Chapter 5: Core Revit Functionalities

Revit's core functionalities are the native Revit tools that do not use visual programming or additional plugins to manage model geometry and data.

We can gain productivity with Revit's core functionalities by planning ahead using the best workflows in a project and understanding their key functionalities. We need to think critically about how we will spend our time in Revit to become more efficient and analyze possible consequences, if we decide to use a specific workflow.

Before we start a specific task, we need to research quality information to ensure that we have enough details to successfully complete the task and think about why we have decided to use a specific process, as well as its benefits. We need to focus our time and energy on the workflow, which will significantly impact our tasks and deliver the required results.

Adopting the best Revit practices while you fully understand the problem you wish to solve will improve...

Understanding schedule management

You can use Revit schedules to create a list of components from your model that automatically update when the model changes.

In Revit, six schedule types are available:

Figure 5.1 – Revit schedule types

Let's look at these in detail:

• Schedule/Quantities

  This schedule type is the most used schedule to quantify elements in the model. You can find multiple object categories here, such as Curtain Panels, Doors, Furniture, Rooms, Walls, Windows, and others.

• Graphical Column Schedules

  Graphical Column Schedules are used to visualize a column's height, size, and material in a chart.

• Material Takeoff

  The Material Takeoff schedule type calculates the materials in the project. We can use it to estimate quantities and for support cost analysis.

• Sheet List

  The Sheet List schedule type lists all the sheets in the project. It can provide an overview of all project sheets.

• Note Block

  The Note Block...

Keynote for the project specification

Keynote is an essential feature for assigning a project specification to element types, individual families, and materials. These processes will save you a lot of time adding notes to your Revit project.

Before you can use Keynote, the project team needs to decide which construction specification standards will be implemented.

In the UK, the construction industry has used the Common Arrangement of Work Sections (CAWS) codes for many years, but it is no longer maintained. Projects are increasing their usage of Uniclass 2015 codes for the specification.

In North America, the construction industry may use OmniClass, which is equivalent to Uniclass, or MasterSpec as the specification system.

Companies may use other specification systems as a project requirement.

We can find the Keynote tool in the Annotate tab:

Figure 5.23 – Revit Keynote

Before you can annotate objects with Keynotes, you need to receive...

Design Options

Revit's Design Options let you have more than one design solution in the same Revit file. We can switch between Design Options, which helps us design meetings and with client's presentations.

The process of creating Design Options is relatively simple, and we will focus on the best practices for managing Design Options to improve our productivity and efficiency. We can find the Design Options tool in the Manage tab | Design Options:

Figure 5.32 – Design Options

Tip

When using Design Options, it is better to have "hosting" and "element hosted" in the same Design Option; for example, a wall (hosting) and a door (hosted).

Let's learn about the best practices for managing Design Options in Revit.

Naming Design Options

Revit Design Options should be named based on your company standards and avoid using the default naming conventions such as "Option 1," "Option 2," and so...

Revit Phasing

Revit phases are an excellent function for working with existing buildings as they allow us to distinguish elements from different Phases and Phase Statuses, such as Existing, New, Demolished, and so on. It also helps us control their visibility.

In Chapter 3, Revit Templates and Standards, we showed you how to implement Revit Phases for Revit templates. In this section, we will present the best practices for using Revit Phases.

Depending on your project's size, we advise having one Revit file for the Existing Phase and another Revit file for the New Phase. Although we may use just one Revit file with both Phases for a single house project, we can gain productivity by using separated files for each Phase in medium and large projects.

Revit File with Only the Existing Phase

This Revit file will only contain the surveyed model for the existing building, and it will only be used to demolish objects.

We can use the Demolish tool from the Modify tab and...

Using Scope Boxes

Scope Boxes can increase efficiency by applying a specific crop region to multiple views and control Levels and Grids extensions.

Scope Boxes are created in the Floor or Ceiling Plan views, but they are visible in multiple views and can be adjusted as required.

To create a Scope Box, select the Scope Box tool from the View tab:

Figure 5.51 – Drafting the Scope Box in a plan view

After adding the Scope Box, we need to select and name it. Usually, the name should be a description of the area that you are cropping:

Figure 5.52 – Changing the Scope Box's name

Once the Scope Box has been created, we can select it from Properties to crop its view:

Figure 5.53 – Selecting and applying the Scope Box to a view

Now, we can select multiple views from the Project Browser menu and apply the same Scope Boxes:

Figure 5.54 – Selecting and applying...

Worksharing

Worksharing in Revit is a process that allows multiple users to work simultaneously in the same Revit file.

We can collaborate with multiple users by adopting the Central and Local files workflow.

Figure 5.60 – Synchronizing with Central and Local files

How to create a Revit Central file

Let's learn how to create a Revit Central file. Follow these steps:

1. Save the initial Revit file in the correct folder and with the appropriate naming convention. In Chapter 4, Starting a Revit Project Efficiently, we learned how to start a Revit project and set up the project's coordinates, so this will be the initial file that contains the correct coordinate system.
2. In the Collaborate tab, click on Collaborate:

   Figure 5.61 – Collaborate tool

3. Let's assume that we are working in your private network and not using the Autodesk BIM 360 cloud platform. Select the Within your network option and click OK:

   Figure 5.62 &...

Drawing production

Efficient drawing production is an essential skill if you wish to master Revit and deliver a set of PDF and DWG files as project deliverables.

We can increase productivity for drawing production by focusing on three best practices:

• Plan the drawing list.
• Work with a good Revit template.
• Control drawing visibility.

Plan the Drawing List

At the beginning of each stage, we must plan the drawing list to be produced and avoid creating drawings as the project continues to be developed.

When we have a list of drawings, the project team or the BIM coordinator can quickly create all the sheets with the correct names, numbers, statuses, and other information. This process is essential for gaining productivity in delivering drawings. We can automate this process to create multiple sheets directly in Revit, or we can use the Dynamo and Revit plugins to speed up this process.

The key point is to make it clear what deliverables will be produced...

Summary

In this chapter, we learned about the Revit core functionalities and best practices to improve efficiency when working with schedules and keynotes for construction specifications. The schedule workflows were divided into Basic and Advanced to help cover the essential processes for managing schedules.

In Revit, keynotes are used to assign construction specifications to Revit components, thus increasing productivity and consistency when we're annotating drawings.

We then explained the best practices and workflows for Design Options, Phasing, and Scope Boxes, which help us to be more efficient in our daily activities when we're working with Revit. We also learned about workflows for Worksharing so that we can collaborate with multiple users working simultaneously in the same file.

After that, we presented the three main factors for increasing productivity during drawing production, including defining the drawing list, working with a good Revit template, and...