4R or Design Automation for Revit environment and figuring out how to best handle it in the VS solution – Context, add-in functionality and history – Preparing the add-in for DA4R – Local testing versus live deployment – User defined input arguments for DA4R – Logging of results... Read more →

View Template Include Setting

A solution to a longstanding question on the view template 'include' setting – Does the Revit API provide any access to the view template 'include' settings defined by the check boxes in this form? – I can get the 'includes' via viewTemplate.GetNonControlledTemplateParameterIds. The method returns a list of parameter ids, and you can then use viewTemplate.Parameters to map them... Read more →

Floor Area Above Room and Mysterious Hide

Today, we focus on two pure programming questions from the Revit API discussion forum – Area of an exterior floor above a room – Mysterious element hiding activity... Read more →

Vacation and Multi-Version Revit Add-In Template

As I already mentioned, I am taking lots of time off in July. This is just a note to let you know I am alive, well and happy, currently in Brassac in Occitanie in southern France, on my way to practice awareness, care and attentiveness in the Buddhist monastery Plum Village near Bordeaux. On the road, I'll just share this quick note from a comment by Zhmayev Yaroslav on multi-targeting Revit versions using TargetFrameworks – Multi-Version Revit Add-In Template... Read more →

Add-In Registration – VendorId and Signature

I am taking lots of time off in July, so this may be my last post for a while. Before leaving, I will share my answers to a list of pertinent questions on add-in registration, especially how to populate the add-in manifest VendorId tag and handle the trusted digital DLL signature – Add-in registration – VendorId – Add-in registration – trusted digital add-in signature – Vacation in July... Read more →

Multi-Targeting Revit Versions, CAD Terms, Textures

Here comes another solution for efficiently compiling add-ins for multiple Revit version targets from one single code base, a note on resources for CAD term databases for consistent terminology translation, and a discussion on accessing custom texture maps in Forge and Revit – Multi-targeting Revit versions using TargetFrameworks – Further enhancement using the CSPROJ Import tag – CAD terminology resources for consistent translation – Showing a custom Revit texture map in the Forge Viewer... Read more →

Material Texture Path

Here is an official answer from the Revit development team on the long-standing and recurrent issue on retrieving the path to a specific material texture bitmap file – Question: I am working on an exporter plugin for Revit that exports all geometry from selected objects using the CustomExporter framework. When extracting object materials, I can successfully get most of the information, but I can't seem to find the path to the material texture Read more →

Revit Server Download and Hiding Point Cloud Scan

Today, I have two important results to share based on hard work by Tim Burnham and Pierre Navarra – Download from Revit Server requires RSN.INI entry – Hiding a point cloud scan RCS in an RCP instance... Read more →

Copy Local False and IFC Utils for Wall Openings

New important issues are researched and brilliant solutions shared daily in the Revit API discussion forum. Here are two from the current crop – IFC helper returns outer CurveLoop of door or window – Setting Copy Local to False resolves AddIn Manager issue... Read more →

Hatch Line Dimensioning Voodoo

Reporting on a very exciting topic from the Revit API discussion forum from the Forge accelerator in Barcelona – Barcelona Forge accelerator – Retain the Add-In GUID – Dimension on hatch pattern... Read more →

WTA Elec, FireP and 3D Aimer Tools

I am traveling to Gothenburg for the Forge accelerator. Meanwhile, Allan Seidel shared his WTA FireP 3D Aimer add-in that creates a custom ribbon tab with discipline related tools for placing specific Revit family types with some families requiring parameter settings made on the fly and the 3D Aimer example that "aims" a special Revit family to a target – WTA FireP 3D Aimer Tools – GitHub Repository and YouTube Video – Source Code Documentation – WTA Elec – Another Family Plunk and Concept Share... Read more →

New Visual Studio Templates for Revit Add-Ins

I have been maintaining a simple Visual Studio Revit add-in wizard for a number of years. Now Andrey Bushman implemented a set of more advanced and convenient Visual Studio templates for creation of Revit add-ins for his own use. The discussion of those led us to once more revisit the topic of the Visual Studio settings for debugging Revit add-ins – New Visual Studio 2015 templates for Revit add-ins – Use Managed Compatibility Mode or Enable Native Code Debugging? – Machine learning software engineer job in Switzerland – FreeCodeCamp... Read more →

Multiple Language RESX Resource Files

A large contribution today from Andrey Bushman, and a couple of upcoming Forge events – Supporting multiple language resource files – Creating and using localised resource RESX files – Upcoming Forge accelerators... Read more →

Virtuous Reproduction, Research, Settings, Ontology

I have probably asked developers for reproducible cases a couple of thousand times by now. Let's discuss that and also return to the topic of how to research a Revit API problem in general. Finally, I'll point out a Revit 2017 API MEP electrical feature. Oh, and I continued my research into deep learning for a Revit API question answering system – Creating a reproducible case may well solve the issue at hand – How to research to find a Revit API solution – Access to cable tray and conduit settings – Getting started implementing a question answering system – First impression from IBM Bluemix – Open source QAS options – Building a Revit API ontology... Read more →

NuGet Revit API Package

Most of the work of the year has been done, and it is time to settle down and clear out for the new. Tomorrow is the winter solstice, followed by Christmas and Yuletide, ending with the Twelfth Night. For me, this is a time of retreat, calm, reflection, and renewal of energy. Today brings a nice gift from Andrey Bushman – NuGet Revit API package – RevitLookup using the NuGet Revit API package – Creating a NuGet package from assembly DLLs – More NuGet packages... Read more →

Restoring a Missing Project Information Element

Some people have recently reported that they encountered models lacking the ProjectInfo project information singleton element. Apparently, it was possible in previous versions of Revit for a faulty or malicious add-in to simply delete this element. That obviously causes problems for other add-ins and Revit itself, who rely on its presence. Luckily, it is not hard to fix. Here is the latest discussion addressing this issue... Read more →

HoloLens Escape Path Waypoint JSON Exporter

Last week, I worked with Kean Walmsley on his entry for the first global Autodesk Hackathon: a HoloLens-based tool for navigating low visibility environments, resulting in the new HoloGuide Autodesk Hackathon project. My modest contribution is the ExportWaypointsJson Revit add-in, an external application implementing the main command, exporting the waypoints, and a subsidiary option settings command, displaying a form, validating input and storing the user preferences. The main command simply prompts the user to pick a model line in the Revit project, traverses it, determines waypoints at predefined intervals and exports them to JSON for consumption by the HoloGuide visualisation... Read more →

Stacked Ribbon Button Panel Options

Topic: a C# .NET Revit add-in demonstrating use of a split ribbon button to access a secondary command, e.g., option settings. In the Revit API discussion forum thread on using a StackButton as a PushButton with options, Allan 'aksaks' Seidel recently proposed a neat UI trick, saying: Perhaps this idea might be usable for others. The StackButton ribbon control is a stack of different PushButton instances where the last used PushButton remains visible to be used again. That visible button is reflected in the stack button's CurrentButton property. Imagine if the StackButton control always shows the first button in the stack, and the other button(s) are secondary to the first button's purpose... Read more →

RvtSamples for Revit 2017

Setting up RvtSamples for Revit 2017 – Copy Html Markup in Visual Studio 2015 – Running Revit 2017 in the Visual Studio 2015 debugger – 'Security – Unsigned Add-In' message – RvtSamples DLL and TXT should be together – Specifying the Revit SDK samples root path – Correcting errors in individual SDK sample entries – PlacementOptions description line is missing – The five FabricationPartLayout external commands – RvtSamples loads and RvtSamples.txt is cleaned up... Read more →

.NET Runtime Security Blocks External Command

Here is a Revit API add-in installation issue that came up in various forms in the past and now again in the context of Windows 10 configuration: I have a plugin that has been working fine for all pre-Windows 10 platforms. Under Win10, the DLL loads into Revit.exe correctly. The add-in manifest contents are displayed correctly in the Revit UI. When I issue the command, however, nothing happens... Read more →

Shared Project Parameter GUID Reporter

I am still busy on the Revit API discussion forum, when not involved in other important seasonal preparations. Now let's look at the overdue solution to determine the GUID of a shared project parameter – Issue – Implementation – Download – Discussion – Solution. A long discussion between CoderBoy, Scott Wilson and Ning Zhou on reporting on project parameter definitions – need GUIDs was resolved back in 2013 and never published... Read more →

REX Add-In Development and Migration

It's been a while since I talked about REX. Some old dedicated posts include – The REX SDK – Extensions for Revit 2012 – REX Content Generator. More recent mentions occur in my discussion of a framing cross section analyser with and without REX and its migration to Revit 2015. Now the time has come for another look... Read more →

Revit Future and Saving User Configuration Settings

I encountered the need and implemented solutions to save user configuration data several times over in the past. Today, prompted by a recent query, I'll point out two of them, and some other exciting and interesting stuff as well: Anthony Hauck on Futures for Revit. The Most Popular Programming Languages 2015. Saving User Configuration Settings. Text Format Configuration File Storage and Parsing. .NET XML Configuration File Storage and Parsing. Anthony Hauck on Futures for Revit BIMThoughts is a podcast platform... Read more →

Revit 2016 SP1 and Sheets Missing from Print Dialogue

Today, I can present the explanation and prophylactic measure required to prevent a problem of sheets missing from print dialogue. It was only occasionally reported, and I finally heard about the fact and its resolution last week. In brief, when creating sheets programmatically, only create one sheet per transaction! Before looking at that in more detail, I'll just mention that the Revit 2016 service pack 1 was automatically installed for me when I started up Revit today. First of all,... 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 →

Setting up a 3D View like a Section View

Lots of add-in developers have struggled with various aspects of setting up cameras and views. I summarised a number of them in two new topic groups: 5.37. Creating and Setting Up a 3D View 5.38. Creating and Setting Up a Section View I keep hoping that they cover everything one needs to know in this area, together with Steve Mycynek's all-encompassing AU class CP3133 Using the Revit Schedule and View APIs. Here is one recent example proving that this sometimes... Read more →

Accessing a Revit Server Central Model Path

I am still enjoying my summer break, and back to work temporarily for just a couple of days in between. For today, I present the following summary of a recent discussion on accessing a Revit server central model path including some useful new hints from the development team. Question: Given a path to a central model on a Revit server like rsn://xxxx, is it possible to know if the given path points to an existing project or not? Answer: Here... Read more →

Adding New Materials from List Enhancements

A weekend post, for a change. There is just too much going on! I recently reimplemented the AddMaterials add-in for Revit 2014, updating the simple little Revit 2011 system to generate new materials in a Revit project based on a list of required material properties stored in an Excel spreadsheet. Luke submitted a comment on that, asking: Question: I have built the solution and created an XLSX file. The add-in runs and says that it has added materials, but I... Read more →

Storing Revit Add-in Settings

Here is another tip from the Revit API discussion forum that seems worthwhile cleaning up and making easy to find, on how to store plugin preferences, raised and discussed by Dimi, peterjegan and ollikat: Question: I am trying to find a way to store user preferences for my plugin. These preferences are file paths, import options etc. so that the next time the user runs the plugin, all the choices he made the fist time he used the plugin stay... Read more →

The GEOM_VISIBILITY_PARAM Visibility Settings

Here is an nice, useful and interesting example of a Revit API forum discussion thread and cooperative research between Remy van den Bor of ICN Solutions, Rudolf Honke of Mensch und Maschine acadGraph, the Revit development team, Joe Ye and your humble scribe on retrieving an element's detail view visibility settings, before wishing you and us all the best for the year of the horse: Remy: Hello Reviteers, Does anybody know how to get to the visibility settings in the... Read more →

Setting the View Display Background

Here is an exploration of various attempts to ensure that the view background is always white, regardless of all user settings like inverted background etc. Before getting to that, I have to share an important discovery for me and my Tammik namesakes by my sister Helene, who recently consulted an Estonian translator. My last name is Estonian and comes from 'tamm', meaning 'oak'. Tammik is a small group of oaks, or oak grove, a common North European name, cf. Eklund... Read more →

Visual Studio 2013 May Partially Support Edit and Continue

The West European DevDays conferences are completed. I am on my way back from Gothenburg to Switzerland. En route, I would like to share this strange and useful discovery by Peter Muigg of CAD Anwendungen Muigg, who says: In spite of what was said in the article on debugging Revit 2014 API with Visual Studio 2013 and the Revit API discussion thread on the same topic, Visual Studio 2013 does in fact partially support edit and continue. Just as stated... Read more →

Unit Abbreviations

Today, we look at determining the units for a given parameter, and specifically providing a suitable unit abbreviation for it. The Revit 2014 API introduced a new Unit API with a large number of enhancements to complete and simplify unit handling issues, and I have not yet explored all of them in depth. Here is the overview of it from What's New in the Revit 2014 API: Units API The API for Units in Revit has been expanded and changed.... Read more →

Programmatic Access to Duct Sizes

Here is a nice little MEP related blog post on accessing duct sizes through the API to round off the week. It was provided by our MEP expert Martin Schmid, who says: I recently heard from a couple of developers that they had difficulties accessing the Duct Size settings in Revit. In the user interface, you can see them by selecting Manage > MEP Settings > Mechanical Settings > Duct Settings > Round/Oval/Rectangular. I threw together a macro to check... Read more →

Recursively Disable Architecture Mismatch Warning

I recently explained the cause and resolution of the processor architecture mismatch warning MSB3270. On closer consideration, I decided to fix it for all the ADN training material labs and samples, and actually for the entire collection of Revit SDK samples as well. This is obviously not something you want to do manually, considering that it involves a modification of hundreds of project files. Here are the steps involved in automating and testing this process: Disable mismatch warning utility Project... Read more →

Sun Direction, Shadow Calculation and Wizard Update

I enjoyed some wonderful hot sunny days since I returned from New England back to Switzerland. Summer finally arrived. A nice change after the rain and cold both here and in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Talking about rain and sun leads up nicely to today's topic, on the sun direction and shadow calculation in a Revit BIM. Before I get to that, though, I present an update of my Revit add-in wizards resulting in part from yesterday's post on the... Read more →

Processor Architecture Mismatch Warning and Key Hook

In the past ten days, I migrated The Building Coder samples, ADN training labs, MEP and Structural sample material from Revit 2013 to 2014. In all of these migrations, I lamented the processor architecture mismatch warning MSB3270 saying There was a mismatch between the processor architecture of the project being built "MSIL" and the processor architecture of the reference "RevitAPI, Version=2014.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, processorArchitecture=x86", "AMD64". This mismatch may cause runtime failures. Please consider changing the targeted processor architecture of your project... Read more →

Units and RevitLookup

Here is a typical question from a Revit API newbie that prompts me to reiterate some important basic beginner information on units and the RevitLookup tool for exploring the Revit database: Question: How can I retrieve the length and mass units from a Revit document? Answer: The internal Revit database length unit is always imperial feet. That cannot be changed, so there is you answer for that. Similarly, the internal database unit for weight is kg, as far as I... Read more →

Determine Revit Demo Mode Revisited

Almost a year back, we talked about how to determine whether the current running Revit application is a demo version or not. The initial suggestion was to test this by trying to execute real functionality modifying the model and then save it. That obviously incurs significant overhead and may cause other problems as well. Rudolf Honke suggested simply reading and evaluating the Revit main window title text instead. Now Madmed created and posted an implementation of Rudolf's idea. I took... Read more →

Categories Collection Item Accessor Fails

The document settings categories collection Item property returns null for certain built-in categories, and even throws an exception for certain others. You should be aware of this. I mentioned a related issue back in the Revit 2011 timeframe, describing The Building Coder CmdCategories sample command. Still, this is a bit unexpected and has caused issues for several developers. Here are some examples: Question 1: For some reason I cannot obtain the category for stacked walls, e.g. using Dim cat As... Read more →

Determine Revit Demo Mode

Here is yet another interesting example of an apparent gap in the Revit API that can be easily filled using a little workaround. We have seen numerous examples of performing a certain operation within a temporary transaction that is then rolled back to cancel it, such as to determine gross material quantities for an element with openings, a host reference and, more generally, all object relationships. Here is an example of using a related but different approach: the trick consists... Read more →

Rotate True North

We have previously looked at how to handle the project location properties and more specifically how to handle the effect of a rotated Project North on an element azimuth. Here is a question on the 'opposite' topic, how to set up a project north rotation in the first place: Question: Is there any way to rotate the truth north using the Revit API? It can be done in the user interface using the Manage > Project Location > Position >... Read more →

Family Instance Room Phase

We already looked at some examples of confusion due to the interaction of phases with the room property on family instances. Here is a new aspect of this encountered and solved by Patrick Rosendahl of SOLAR-COMPUTER GmbH, who kindly explains the issue and its resolution like this: Problem: I am having a problem with the FamilyInstance Room property. I looked at the discussion of issues with the Room property and its phase dependency but have not been able to solve... Read more →

Set New Pipe Type Properties

Here is an interesting Revit MEP API question on setting the preferred elbow, tee and junction type information after creating a new Revit MEP pipe type, answered by my colleague Joe Ye in Beijing: Question: I am creating a new Revit MEP pipe type by filtering for all element types of the category OST_PipeCurves and selecting the one named "Standard". On the resulting new ElementType instance, I would like to define the preferred settings as follows: Change the preferred elbow... Read more →

Locking the Add-Ins Ribbon Tab

Here is a minute user interface question of interest to developers that comes up from time to time: Question: When I select an element in the Revit model, the ribbon tab is always switched. Is there any way to keep 'Add-Ins' tab focused at all times? Answer: Here are two little tricks that might help: Drag the panel you wish to have available off the ribbon add-ins tab somewhere else on the screen. It will then remain available at all... Read more →

Visual Studio, C# and VB Express

Yesterday Kean mentioned that debugging AutoCAD.NET projects using the Visual C# and VB Express editions is now directly supported by the latest version of the AutoCAD .NET Wizard. That prompted me to have a look and see what the current situation is with Revit add-ins. Obviously, we poor Revit developers do not have such a sophisticated wizard available ... or so I thought! I installed Visual C# Express and started my experiment: I launched the new installation and selected New... Read more →

Set Copy Local to False

I cannot count the number of times I have pointed out that the Copy Local flag should be set to false on the Revit API assembly references. Here are some of the numerous previous examples and explanations of this: A C++ Revit add-in Selection watcher using Idling event The DevTV add-in templates Pipe to conduit converter Custom ribbon tab Porting from C# to VB.NET Exporting a family instance to gbXML Application events in VB Debugging a Revit add-in The SDK... Read more →

Retrieving Materials

Some people have reported issues using the Document.Settings.Materials collection. For instance, its Contains method may throw an exception when used with Revit Structure 2012, while it works fine with Revit Architecture 2012. The problem actually probably has nothing to do with the flavour of Revit being used, but is caused by the template file that the project is based on. If you retrieve materials in a project based on the architectural template in Revit Structure, it also works fine. In... Read more →