2019 – Year in Review

Hi folks, this is your faithful editor Tim Grimm here. I usually look forward to these Revit Add-ons year-in-review articles; they're an opportunity to look back at our accomplishment for the year and see what most connected with our readers. This year I approach this piece with some trepidation though. Although we published 476 posts during the year, this was well off the goal of 1,000 that we'd set for ourselves at the beginning of the year. Why did we fall so short? It's quite simple: I returned to full-time employment in March. Frankly, since then, it was all we could do to try to keep up with the low-hanging fruit of the Autodesk App Store, because contributors were BUSY there.

As a result, many of our regular features suffered, such as our 'weekly' roundups of the App Store, which were often several weeks, or even months, combined, our 'week in review' articles, which ended in early March, our monthly 'what's hot' articles, which ended in May, and our 'product roundups' and 'product reviews', which were almost nowhere to be seen.

Worse yet, for the second year in a row, our coverage of webinars, Dynamo and the Revit API suffered. And, for the first time, add-ins not published on the App Store were also under served.

It's clear to me now that, with how busy and productive the community is, comprehensive coverage isn't a job for one or two people, unless they're full-time, or are smarter than me and can automate the process. In fact, maintaining the site in the manner that I always have, which is manual entry, I could see the following individual content contributors being needed:

• Autodesk App Store and recurring features
• Non-App Store add-ins (including webinars)
• Dynamo coverage (including original content)
• Revit API coverage (including original content)

There's a major announcement coming in the New Year that may ultimately feed into something like the above. Or not. We'll see. Stay tuned.

Pageviews

Although our number of posts were down slightly from last year, 476 as compared to 500 (-24), our pageviews rose to a new high-water mark, from 664,301 to 695,688 (+31,387).

Our Sponsors

Revit Add-ons is ad-supported. Our ad revenue doesn't make for a great hourly rate, but it does help us to feel appreciated, and it motivates us to put a lot of effort into the site. If you value the work we do on Revit Add-ons, please, show your support for our sponsors.

At 6-1/2 years, RevitWorks is our longest continuous customer. They're authors of Door Factory Premium, among many other add-ins. Door Factory is also available in a free Preview version for creating the best single and double swing doors.

RTV Tools has been an outstanding supporter of our site for 5-1/2 years. They're the author of the popular RTV Xporter PRO add-in, as well as a number of others, all designed to help you get the most out of your BIM.

UNIFI Labs, authors of UNIFI Core, the essential cloud platform for creating, organizing, accessing, and managing building content, have been advertisers on Revit Add-ons for about 4-1/2 years.

SPECtrum BIM, authors of the GAMUT suite of products for rethinking content management,  joined us in winter 2015.

ElumTools by Lighting Analysts, the first fully-integrated add-in lighting software for Revit, joined us as an advertiser in summer 2016.

Revolution Design, makers of the add-ins Keynote Manager, Selection Master and the productivity suite Revit Workflow was one of our earliest supporters, starting to advertise with us way back in 2012. We were very happy when they rejoined us in winter 2016.

StrucSoft Solutions, makers of the MWF (metal wood framer) line of products, as well as some useful free add-ins, joined us in Spring 2017.

Ideate Software, makers of Ideate BIMLink, Ideate Explorer, Ideate Sticky and Ideate Apps, was one of our earliest advertisers, originally joining us in winter 2012. We were thrilled when they rejoined us in June of last year.

Bird Tools, makers of free or inexpensive add-ins Automatic Tag Stacker, BIM Repeat Remapper, SpankMyRevit!, and Tag Alignment Tool, Joined us about 1-year ago.

Lastly, CTC Software, makers of the content management solution HIVE, and the popular BIM Project Suite, BIM Manager Suite, BIM Data Suite, and BIM Batch Suite originally advertised with us from 2014-2016, and rejoined us about 1-year ago.


We hope that you agree that we have a great stable of sponsors, and hope that you'll show them your appreciation.

Editor's Choice Award Winners

We recognize products with Editor's Choice Awards for a number of reasons. It may be because an add-in solves a unique problem, or a common one in a unique way. It may be because it delivers exceptional value, or is exceptionally well thought-out. Or maybe it just tickles our fancy.

We were happy to recognize the following product in 2019:

Backup File Organizer
Keeps your project directories clean by automatically moving Autodesk® Revit® backup files into a separate folder.

Reader's Choice Award Winners

At the end of each year, we take a peek behind the curtain to see which posts received the most pageviews over the course of the year. The top-charting posts/add-ins receive Reader's Choice Awards. Only posts from the year in question are considered.

This year, we included the top 10 posts.

pyRevit is one of the most popular add-ins on Revit Add-ons and our post about pyRevit v4.6.10, 4.6.11 came in at #1 for the year.

The free Naviate Rebar Extension came in at #2 for the year. PropertyWizard charted at #5. Smart Unhide charted at #7 .Warning Manager came in at #9.

Our post about using IrisVR to view Navisworks clashes in VR with Google Cardboard came in at #3. Our post about Autodesk's DevDays Online 2019 came in at #6. Free Dynamo Scripts for Opening Sheets by View or Element charted at #8. Lastly, our post about Using Dynamo to View Grids in 3D Views in Revit and the Forge Viewer rounded out our list at #10.

Our roundup of Revit 2020 Product Enhancements from Autodesk came in at #4 for the year.

Acknowledgements

Many thanks again to our advertisers!

Congratulations to all the award winners!

Thanks to the add-in developers and bloggers who make the Revit add-ins community such a thriving one!

Most of all, thank you dear readers for frequenting our site; we couldn't be a success without you!

And speaking of our readers, now might be a good time to mention our social media accounts. Presently we have 1,304 followers on Twitter, up from 941 last year (+363), and 2,422 followers on Facebook, up from 2,032 last year (+390). We also have 1,578 email followers. Thank you all!

Wishing you a happy, healthy and prosperous 2020!

Ye ole editor,

Tim Grimm

Greater Seattle area, USA

Not bad for a reformed Bentley guy

Related

• 2018 – Year in Review
• 2017 – Year in Review
• 2016 – Year in Review
• 2015 – Year in Review
• 2014 – Year in Review
• 2013 – Year in Review
• 2012 – Year in Review, Part 2
• 2012 – Year in Review, Part 1