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AB218-4
You have been using Autodesk Revit or are new to Autodesk Revit and may have done a few pilot
projects. Now what? Learn the tips and tricks for creating a network deployment for Autodesk Revit.
Learn techniques for standardizing your Revit project templates to match your company standards and
deploy them to your users. Learn how to set up a deployment for mobile users, and how to deploy
custom content to mobile users. Create a company standard for file-naming, folder structure for projects,
and custom content.
Introduction:
This class is divided into three main topics.
Understanding the benefits, planning and creating Network deployments
Standardizing Project Templates and deploying them
Creating company standards, libraries and deploying to your users
Training and on-going support
Majority of the time will be spend on the first topic since there are other classes at AU that go into much
more detail of template creation and organization.
Revit-alize?
So what do I mean when I say “Revit-alize”. It is the amalgamation of the four topics mentioned above
plus the support needed from management to utilize Revit for projects.
Most of the BIM Managers were CAD Managers and are now wearing new hats. We learned a lot during
our CAD days of standardizing CAD, having a central location for content, etc. Let us use those same
techniques and create a Revit implementation that is easy to install, update and maintain, both from an IT
and BIM Manager’s perspective. From this point onwards I will be concentrating on the Deployment
perspective in terms of “Revit-alizing” your office.
Let us tackle the first task of creating a network deployment. We will cover the other topics toward the
end of the class. Since using these deployment strategies we can update the end user easily and provide
on-going support.
Technology:
On the topic of company management support to utilize Revit, the other most important support is the
financial support needed to purchase computers that are capable of handling the requirements that Revit
needs. Revit is OS, Processor, Memory, Video Card, Hard Drive, Network intensive. The technological
resources that Revit requires can be reduced by utilizing good organization of the Revit file, like using
Worksets, light families and utilizing linking. It is the education of the user that can go farther than
spending money on adding more ram, etc.
There will be many opinions for system requirements, depending on who you talk to. So here are my
recommendations:
1. Higher single core speed instead of slower multiple cores. (Revit is still mostly single threaded so
it will benefit from the higher CPU speed than a quad core CPU, except)
2. 4GB ram minimum for 64-bit OS, 3GB for 32-bit.
3. Dedicated video card with hardware support for Microsoft DirectX9 or later. Workstation class
video cards are not necessarily better, you can get more power for less money by purchasing
consumer level cards.
4. Windows 7 64-bit Pro.(64-bit OS has a bigger footprint so you need more ram to accommodate it)
5. Gigabit Ethernet (which is mostly standard now)
6. WAN compression technologies if you have multiple offices working on the same file
7. Hard drives, DVD drives, other peripherals are not too critical, but if you are getting a laptop buy a
7200rpm hard drive.
Let us look at the main topic of this session.
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
Planning
To successfully deploy Autodesk Revit 2010 within your office(s) you need to answer some questions
first:
Where is the network deployment stored?
Which server will be the license server? (for Network Licensing)
What flavor of Revit is being deployed? (Architecture, Structure, System, all three, just one, or
two)
Which architecture Revit will be deployed for 32bit or 64bit or both.
Where is the central content stored & what folder structure you are going to follow (Revit’s,
Custom, or Hybrid)
How are the users going to access the Revit OTB and Custom content (on server or locally)
Number of laptop users vs. desktop users?
Who is responsible for updating content? User rights
Which template is going to be the default template and where it is going to be stored?
Even though for this demonstration I will be using Revit Architecture, these ideas apply to other Revit
flavors also. I will assume the following answers to the questions and create a deployment. All these
questions must be answered to successfully create a deployment
Where is the network deployment stored?
It will be installed on \\blackops\software\Revit2010. Deployment creation must be done to
UNC paths only. (we can fix it later for multiple offices and mapped drives).
Which server will be the license server? (for Network Licensing)
We will use blackops as the license server too. (Deployment, Content and Licensing servers
do not have to be the same.
What flavor of Revit is being deployed? (Architecture, Structure, System, all three, just one, or
two)
Architecture
Which architecture Revit will be deployed for 32bit or 64bit or both?
Both 32 bit & 64 bit. (we will have to do two separate deployments)
Where is the central content stored & what folder structure you are going to follow (Revit’s,
Custom, or Hybrid)
Revit OTB and Custom
Number of laptop users vs. desktop users?
In my office most of the users are laptop based users so I have to provide local content
access. VPN is the easy answer, but slow access and non network availability can be an
issue. This is why at GBBN Architects, all content is made available locally.
How are the users going to access the Revit OTB and Custom content (on server or locally)
All content will be made available on users hard drive. This will aide with laptop users. This
document will cover creating a sync batch file to help users be up-to-date with the server.
Who is responsible for updating content? User rights
This class will cover how to prevent users from changing server based content installed
locally.
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
@echo off
reg QUERY "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Autodesk\Revit\Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010\ServicePack2"
IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO REGNOTFOUND
:REGFOUND
GOTO END
:REGNOTFOUND
REM REG NOT FOUND. Install Service pack 2
if "%programfiles(x86)%XXX"=="XXX" GOTO 32BIT
J:\ACADarch\LocalSupport\Install\RevitArch2010\updates\Autodesk_Revit_Architecture_2010-x64_Update_2.EXE /q
GOTO END
:32BIT
J:\ACADarch\LocalSupport\Install\RevitArch2010\updates\Autodesk_Revit_Architecture_2010-x86_Update_2.EXE /q
:END
First we are checking the registry whether Service Pack 2 is installed. Then we check whether to install
32bit or 64bit version of the service pack. The /q mean install it without interaction/quiet.
7.6: Configure InfoCenter Communications Center
Depending on the size of your organization you may want to enable features on this page. If you want to
deploy updates administratively then you need to turn off
Live updates. Otherwise the user may get notices of the
updates and install them.
Enabling the Information Channels will retrieve Help
information from Autodesk site and display results in the
Communications Icon at the top-right of the Revit application.
If you plan to publish information using the CAD Manager
Channel, please visit http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/magazine/cc163989.aspx or
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/rss/rss.html for information
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
employees. If you enable Allow acess to Subscription Center uses/advance users can create support
requests from Revit or also access the e-Learning catalog available to subscription users online
including AU Online.
I highly encourage our users to enter their email address and SUBMIT the crash report. This enables
the Subscription Support team to look at your crash report when you submit a support request. It is a
nice Subscription perk. The submission of crash reports also helps the development team to see trends
of crashes and fix them in future releases.
Once the deployment is created you can install using the icon the setup creates in the root directory of
the deployment. If you want to tweak your settings, or customize your Revit content installation you will
need to follow “Creating an install script” in the document and not use the icon. Remember that you will
need two deployments if you want to install 32bit and 64bit in your office. If in future you want to modify
the deployment to add more libraries, configure CAD Manager channel, etc you can use the Create and
Modify a deployment icon located under Tools directory of the deployment.
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
Import/export line weight files, fontmap files (put this file in S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\Data folder)
Get these from the “%PROGRAMFILES%\ Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010\Data\” folder
UIState.dat If you want to pre-populate the Quick Access Toolbar (put this file in
S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks folder)
(Vista/Win7-> %LOCALAPPDATA%\Autodesk\Revit\Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010\, XP
%APPDATA%\Autodesk\Revit\Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010\)
We will try to achieve the following tasks using the batch file.
1. Copy Tweaked copies of Revit.ini, content.rcl, keyboardsshortcuts.txt & UIstate.dat
2. Launch the install routine for Revit automatically on 32 or 64 bit machines.
3. Copy the company standard content to the local drive, if needed.
4. Install any patches if they are now included as part of the deployment.
. This batch file can be downloaded from AU online
REM Batch file to install Revit 2010 and copy custom content
REM 1. Copy the tweaked files
XCOPY “S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\Program\*.*” /s/e/y/i/d/r/EXCLUDE:S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\exclude.txt “%PROGRAMFILES%\Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010\Program\“
XCOPY “S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\Data\*.*” /s/e/y/i/d/r/EXCLUDE:S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\exclude.txt “%PROGRAMFILES%\Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010\data\“
XCOPY “J:\Standards\Revit\*.*” s/e/y/i/d/r/EXCLUDE:S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\exclude.txt C:\OFCStandards\Revit\
REM 2. Decide which Revit architecture to install 32bit or 64bit
:INSTALL
if "%programfiles(x86)%XXX"=="XXX" GOTO 32BIT
echo 64-bit Windows installed
:64bit
S:\software\Revit2010\AdminImage\Setup.exe /qb /I S:\software\Revit2010\x64\AdminImage\Revitalize-Arch-64.ini
GOTO END
:32BIT
echo 32-bit Windows installed
S:\software\Revit2010\AdminImage\Setup.exe /qb /I S:\software\Revit2010\x86\AdminImage\Revitalize-Arch-32.ini
:END
Echo all done
Pause
Next we need an exclude.txt file which will tell XCOPY what not to copy. Start notepad and add the
following text and save it as Exclude.txt file at S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks
.zip
.rar
.bak
.tmp
.cab
.00
A little explanation about XCOPY. There are other more powerful utilities available like ROBOCOPY etc,
but for what we need to achieve XCOPY works great.
Some of the switches I have used in XCOPY
/d: this compares the date of the file and if the local file is newer, it will not copy the file from the server,
avoiding an overwrite of user modified files.
/EXCLUDE: this allows us to not copy certain file extensions. Especially the Revit family backup files that
have .00 appended to it. You can add more extensions in the exclude.txt file as needed.
Tweaking the files:
I have used xcopy to pre-copy the tweaked files to the users hard drive. This can also be achieved using
ORCA MSI editor (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa370557(VS.85).aspx) to create a transform
(MST file) and use that transform to point the installer to the tweaked files (this is what I have used in the
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
past personally). Assign more than one transform by editing the Revitalize-Arch-32.ini (in the
Adminimage folder. The name of the ini will the name of your deployment). Add the custom transform to
TRANSFORMS= line at the bottom of the ini file.
Tweaking Revit.ini:
Most of the tweaking in Revit.ini will be in the Directories section. Open the Revit.ini file from
S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\Program folder. The reason we copied this file is that in case you modify
the deployment in future our changes do not get overwritten by the deployment creator. Changes and
additions are shown in bold & italics. The Revit.ini below is not the complete ini file.
[Revit.ini]
[Directories]
DefaultTemplate=C:\OFCStandards\Revit\MYCOMPANY Imperial 2010.rte
FamilyTemplatePath=C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\RAC 2010\Imperial Templates
DataLibraryLocations=Imperial Library=C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\RAC 2010\Imperial Library,Metric
Library=C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\RAC 2010\Metric Library,Imperial Detail Library=C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\RAC 2010\Imperial
Library\Detail Components,Metric Detail Library=C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\RAC 2010\Metric Library\Detail Components,My
Company=C:\OFCStandards\Revit\
ProjectPath=C:\RevitLocal
ImportLineweightsNameDWG=C:\Program Files\Autodesk Revit Architecture 2010\Data\MYCOMPANY-importlineweights-dwg.txt
MaterialLibraryFiles=..\Data\Rendering
ExportLayersNameDWG=C:\OFCStandards\Revit\ MYCOMPANY-exportlayers-dwg-AIA.txt
ExternalParameters= C:\OFCStandards\Revit\MYCOMPANY-SharedParameters.txt
[ExternalApplications]
[ExternalCommands]
You can also add any external programs or tweak other settings that are specific to your needs. If you
add any external utilities you will need to copy their files to the appropriate folders. Best option is to
check your local install of Revit.ini file. Some external tools cannot be copied and added to the ini file
manually and need to be installed after the Revit install. I use InnoSetup to make modifications to the ini
file post install. There are DOS based ini modifications tools also available on the web. Windows
scripting is another tool you can use to push changes to the Revit.ini file after installation.
Tweaking Content.rcl:
If you plan to distribute your deployment to other servers you will need to tweak the content.rcl file, which
copies the OTB content and help files to the users machine. The content.rcl file found in the
S:\software\Revit2010\x86\AdminImage\RevitSetup\RevitArchitecture (or your flavor of Revit) is not used,
rather the embedded one in the MSI is used. So we need to pre-copy our tweaked file. The reason we
are tweaking this file is to make our install non-UNC (or another server) based so it can be copied to other
remote servers. Depending on the libraries you select, the size of the Content.rcl file will vary. The key
here is to change the path. Change all the UNC paths by using notepad and FIND/REPLACE option.
(partial content.rcl file)
[Bundle_NAImperial.cab_2]
……
name=North American Imperial
filename=NAImperial.cab
……
fullpath=\\blackops\software\Revit\AdminImage\ContentENU\NAImperial.cab
Change to
fullpath=S:\Revit\AdminImage\ContentENU\NAImperial.cab
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
@Echo OFF
XCOPY j:\acadarch\REVIT\GBBN\*.* /s/e/y/i/d/r/EXCLUDE:S:\software\Revit2010\Tweaks\exclude.txt "C:\acadusercustom\Acadarch\Revit\GBBN"
REM Set the custom content read-only so users cannot modify it.
ATTRIB +r "C:\acadusercustom\Acadarch\Revit\GBBN\*.*" /S
accessing the standard content. If you plan to install your office standard content locally then you will
need to create a sync routine to update the local content, yet still maintain the security of users not
overwriting standard content. You can use Offline files, and maybe some other tools, but I prefer XCOPY
again to achieve this simple task. All you need is to ADD the above lines to the users logon script or add
the batch file to the registry under:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run.
e.g. (created using InnoSetup)
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
Standardization:
As mentioned in the beginning that I am not going to go in detail about Creating Templates and a detailed
standardization, but I want to discuss the important things that you can put in place to create standards
for your office that go beyond your templates. There are other classes at AU that go in much greater
depth on Standardization of Templates and I would refer you to those classes as well. My goal is to touch
on the topics that you can implement within your office to Revit-alize it.
Folder Structure:
You need plan out two folder structures, one for Standard Content and the other for Projects. I would
also recommend a Family Development folder and Family Submittal Folder to house currently worked on
families and for users to submit their families which can later be published in the Standard Content folder.
1. Standard Content
1.1. Copy the OTB content folder
1.2. Depending on the Revit flavor add custom folders e.g. for
Revit Architecture: Details, Generic Models, Groups,
Schedules, System Families, Templates.
2. Project Folder
Many companies have different requirements, but for Revit I
would recommend a few folders to organize the project files
2.1. Current
2.2. Consultant Models
2.3. Families
2.4. Export
2.5. CAD imports (this will house actively used CAD linked files
from Consultants, etc)
2.6. Plots (to house PDF’s,DWF’s,etc)
2.7. Archive (To store past phase files, SD, DD, CD, etc)
File Naming:
Project files
Every company has a numbering system which should be prefixed to the project central file. Prior
to 2010 release we had procedures to create local files, you can still use those or let Revit 2010
create the local file for the user automatically. The local files will be saved in the location that was
specified when creating the deployment Step 7.4 User Files. I still prefer to name the local file
consistently, i.e. same length, for all users. This way I can use batch rename tool (my favorite
Flash Renamer http://www.rlvision.com) to rename the plot files generated by multiple users.
Families
My recommendation is to prefix families with a 00Initial of Company (for
standard content e.g. 00G_Family) or Project name (for project families,
e.g. 01_Project Family). This will help sort the Type Selector and makes it
easier to distinguish standard company content from OTB or downloaded
content. Once a downloaded content or project content is approved and
published in the Standard, it should be renamed with the above convention. It is also a good idea
to have a custom text parameter in your families to add a version/date. This way it will be easier
to troubleshoot families in the future.
Also refer to the Revit® Model Style Guide to help you develop consistent, useful Revit models at
http://style.guides.s3.amazonaws.com/Revit_Model_Style_Guide_v2.zip
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
Process Guidelines:
Creating procedures & guidelines can go a long way to maintain consistency and help reduce problems
related to Local files and bloated project files. Procedures include:
Location of and Naming Local files
Reload latest or Synchronize with Central when opening the project every time.
Saving guidelines,
When and how often to synchronize with central,
Saving at the End of Day & always Relinquish All Mine
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
3D Views:
If you are creating any 3D View for publishing it should be prefixed with PUB – 3D View Desc,
i.e. PUB – Exterior SW, PUB – Camera – Lobby, PUB – Camera – Room 1212
Elevations:
All Published Elevations should be prefixed with Pub. Before creating an
Elevation view pay close attention to the type selector to verify which type
of Elevation is being created, Exterior/Interior.
Exterior Elevations: Exterior elevations are to be named with the direction North, South,
East, West. Partial elevations are to be prefixed with Part and a minimal description.
Developed Elevations will get a Dev prefix. E.g. PUB North, PUB Part South at Roof.
Interior Elevations: Interior Elevations are to be identified with the Room# and Direction.
E.g. PUB 1232 N, PUB 1232 Office South.
Sections:
Before creating a Section view pay close attention to the type selector to
verify which type of Section is being created, Building/Wall/Interior.
Building Sections: PUB - Direction - Column Grid #. E.g. PUB - NS
– Col D
Wall Sections: PUB – Elevation Direction – Nearest Column Grid #. E.g. PUB – N – B,
PUB – E – 13_1(notice no periods)
Interior Sections: PUB – Room # - Desc. E.g. PUB – 1212 – Casework, PUB – Clg –
1212 – Soffit
Details:
When using the Callout tool for Details, selecting the correct subset is
important for it to show up in the correct category in Project Browser.
Interior Details: PUB – Room # - Description. E.g. PUB – 1212 –
Type of Detail
Plan Details: PUB – Column Grid Intersection – abbreviated Description.
Wall Section Details: PUB - Wall Section (as named under wall sections above) –
Level/Description
Misc Details: PUB – Description
Drafting Views:
Drafting Views are used to create details from scratch or importing details from AutoCAD. If the
Drafting Views published it should have the PUB Prefix. Since Drafting Views can be of wide
variety, naming conventions will need to be developed for your specific needs.
I believe you now have an idea to develop View Naming conventions for other views in Revit. The
key is consistency which will help reduce wasted time and increase efficiency.
Worksets:
Naming conventions and procedures for worksets is very critical. Worksets are not layers, but
remembering our AutoCAD days and the idea of making sure every object was on the correct layer is
similar here. Educating users the importance of creating objects on the correct workset will not only allow
you to manage the project, but it can go a long way to reduce the hardware requirements that Revit has.
It will make your project load faster and users will be more efficient by unloading unnecessary worksets.
Try naming the workset based on system or group, e.g. 1St Floor Exterior, 1st Floor Interior, 1st Floor
HVAC, 1st Floor Electrical, etc
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
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Autodesk® Revit®: A BIM Manager's Guide to Revit-alizing Your Office
Conclusion
We have covered a multitude of topics to help standardize Revit and create a company standard. The key is to educate the
users to follow the standard. It may take a few extra minutes for the users to follow the guidelines, but it will result in a much
streamlined, efficient working project.
If you have any comments or suggestions or need consulting help please feel free to contact me at (513-777-9917) or email
me at bimologist@cadbazaar.com or visit http://www.pctroubleshooters.com
Thank you
Nauman Mysorewala
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