Using Dynamo to Manage Building Information

There's a post on the CASE website demonstrating how Dynamo is most equipped to add value not in the creation of free-form geometry but, instead, in the management of building information.

Three examples are given. The first is related to building intelligent, responsive models.

The second examples relates to streamlining data entry and documentation.

Finally, there's a quality control example.

The article, by CASE's William Wong, is well worth a read, and is available on the CASE website.

User Activity Add-in – Timesheet Tracking & Delta Change Highlighting

From the Autodesk Exchange Apps website...

User Activity records user’s interaction within Autodesk® Revit®, allowing users to accurately complete their time sheets and highlight within the model changes made from date x to date y, making it easy to clarify to consultants and clients changes made.

User Activity records the following Revit operations:

• Document Open
• Document Close
• Document Save
• Document Synchronization
• Document View Changed
• Document Idle

And, includes the below Revit Element operations:

• Element Add
• Element Change
• Element Delete

Elements are recorded by Category. You choose the Categories.

Each user has their own database file, an .sdf file allowing them to quickly see the Revit files and projects they have interacted with, in a day, week, month or year. The .sdf file has a size limitation of 4 gigabytes.

The App automatically creates a new database for the user before reaching the upper limit and dates the previous file with today’s date. The user within the Data Viewer can then amalgamate databases to see all their activity.


This is a 21 day trail version.

The User Activity add-in is brought to you by Kiwi Codes Solutions Ltd.

There's more information available on the Autodesk Exchange Apps website.

ViewSync Add-in Gets a Major Update, and a Lower Price

ViewSync 1.5 has been released. ViewSync is the handy add-in that synchronizes open views as the user pans, zooms and rotates the active view.

New to ViewSync 1.5

• Synchronization applies to ceiling plans
• Synchronize Elevation Views with active Elevation view
• Synchronize Elevations and/or 3D views with active Plan view 

Other good news is that the app has been reduced in price from USD 15.00 to USD 9.00.

If you haven't seen ViewSync in action yet, check out the following video -- it's pretty darn cool!



The ViewSync add-in is brought to you by Marsh API LLC.

There's more information available on the Autodesk Exchange Apps website.

Roundup – New and Updated Revit Add-ins on Autodesk Exchange Apps for the Week of 1/18/2015

NEW

Show ID
Show ID is a small but helpful tool for Autodesk® Revit® users to extract element IDs from Revit file and store in the element's project parameter, which is shown in the Properties Panel | Build.IT Ltd | Free

JAZO doors & louvers
JAZO steel and aluminium doors and louvers. Configure and insert fire-resistant, burglar-proof doors and louvers for your utility housings, where ventilation is required | JAZO Zevenaar bv | Free

Egan Sheet Matrix
This app automatically renumbers views on sheets to comply with the Drawing Area Coordinate System of the NCS, or according to a custom user-defined matrix | Egan BIM Resources | Trial

Plot Manager 2014
With the Plot Manager for Autodesk® Revit® 2014 you can easily plot your sheets | CAD & Company | USD 25.00

Plot Manager 2015
With the Plot Manager for Autodesk® Revit® you can easily plot your sheets | CAD & Company | USD 25.00



UPDATED

RoomMass
RoomMass provides a tool for automatically creating: - mass elements (mesh geometry) from 3D room’s objects - mass elements (solid geometry) from extrude 2D room's objects | AsiaSW | USD 19.00

CSI SAFE Converter 2015
Allows user to transfer Autodesk® Revit® 2015 model to CSI SAFE 12.x Application provides efficient way transfer structural elements and their sections and materials | Aurora Development | Trial

Duct Hangers
This tool is designed to place duct hangers along the duct automatically | BIM Soft Solutions | USD 10.00

Create Sheets from Excel List
This tool is designed to create sheets in Autodesk® Revit® model using existing Excel sheet list | BIM Soft Solutions | USD 10.00

Cable Tray Hangers
This tool is designed to automatically place cable tray supports along the cable tray | BIM Soft Solutions | USD 10.00


Related: Other roundups.

Revizto Poised to be First AEC App to Add Virtual Reality Support for Oculus Rift

I recently received an email from Revizto notifying me that they would soon be adding support for the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset to their product. Revizto converts Revit, SketchUp, AutoCAD, Navisworks and other CAD models into lightweight navigable 3D environments that can be shared with anyone.

The new Revizto v3.2 with Oculus Rift integration will be released at the end of February. Look for a release announcement here!

And, if you're new to Revizto, check out this introductory video!

Free Show ID Add-in

From the Autodesk Exchange Apps website...

Show ID is a small but helpful tool for Autodesk® Revit® users to extract element IDs from Revit file and store in the element's project parameter, which is shown in the Properties Panel.

Often during the communication and collaboration between architects and engineers, there is a need to identify the subject elements. Show ID, after doing a global extraction, can easily display the ID of selected element. Also, in the Clash Report generated by Navisworks® or 360™ Glue ® , element ID is referred. Show ID helps you to find the right element.

When the Show ID Command is triggered, a dialog box will be displayed. The user can choose whether to select all element IDs from the active Revit document, or use current selection set.

After the "OK" button is clicked, Show ID will read all elements (or the selection set if “Applied to the selected element” option is selected) from the Revit file and extract the Element ID fields. Once it is complete, a pop-up dialog will be displayed to notify the user.

The extracted Element ID field will be automatically shown in the Properties Panel of each element.

The free Show ID add-in is brought to you by Build.IT Ltd.

There's more information available on the Autodesk Exchange Apps website.

Free JAZO Doors & Louvers Add-in

From the Autodesk Exchange Apps website...

With this application, you will be able to configure and insert JAZO doors, louvers and miscellaneous JAZO products. The app will support you by designing the access and ventilation of your utility rooms.

Define type, height and width. Insert into your model. That's all it takes!

Doors

• Transformer doors
• Design louver doors
• Industrial doors
• Escape doors
• Fire resistant doors
• Burglar proof doors
• Sound insulating doors
• Gas doors

Louvers

• JAZO-Lines 36
• JAZO-Lines 48
• JAZO-Lines 60
• Fire resistant louvers
• Burglar proof louvers

More products will be added soon!

The free JAZO Doors & Louvers add-in is from JAZO Zevenaar bv.

There's more information available on the Autodesk Exchange Apps website.

Free Project Scorch – Fire Simulations in Buildings

From the Autodesk Labs website...

Project Scorch is a free* technology preview that helps users who need to perform fire simulations within a structure. Project Scorch uses the NIST Fire Dynamics Simulator to understand fire behavior within a building, such as smoke development and propagation, sprinkler behavior, and more. Project Scorch is a more efficient and easier to use front end for FDS from simulation set up and results exploration.

There's more information available on the Autodesk Labs website.

Free Dynamo Plug-in for Robot Structural Analysis

From the Autodesk Labs website...

Dynamo Plug-in for Robot Structural Analysis is a free* technology preview that allows designers and engineers to drive Autodesk® Robot™ Structural Analysis software from Dynamo. Dynamo Plug-in for Robot Structural Analysis helps designers to create parametric and complex structural frames models in Dynamo, submit it to Autodesk Robot Structural Analysis for simulation, and review the results returned from the analysis.

Features

• Create nodes and bars in Autodesk Robot Structural Analysis
• Assign cross section and material to bars
• Define nodes as support
• Run calculations on the Dynamo model
• Get internal forces, displacement, and stress for bars
• Get reaction for support nodes

There's more information available on the Autodesk Labs website.

Free Project Gaudi for Rhino – Structural Geometry Generator and Analysis Engine

From the Autodesk Labs website...

Project Gaudi for Rhino is a free* technology preview that provides a structural geometry generator and analysis engine for use as a Rhino plug-in for conceptual design workflows. With this technology preview, a user is able to take a conceptual form as a Rhino mesh, add structural framing systems (trusses, beams, columns, etc.) to the form, analyze this system to see stresses and displacements, and then either return the geometry to Rhino, or send it to Robot Structural Analysis for further analysis and start their BIM workflow with Revit.

There's more information available on the Autodesk Labs website.

Free Revit Version Checker

From Matteo Cominetti's website...

Revit Version Checker is a simple standalone Windows tool to check the version of your Autodesk Revit files (.rvt and .rfa).

 Simply Drag&Drop a bunch of files or folders on the main Window and choose if to Append, Prepend or Clean the file name of the YEAR version.

No need to have Autodesk Revit installed!

There's more information available on Matteo Cominetti's website.

Free Clockwork for Dynamo Contains Many Revit-Related Nodes

From the Clockwork for Dynamo page on GitHub...

Clockwork is a collection of custom nodes for the Dynamo visual programming environment which can be downloaded using the package search feature inside Dynamo or, alternatively, from Dynamo's package manager. It contains many Revit-related nodes, but also lots of nodes for various other purposes such as list management, mathematical operations, unit conversions, geometric operations (mainly meshes, points, UVs and vectors) and paneling. Currently it consists of some 320+ nodes of which a large portion was previously published in a number of separate packages. My reasoning is that keeping all nodes in a single package will make updates easier and reduce package dependencies.

Out of plane analysis results

There's more information available on the Clockwork for Dynamo GitHub page.

Plot Manager

From the Autodesk Exchange Apps website...

You can easily plot your sheets with the Plot Manager for Autodesk® Revit®. Select your sheets to print and print quick and easy your overall BIM project into one PDF file. Easily select the same paper size for all sheets. Or use the paper size configured within the sheet. Not only do you receive Plot Manager you get the Booklet A3 as well. This will print all your sheets into one A3 PDF Booklet, with just one single click.

Plot Manager
Starts the Plot Manager dialog. This lets you specify the sheets you want to print to PDF. The paper size to print on. The scale to print, when applicable. Whether the sheets need to be printed to separate files or into one single file. And the filename(s) of the PDF

Booklet A3
Prints all available sheets into a single PDF file with the paper size set to A3.

Plot Manager is priced at USD 25.00.

There's more information available on the Autodesk Exchange Apps website.

Egan Sheet Matrix – Automatically Renumber Views on Sheets

From the Autodesk Exchange Apps website...

What you can expect from the Egan Sheet Matrix application:
 
Automatically Renumber Views On Sheets

This app automatically renumbers views on sheets according to a user-defined matrix.
The app has been designed to conform with the Uniform Drawing System/ Drawing Area Coordinate System of the U.S. National Cad Standard. However, the app can be adjusted as required for each company.

Typical Module Numbering

Typically, the app will renumber any detail that is placed on a sheet or moved on a sheet according to the currently assigned titleblock module.
 
Duplicate Module Numbers

If there is a detail already placed in the module, the app will renumber the detail with the correct module number, but append “X-##,” where “##” is a random number, to indicate that the number is a duplicate. Other than this convention, the user is responsible for recognizing and correcting duplicate module numbers.
 
Out of Matrix Numbers

If a detail is placed or moved outside of the matrix, the detail will not be given a module number but will be numbered “X-##,” where “##” is a random number, to indicate that the detail is outside of the matrix. Other than this convention, the user is responsible for recognizing and correcting details that are outside of the matrix.
See screenshots below for more information.

2014 – Year in Review

Happy New Year everyone!

2014 was a busy and productive year here on Revit Add-ons because there were a lot of exciting developments in the area of Revit add-in applications. Still, for the first time since this site debuted in 2011, the number of posts declined from year to year – from 234 in 2013 to 206 in 2014, a decline of about 12%. I was heartened to see that, even so, pageviews still showed a modest uptick of about 2%, from 336,888 to 343,615.

In compiling the stats for the above image, I discovered something rather amazing – I began this site in April 2011, and the total pageviews for that entire year was 5,767. Nowadays Revit Add-ons typically receives that many pageviews in just a single workweek! (If you look very closely at the graph, you can see the slight bump in 2011 representing the modest beginnings of this site.)

Some notable changes took place to the site in 2014, including the debut of product reviews.

In August, I set up accounts for the site on Facebook and Twitter, and added corresponding widgets here. With just 22 likes on Facebook and 25 Twitter followers to date, these social networking efforts are still nascent, but I welcome different ways to reach you, the readers.

The first weekly post about new and updated Revit add-ins on Autodesk Exchange Apps went up in September. These roundups have proven to be quite popular, and offer welcome new fodder for this site.

In December, I made some changes to advertising on Revit Add-ons intended to add additional value to advertisers, as follows.

• The standard discount for 6-month pre-purchases increased from 10% to 15%, and the 12-month pre-purchase discount from 15% to 25%. 
• New customers receive an additional 10% discount.
• A new customer referral program extends advertisers ads for 2 months when their referrals purchase ad space.
• Top banner advertisers now receive a complimentary sidebar ad when their ad is rotated out of the top banner space.

If you'd like more information about advertising on Revit Add-ons, please drop me a line.

Lastly, I gave the site a little refresh in December; I tried to make it a little cleaner and "flatter," and a little easier on the eyes by reducing contrast between the page and the text. I hope you like the changes. Feedback is always appreciated.

There are some new things coming up soon in 2015 too, including interviews with key Revit add-in developers and a new .com URL for the site.

And what of the add-ins themselves? 2014 was a banner year and if I had to describe it with a single word it would be "maturity."