eLearning – Upcoming Classes

Join the Ideate Tech Experts for eLearning – live online classes that provide your entire organization with easy access to premium education. 

9.16.13::Ideate Software 101:
Revit Project Management with Ideate BIMLink

9.17.13::Revit 201:
Documenting your project in Revit MEP

9.19.13::Infrastructure 201:
Analysis for Master Planning

9.20.13::Revit 201:
Revit MEP and Low Voltage Systems MEP

9.23.13::Revit 201:
Conceptual Design

9.30.13::Ideate Software 201:
Ideate BIMLink for RMEP Projects

Each class is designed to give you specific, improved results in a particular topic. You can interact with the instructor right from your own office, while eliminating travel time. Because the class schedule rotates, you can easily select your topics of interest and choose the day which best meets your schedule.

Click here for class descriptions, times and registration link. Questions? Contact education@ideateinc.com

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Ideate, Inc. Publishes New Study in Success Featuring Aurecon and Ideate BIMLink

SAN FRANCISCO, California – 8/22/2013 - Ideate, Inc., a leading Autodesk Authorized Developer and Autodesk solutions provider offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry with a special focus on Building Information Management (BIM), today announced the publication of its most recent Study in Success, “Aurecon Streamlines Seismic Mitigation Work with Ideate BIMLink.”

Ideate BIMLink customer Aurecon provides engineering, management and specialist technical services for public and private sector clients globally. In the wake of the especially devastating and costly earthquake of 2011, buildings throughout New Zealand are being upgraded and strengthened. The Study in Success explores ways Aurecon is using Ideate BIMLink as the firm designs buildings that employ the most effective known seismic mitigation technologies.  These technologies cushion seismic vibrations and allow a building to move during a seismic event with a minimum amount of damage to the building’s structural and architectural elements.

As the volume and complexity of data for such projects increase, the firm has needed a way to transfer data from an engineering spreadsheet into the Autodesk Revit model without having to transfer it over manually.

According to Clinton Maulder, Associate – Buildings, Aurecon, Wellington, New Zealand, “With manual entry, the engineer has to check against all the original source data. If there was a mistake and it wasn’t picked up in a manual check, there could be costly delays to remedy on site, or the structure might not perform as well as expected. If we eliminate as many opportunities for manual error as we possibly can, we minimize these risks.”

By using Ideate BIMLink, the firm has been able to calculate volumes of data and standardize parameter values in Microsoft Excel. Then, the verified data is pushed back into the Revit file. As Clinton Maulder explains, “Being able to effectively deal with source data and eliminate ‘double handling’ saved time and reduced the chance of errors.”

Bob Palioca, President, Ideate Inc., says, “We are pleased that Ideate BIMLink has helped Aurecon enhance workflows in its vital seismic mitigation projects. Our software solutions stem directly from our customers’ need to overcome stumbling blocks. When we help customers manage data on a vast scale more easily, and when we facilitate the flow of information and collaboration between project stakeholders, our customers can then leverage BIM to its fullest advantage. We delight in their success.”

Ideate has published “Aurecon Streamlines Seismic Mitigation Work with Ideate BIMLink” online. Download the Study in Success at http://www.ideateinc.com/ideas/case.html.

About Ideate, Inc.
Ideate, Inc. is a leading Autodesk Authorized Developer with 25+ years’ experience in software development and specific focus on Building Information Modeling (BIM) and is an Autodesk solutions provider offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to the AEC industry since 1992. Headquartered in San Francisco, California and operating five Autodesk Authorized Training Centers (ATCs) in the northwestern U.S., Ideate is recognized as an Autodesk Gold Partner for Architecture, Engineering and Construction, one of Autodesk’s highest levels of authorization.

Ideate BIMLink lets users pull data from an Autodesk Revit file into user-friendly Microsoft Excel and push Excel data into Revit with equal ease.  www.ideatebimlink.com

Ideate Explorer for Revit is a simple, powerful Autodesk Revit add-on to explore, quantify and manage the 100,000+ building elements in a Revit model. www.ideateexplorer.com

Autodesk, ATC, and Revit are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. Microsoft Excel is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders.

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eLearning – Upcoming Classes

Join the Ideate Tech Experts for eLearning – live online classes that provide your entire organization with easy access to premium education. 

8.26.13::Revit 201:
Revit MEP and Low Voltage Systems MEP

9.5.13::Civil 3D 201:
Section Sheets Code Set Styles

9.9.13::ISW 101:
Revit Auditing with Ideate Explorer for Revit

9.10.13::Revit 201:
Residential Construction in Revit Architecture

8.19.13::ISW 101:
Ideate BIMLink for RMEP Projects

9.11.13::ISW 101:
Revit Project Management with Ideate BIMLink

Each class is designed to give you specific, improved results in a particular topic. You can interact with the instructor right from your own office, while eliminating travel time. Because the class schedule rotates, you can easily select your topics of interest and choose the day which best meets your schedule.

Click here for class descriptions, times and registration link. Questions? Contact education@ideateinc.com

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Annual Ideate BIMLink User Survey

Every year we reach out to our customer base to make sure we’re adding value with each iteration of Ideate BIMLink. Our development team just completed another point release for both 2013 (yes, you heard correctly – new features added to the old version!) and 2014. You can learn more about the improvements in our What’s New in Ideate BIMLink video.  

MORE IMPORTANTLY, you can make your voice heard for any new features you’d like to see. All existing Ideate BIMLink users should have received their user survey form via email on 14 August. Those who complete the survey are automatically entered into a drawing to win an iPad mini. The survey ends September 23rd, so if you haven’t filled yours out yet, take a few minutes and let us know what you’d like to see in the next version of Ideate BIMLink. The winner will be announced on August 27th.

If you are an Ideate BIMLink owner and have not received your survey, you can request a copy of the survey.

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Ideate, Inc. Publishes New Study in Success Featuring HDR Wayfinding/Signage and Ideate BIMLink

SAN FRANCISCO, California – 8/15/2013 - Ideate, Inc., a leading Autodesk® Authorized Developer and Autodesk solutions provider offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry with a special focus on Building Information Modeling (BIM), today announced the publication of its latest Study in Success, “Ideate BIMLink Manages Seen and Unseen Data for HDR Wayfinding/Signage.”

Wayfinding presents significant challenges to planners who have to collaboratively identify logical traffic patterns, solve problems in architectural and urban spaces, and ultimately help people navigate unfamiliar environments. Immense amounts of disparate data have to be incorporated into BIM models that are primarily designed for other purposes.

The Study in Success explores ways the HDR Wayfinding/Signage studio is using Ideate BIMLink to manage the seen and unseen data in its BIM models. By using Ideate BIMLink, the HDR Wayfinding/Signage studio is enhancing workflows, making the best use of Revit- and non-Revit users’ time, and shaving from half to two-thirds the time required to create message schedules.

HDR is a global employee-owned firm of more than 7,500 AEC professionals in more than 185 locations. Rick Sorensen, Wayfinding/Signage, HDR, says, “With Ideate BIMLink, we can take full advantage of Excel’s capability to reveal multiple lines of data at once. We may not be able to see all the data in the model, but we can see it all in Excel.” Autodesk Revit-user Sorensen receives input from the non-Revit using members of the studio team in Excel. As a result, he does not have to spend a second thinking about model integrity. Instead, he tasks Ideate BIMLink with pushing the Excel-checked data back into the BIM model. The accuracy is reliable, and that contributes to even greater efficiency. Efficiency allows for a better end result and value to the owner.

Sorenson adds, “In the past, I would spend three days at a specific data management task that I can complete now in one-half to one-third the time. As for cost savings, we are limited on our hours per project. Anything that saves us time saves us money.”

Bob Palioca, President, Ideate Inc., says, “We are delighted that Ideate BIMLink, one of our Ideate developed software solutions, is creating a new workflow solution and contributing to the success of customers such as HDR. Our software development grew out of our desire to overcome gaps our customers faced repeatedly. We continue to improve the flow of information, facilitate collaboration between Revit and non-Revit users, and make data management on a vast scale much easier.”

Ideate has published “Ideate BIMLink Manages Seen and Unseen Data for HDR Wayfinding/Signage” online. Download the Study in Success at http://www.ideateinc.com/ideas/case.html.

About Ideate, Inc.
Ideate, Inc. is a leading Autodesk Authorized Developer with 25+ years’ experience in software development and specific focus on Building Information Modeling (BIM) and is an Autodesk solutions provider offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to the AEC industry since 1992. Headquartered in San Francisco, California and operating five Autodesk Authorized Training Centers (ATCs) in the northwestern U.S., Ideate is recognized as an Autodesk Gold Partner for Architecture, Engineering and Construction, one of Autodesk’s highest levels of authorization.
 
Ideate BIMLink lets users pull data from an Autodesk Revit file into user-friendly Microsoft Excel and push Excel data into Revit with equal ease.  www.ideatebimlink.com
 
Ideate Explorer for Revit is a simple, powerful Autodesk Revit add-on to explore, quantify and manage the 100,000+ building elements in a Revit model. www.ideateexplorer.com
 
Autodesk, ATC, and Revit are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. Microsoft Excel is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders.

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eLearning – Upcoming Classes

Join the Ideate Tech Experts for eLearning – live online classes that provide your entire organization with easy access to premium education. 

8.12.13::ISW 101:
Revit Auditing with Ideate Explorer for Revit

8.13.13::Revit 201:
View Properties:Controlling Visibility

8.15.13::Civil 3D 201:
Object & Label Styles

8.19.13::Civil 3D 201:
Working with ReCap

8.19.13::ISW 101:
Ideate BIMLink for RMEP Projects

8.20.13::Revit 201:
Impression in Revit

Each class is designed to give you specific, improved results in a particular topic. You can interact with the instructor right from your own office, while eliminating travel time. Because the class schedule rotates, you can easily select your topics of interest and choose the day which best meets your schedule.

Click here for class descriptions, times and registration link. Questions? Contact education@ideateinc.com

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Revit 2014 Feature Review: More Data Liberated!

As the developers of Ideate BIMLink we’ve been very focused on the data that our customers are embedding within their Revit Building Information Models, so as always when a new version of Revit ships, we carefully scrutinize all the new features and how they relate specifically to information management. Here’s a brief synopsis of what to look for and why you should care.

Revit 2014 Supports New Schedules Types
On the View tab, under the Schedule tool, find these new kinds of schedules. 

New Schedule Category	Value 1-5 (5=Best)
(Arch) Columns	1
Feature: These are the architectural columns; the structural columns are already being scheduled. Benefit: Questionable value unless you are using the column family in some atypical way. Structural columns are generally the ones to schedule for takeoff work.
Detail Items	5
Feature: 2D detail components, including fill patterns, are included in this new schedule type. Benefit: This has been a user request for some time, which is why it’s been in Ideate BIMLink since version 2011. Oddly, the repeating details and filled region elements appear to be lumped in with the more conventional items, so you may need to filter them out. Editing the keynote assignment will be the most practical use of this new functionality. Take Detail Items farther with Ideate BIMLink.
Entourage	1
Feature: These are the 2D stick people that when rendered look slightly less 2D. YinYin – where are you?! Benefit: I see no practical use of this feature, so email me if you can figure it out. I guess if you had 100+ Entourage components and you wanted to use this schedule as a way of knowing which Rooms they were in, that might be useful, but that seems like a bad use of a schedule.
Generic Models	4
Feature: All those items that otherwise defy categorization can now be scheduled. Benefit: This was another early Ideate BIMLink request that was implemented in 2011, so no doubt this will prove useful to some who are managing uniquely modeled elements. The absence of level and host information is why this is not marked as a 5.
Grids and Levels	5
Feature: The name says it all. Benefit: Why not schedule these? While this hasn’t been a strong user request, having a summary of this information is a great way for a project manager to understand the project at a glance. I particularly like the fact that you can see and modify the Scope Box assignment for these items. Auditing Grids and Levels are part of Ideate’s Revit Audit Tips.
Pads	1
Feature: The building pad object that is used to create a topography “cut” and place a slab-like object at the same time. Benefit: If used at all (it has an issue, still, with being properly managed by phases) the pad is unlikely to be needed as a scheduled object.
Roof Soffits	3
Feature: Roofs, Roof Fascia, and Roof Gutters have always been able to be scheduled; now Roof Soffits join the mix. Benefit: This is a long-standing Revit request related to the delivering a more complete quantity takeoff. Glad to see that it’s been included.
Structural: Beam Systems, Area Reinforcements, Path Reinforcements, and Fabric Areas	2
Feature: As with Roof Soffits, the addition of this data rounds out the Structural elements that can be modeled. Benefit: Unclear to me whether this has value. I think this information may be a bit ahead of the curve for most structural/construction firms, but it’s nice to see Autodesk expose this information to be leveraged as customers see fit.

Revit 2014 Schedules Include New Properties
In addition to the new schedule categories several bits of data have been exposed for your use. What will you leverage?
 

New Property Added To Schedules	Value 1-5 (5=Best)
Phase Created/Phase Demolished	5
Feature: Now your takeoff schedules can include the name of the Phase in which the element was created. I’m assuming that the Demolished field has negligible value when it comes to schedules. These two fields can also be used as a Filter within the schedule. Benefit: As we have documented in this blog called “Avoid Takeoff Blunders,” not having the phase info could cause significant issues within a quantity takeoff. In a multi-phase project these fields should be required as part of a QC process.
Analytical and Physical Element Data Merged	3
Feature: When you schedule the structural framing category (or any other category with associated structural analytical model categories) you can now find both the physical and analytical properties available within the same schedule. Benefit: Being able to edit some of the analytical structural properties, in-line with its physical properties is part of a larger improvement related to the analytical model which will help solve round-tripping issues between Revit and structural analysis software.

It’s great to see all this newly liberated data – it will be fun to see the new and creative ways in which Revit users put this data to work.  

Don’t forget to look through other great features our Ideate Technical Team has found in the new 2014 releases for Revit Architecture, Revit MEP, Revit Structure, Civil 3D, AutoCAD, Navisworks and more: ideateinc.com/2014

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. Glynnis is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon and has worked in the commercial, residential, and healthcare markets as an architect and has also worked in the construction industry as a construction estimator and project manager. Follow Glynnis on Twitter: @GVPinNJ

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$200,000 Software to be Awarded in Ideate 2013 Higher Education Software Grants

San Francisco, CA, 02/27/2013 – Ideate, Inc. (ideateinc.com), a leading Autodesk® Authorized Developer for more than 25 years, today announced it has pledged to grant more than $200,000 worth of Ideate-developed software to higher education institutions in 2013. Up to (15) awards will be granted to those institutions that can best demonstrate their support of research, development, and/or educational programs related to Building Information Modeling (BIM) and its use in collaborative design, construction, and facilities or asset management. 

“Our commitment to our architectural, engineering and construction (AEC) customers’ needs inspires us to continually advance BIM technology. We are pleased that firms of all sizes are incorporating our Autodesk Revit® focused solutions into their workflows,” says Glynnis Patterson, Ideate Director of Software Development. “We are also aware of growing AEC industry demands for ever greater productivity and enhanced efficiencies. That is why we are instituting this grant program. Through grants, we can support college and university instructors who are educating AEC professionals to meet these expanding demands.” 

Grant recipients will be awarded the Ideate Software Education Package which includes a network license with (10) seats of Ideate BIMLink and (10) seats of Ideate Explorer for Revit as well as access to live online Revit training for the year through Ideate, Inc. eLearning for Autodesk Revit.

Ideate-developed software for the Autodesk Revit family of products allows users to manage and edit their BIM data with ease. Ideate BIMLink utilizes user-friendly Microsoft® Excel® for a wide variety of data management tasks that support vastly improved workflows. And Ideate Explorer for Revit empowers users to audit a 250 MB Revit model in less than one minute to keep it trouble-free. 

Interested higher education institutions should Apply Online. Schools that are currently participating in the Solar Decathlon 2013 are encouraged to apply. 

To be eligible, applicants must be employed at the institution and the institution must already be using Autodesk Revit software in its labs. The deadline for applications is Wednesday, March 27, 2013. Winners will be announced Tuesday, April 2, 2013 at noon (GMT - 8:00). 

About Ideate, Inc.
Ideate, Inc. is a leading Autodesk Authorized Developer with 25+ years’ experience in software development and specific focus on Building Information Modeling (BIM) and is an Autodesk solutions provider offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to the AEC industry since 1992. Headquartered in San Francisco, California and operating five Autodesk Authorized Training Centers (ATCs) in the northwestern U.S., Ideate is recognized as an Autodesk Gold Partner for Architecture, Engineering and Construction, one of Autodesk’s highest levels of authorization. 

Autodesk and ATC are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders. 

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Ideate BIMLink in the Cloud – Now non-Revit Users Can Edit Revit Data Too!

A great reason to use Ideate BIMLink for Autodesk Revit is that it allows non-Revit users to contribute to the data side of the model. What do we mean by this? We mean that interior designs or consultants who don’t have Revit can fill out important space and room information such as a finish schedule or the Specified Airflow values using plain ‘ole MS Excel. We mean that the project manager who is busy traveling to job sites can edit the sheet list  information from the job trailer without having to access the project’s .RVT file. Or, maybe it’s the building engineer, onsite, who is reading barcodes from each installed piece of mechanical equipment and wants that data stored back into the as-built model. Ideate BIMLink is the perfect solution for all these scenarios.

How does it work? We’ll use the example of filling out the manufacture and model number for the mechanical equipment or specialty equipment. Bob is the engineer who owns Revit and uses a workstation, while Sue is the general contractor completing the as-built information. Sue is onsite with an iPad walking through the building to confirm each piece of data. Here’s the basic procedure:

1. Bob exports the list of mechanical equipment from the Revit model using Ideate BIMLink.
2. Bob saves the .XLSX file into Dropbox.
3. Sue uses CloudOn with Dropbox on her iPad and sees the file Bob just posted.
4. Sue opens the .XLSX and walks around to verify the Manufacture and model number for each piece of equipment that’s actually installed.
5. Some of the model number fields are missing or incorrect.  Sue edits them on the iPad.
6. When Sue is done Bob uses Ideate BIMLink to import the edited .XLSX data and push it back into Revit.
7. Now the Revit file data matches the as-built information and the owner gets a high-quality deliverable!

Give it a try; you can download a free Trial version of Ideate BIMLink and both Dropbox and CloudOn are free Apps for the iPad and iPhone. Note that CloudOn also works with Google Drive and with SkyDrive accounts.

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. In a previous life Glynnis spent many hours looking at blueprints with a scale, highlighters, and a scratch pad to develop detailed cost estimates.

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Part II: Loaded Type Has Been Renamed… to Protect the Innocent

Copy/Monitor Quirkiness Between Revit MEP and Revit Architecture

Last month my colleague, Bill Johnson explained some quirkiness with the Copy/Monitor tool as it relates to managing data. His excellent blog on this topic details how Revit MEP families that are copied only capture the family:type name and the location, leaving any instance-based parameter to re-set to its default values sometimes causing unexpected size and elevation changes for the copied elements. 

For those who have already run into this dilemma I’ll describe some of the basic steps we’ve used to map the original object parameter values to the objects within the new file – this is not for the faint of heart!
 
Problem: after Copy Monitoring plumbing fixtures all the instance parameters are reset to default, causing information about the grab bars, the toilet graphics, and the Instance Mark to be incorrect. How can we Copy/Monitor the data?

 
Solution: Using Ideate BIMLink we can create a custom database key, based on the object location. This allows us to then map the old instance parameter values onto the copied objects – even if the parameter names aren’t the same!  See video for explanation.



[--Alternate video format--]
 
Just because you can copy objects, doesn’t mean you should. As a general rule we would not recommend using Copy/Monitor on any object other than Grids and Levels. However… there are situations where it may be prudent to copy/monitor families. If so, proceed with caution and definitely review Bill’s blog or ask Ideate Consulting for help in developing Copy/Monitor strategy for your complex projects.
 

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. In a previous life Glynnis spent many hours looking at blueprints with a scale, highlighters, and a scratch pad to develop detailed cost estimates.

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Ideate Explorer for Revit 2013 User Survey Winners

Congratulations to our Ideate Explorer for Revit Survey Winners:

• Anders Alverfeldt of Yellow AB in Sweden
• Jeremy McMartin of Kirkor Architects
  and Planners in Canada
• Shawn Harriman of Roebbelen Construction
  in the United States
• Clark Morgan of WG Clark Construction
  in the United States

The above winners received a $50 Apple gift card for completing our 2012 Ideate Explorer for Revit user survey. Each person who completed the survey was entered into a random drawing to win.

We take your input very seriously - You ask, we listen. Our newest release of Ideate BIMLink will ship soon and contains all three of our top user survey requests from the 2012 Ideate BIMLink survey. See the Sneak Peek before it ships!

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Autodesk Revit Database Management and Ideate BIMLink

A customer recently asked us for information about using Ideate BIMLink in conjunction with MS Access. Before I share information about how this can be done, I’ll outline some important information about how Revit can connect, out-of-the-box, with an Access database. Revit is a database of building information and this information, or at least a portion of it, can be exported to ODBC which can in turn be opened within Access. You can learn more about this process in the Wiki.

This process is one-way, meaning that the data can leave Revit via Export, but there is no corresponding import. This is most useful as a way to manage data that can logically remain separate from the building objects, such as construction cost data or for managing HR data relative to spatial data.

For people who are interested in a more fluid, two-way data exchange, Autodesk also provides a free tool for subscription owners, called Revit DB Link. This tool permits both an import and an export and can be used for a wider variety of tasks. A common usage might include editing volumes of Room- or Space-based parameters within Access and then importing the changes back to Revit. I should clarify that this tool does not permit a “live link” between Revit and Access, meaning that both the import and the export processes within Revit are manual. It should also be noted that for 64-bit users, the setup for the MS Access will require a 64-bit ODBC driver which wasn’t provided by Microsoft until the release of Office 2010. You can learn more about the setup on this 2010 Typepad Blog (recent Autodesk posts imply that this information is still valid).

Ideate BIMLink also provides and import/export capability but is aimed at the average user who does not want to setup an Access database or who has found that the Revit DB Link tool cannot manage the volume or type of data needed for a specific task. Excel provides a simple and elegant way to manage the large volumes of data within the Revit project. This chart explains some of the differences between Revit DB Link and Ideate BIMLink.

Now, back to the question at hand… can you use Ideate BIMLink with MS Access? You can, here’s how: http://www.screencast.com/t/ayYInfVSg. I think the primary reason you might consider this workflow is that Ideate BIMLink lets you deal with smaller chunks of data and, again, does not require Access knowledge. The Revit user or consultant can manage a small chunk of the database within Excel. For example, they could fill out important COBie-related fields for specialty equipment items then handover that chunk of Excel-based data for incorporation into the larger, Access database. Ideate BIMLink uses the Type and Instance IDs as the database “key” to help coordinate the information between the Building Model and the database model. It’s the right tool for keeping it simple and fast.

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. In a previous life Glynnis spent many hours looking at blueprints with a scale, highlighters, and a scratch pad to develop detailed cost estimates.

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Ideate, Inc. Publishes Jasmax and BVN Use Case Study in Success

SAN FRANCISCO, California – 09/11/2012 - Ideate, Inc., a leading Autodesk® Authorized Developer and Autodesk solutions provider offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to the AEC industry, today announced the publication of a Study in Success specific to a use case of Ideate-developed software, Ideate BIMLink for Autodesk Revit.

The study, “BVN with Jasmax Makes 3.5 Million Combinations Workable in Minutes with Ideate BIMLink for Revit,” details how with the assistance of Ideate BIMLink, BVN Architecture of Australia in strategic partnership with Jasmax, New Zealand’s largest architectural practice, were able to manipulate, manage and harness about 3.5 million sunscreen element combinations to create a randomized pattern for a large building façade. The endeavor would have been next to impossible before the advent of Ideate BIMLink.

Specifically designed sun screens were required to maximize the shading efficiency of the façade, minimize the need for mechanical systems, and provide natural light while reducing glare and eye strain for building occupants.

Melanie Tristram, Jasmax Associate–Revit Manager, says of the use case, “The time saving represents more than the hours we did not have to spend. No one, certainly not our Revit users, wants their valuable time caught up in days of data entry. That process is unsatisfying and it is open to error. Ideate BIMLink improved our efficiency and accuracy.”

Jasmax Associate–BIM Specialist Michelle Leonard adds, “On each and every occasion that we wanted to explore a potential set of interactions, without BIMLink, we would have spent a day and a half of tedium. With BIMLink, we achieved each exploration in about half an hour.”

Bob Palioca, President, Ideate Inc. says about the Study in Success, “We take special pride in supporting sustainable design innovators such as Jasmax and BVN with Ideate-developed solutions for BIM, and we take special delight in sharing their successes with the worldwide AEC community.”

Ideate has published “BVN with Jasmax Makes 3.5 Million Combinations Workable in Minutes with Ideate BIMLink for Revit” online. Download the Study in Success at http://www.ideateinc.com/ideas/case.html.

About Ideate, Inc.
Ideate, Inc. is a leading Autodesk solutions provider, offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to AEC professionals. Established in 1992 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Ideate is recognized as a Gold Partner for Architecture, Engineering and Construction, one of Autodesk’s highest levels of authorization. Ideate, Inc. operates five Autodesk Authorized Training Centers (ATC): San Francisco, Sacramento and San Jose, California; Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington. Ideate facilities are Autodesk Authorized Certification Centers, providing globally recognized certification courses for professionals who sell, service and support Autodesk products and solutions. For more information visit www.ideateinc.com

Ideate, Inc. is also a member of the Autodesk Developer Network (ADN) with 25+ years experience in software development and specific focus on Building Information Modeling (BIM). Ideate BIMLink lets users pull data from an Autodesk Revit file into user-friendly Microsoft Excel and push Excel data into Revit with equal ease. www.ideatebimlink.com

Ideate Explorer for Revit is a simple, powerful Autodesk Revit add-on to explore, quantify and manage the 100,000+ building elements in a Revit model. www.ideateexplorer.com

Autodesk, ATC, and Revit, are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders.
 

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Conventional and Unconventional Ways to Leverage Data with Ideate BIMLink

Nicholas M. Kramer (NK), LEED® AP is a well-recognized guest lecturer on BIM and sustainability at Autodesk University (AU) and other forums. He is employed as a BIM Project Administrator at HMC Architects in Ontario, California, and currently serves as president of the BIM User Group Inland Empire (BUGIE), and is Program Manager for Revit Technology Conference (RTC) North America.

At RTC 2012, Nicholas presented his experience in the use of collecting, cataloguing and leveraging room data with Ideate BIMlink. On behalf of RTC, he also explored a heretofore unreported use of Ideate BIMLink.

In a recent interview with Ideate Director of Software Development Glynnis Patterson (GP), N.C.A.R.B., Nicholas shed light on these two distinctively different uses of Ideate BIMLink. One is a unique and unexpected usage, and the other represents a more mainstream AEC data problem.

GP: As the Program Manager for the Revit Technology Conference in North America, one of your jobs is to select and coordinate the speakers. Can you tell us about your unique use of Revit and Ideate BIMLink as a way of managing this rather unconventional “BIM” data in 2012?

NK: We had over 400 online applicants who were interested in speaking at this year’s RTC conference. Part of our challenge was to not only select great speakers but also to provide the right balance of topics across disciplines, difficulty levels and to make the most of each available time slot. Because we’re already using Revit to manage data, we took it upon ourselves to see if we could also apply it to this event management problem.  

The event management software we have been using can provide us with a .CSV file. The file contains each proposed speaker’s contact information along with 17 other data fields. We use those to sort and refine our selection process.
After we created a simple custom family within Autodesk Revit to represent each potential speaker, we used Ideate BIMLink to transfer the data from the event management software onto our “speaker” object. Importing 17 data fields for each of the 400 speakers would have taken quite a while, but with Ideate BIMLink it took just a few minutes to set up and then import all the data.

By using some simple visibility parameters, we were able to color code each speaker and arrange the speakers into a virtual conference. We used this as one way to assess whether we had the right mix of speakers during each time slot.

GP: It’s great to see such an unconventional use of the software. I understand you also used Ideate BIMLink in a far more conventional way: the management of a space program for a project you’re working on at HMC Architects. Can you tell us about the customer’s requirements for cross-coordinated data and how Ideate BIMLink was used to address these requirements?

NK: Sure. The customer is California State University (CSU) at Pomona and HMC was selected to do a 17,000 square foot wing addition for Collins College. They have specific submittal requirements in format as well as the links between multiple forms from program validation to the project estimate.
 
I realized early on that being able to manage this data for a relatively small project such as this one within a highly portable format, such as Microsoft Excel, would be central to our success with larger projects on our horizon.  We utilized Ideate BIMLink to transfer our programmatic requirements into Revit at the beginning, and then throughout the project we were able to continue to manage the requirements via Ideate BIMLink. Managing this amount of data any other way would have meant a loss of profit on our end.
 
GP: You mention that Excel is “portable.” Can you elaborate on that and explain how accessing the Revit data via Ideate BIMLink increases portability?
 
NK: This was one of the themes of my RTC presentation, leveraging the BIM data. Being able to use the data where and when you need it is one of the many hot topics in the AEC industry. The reality is that not everyone will be using Revit throughout a project’s lifecycle. Ideate BIMLink helps by putting the information into a portable and usable format that allows non-Revit users to leverage this important BIM data.
 
GP: If people want to learn more about your RTC presentation, where should they go?
 
NK: I’ll be expanding upon my RTC presentation at this year’s Autodesk University in November 2012, so I hope those who are interested will come out to Las Vegas if they can. In the interim, a hand-out distributed to BUGIE is available here.
 
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Nicholas M. Kramer (NK), LEED® AP, is a project leader and BIM project administrator at HMC Architects in Ontario, California. He has been using Autodesk® Revit® since version 8.1 and has helped implement Revit access across an architectural company with a staff of more than 400. He is currently the company-wide resource for BIM content creation and standardization on a wide variety of projects. His project experience varies from a 400,000 square foot library to higher education laboratory buildings to medical tenant improvements to the renovation of the MLK hospital in Los Angeles, California.

Import Space Program Data into Revit
http://hmcarchitects.com/
www.rtcevents.com
http://www.meetup.com/BUG-IE/
http://au.autodesk.com
http://www.ideatebimlink.com/

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. In a previous life Glynnis spent many hours looking at blueprints with a scale, highlighters, and a scratch pad to develop detailed cost estimates.

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Ideate, Inc. Announces New Workflows in Ideate BIMLink 2013

SAN FRANCISCO, California - 05/15/2012 - Ideate, Inc., a leading Autodesk Authorized Developer and Autodesk solutions provider offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to the AEC industry, today announced an update to Ideate BIMLink, the popular application for Autodesk Revit software. Expanded content and improved performance give users of Ideate BIMLink 2013 unprecedented access to and control of BIM data.

With Ideate BIMLink 2013 the Revit project team and non-Revit using data contributors can access information appropriate to their needs within a platform that safeguards the BIM model against error. Ideate BIMLink is used for a wide variety of data management tasks and now in 2013 supports several new important workflows including the ability to automatically generate consultant sheet lists, automatically populate with unplaced spaces, export detailed information about parts and materials and assist with view template implementation.

“We recognize the importance of a timely product delivery and are pleased to be able to deliver both Ideate BIMLink and Ideate Explorer for Revit 2013 within a few days of the official Autodesk Revit product launch this year,” said Ideate Inc. president Bob Palioca.

“We’ve included many new features and improvements thanks to all the great customer input we’ve had,” remarked Ideate director of Software Development Glynnis Patterson, “And we’ve also re-tooled Ideate BIMLink with significant performance improvements that will bump our customer’s ROI even higher.”

Ideate BIMLink is priced at US$850 with an upgrade from version 2012 priced at US$250. Ideate BIMLink is currently available via download from www.ideatebimlink.com and from authorized Ideate reseller partners. For information on network pricing, contact bimlink.sales@ideateinc.com.

Ideate BIMLink works with Autodesk Revit Architecture, Autodesk Revit MEP, and Autodesk Revit Structure software in conjunction with all versions of Microsoft Excel. A no-charge 30-day trial version of Ideate BIMLink software is available at http://www.ideatebimlink.com/trial

Ideate BIMLink and Ideate Explorer for Revit will be shown at the upcoming Revit Technology Conferences (RTC); one in North America on June 28-30, 2012 and another in Australia May 24-26, 2012.

About Ideate, Inc.
Ideate, Inc. is a member of the Autodesk Developer Network (ADN) with 25+ years experience in software development and specific focus on Building Information Modeling (BIM).

Ideate BIMLink lets users pull data from an Autodesk Revit software file into user-friendly Microsoft Excel and push Excel data into Revit with equal ease. www.ideatebimlink.com

Ideate, Inc. is a leading Autodesk solutions provider, offering quality software, training, support and custom consulting services to AEC professionals. Established in 1992 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Ideate is recognized as an Autodesk Gold Partner for Architecture, Engineering and Construction, one of Autodesk’s highest levels of authorization. Ideate, Inc. operates five Autodesk Authorized Training Centers (ATC): San Francisco, Sacramento and San Jose, California; Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington. Ideate facilities are Autodesk Authorized Certification Centers, providing globally recognized certification courses for professionals who sell, service and support Autodesk products and solutions. For more information visit www.ideateinc.com

Autodesk, ATC, and Revit, are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc., and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries. All other brand names, product names or trademarks belong to their respective holders.

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Carpe Vista!; or using View Templates in Revit 2013

My favorite new feature in Revit 2013 is the ability to persistently control views through the use of View Templates. In earlier versions of Revit there was a “Default View Template” field which didn’t do a whole lot. Sure, you could grab a whole bunch of views through the Project Browser and manually force them to update per your View Template rules, but who has time to remember?

Now in 2013 you can assign a View Template to a set of views and the elements within those Views will continually abide by the View Template rules! This goes a long way towards eliminating plotting errors by putting up a small roadblock for those who ponder setting overrides to a view’s display settings. When a View Template is assigned in 2013, the corresponding Visibility Graphics (VG) dialog will appear as grayed out per this image. Initially this may cause some minor heartburn but in the long run, returning the visibility control over to the BIM Manager can only be a good thing!

My colleague, Shruti Harve, made a great video on how to manage the View Template settings in Excel using Ideate BIMLink 2013. All views will not need a View Template assignment, but taking the time to assign your floor and ceiling plans will be well worth the effort when it comes time to publish your project. Set aside some time today to look closely at this new Autodesk Revit 2013 feature.

So with apologies my 8th grade Latin teacher – Carpe Vista!
Post scriptum: for all you Windows Vista™ fans (?!) that’s “seize the View” 
 

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. In a previous life Glynnis spent many hours looking at blueprints with a scale, highlighters, and a scratch pad to develop detailed cost estimates.

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Ideate BIMLink – The Results Are In

It was less than a year ago when we conducted a survey of the Ideate BIMLink user base. The user feedback from the 2011 survey was instrumental in forming our product direction over the past 10 months. We’re pleased to report that since then we’ve issued an additional two “point releases” and were able to address many of the top user requests for new features within our 2012 product including providing FlexLM network licensing and access to key schedule data.  As with last year’s version, our survey gave us some great insight into both the value that Ideate BIMLink is bringing to our customers and some exciting ideas about where our 2013 product should be going.

Almost all of our customers are using BIMLink to solve several kinds of workflow issues. Many, for example, are using it to manage sheet-based information or to create new rooms from an Excel space program. Others continue to use Ideate BIMLink to manage large quantities of custom family content. Others are using Ideate BIMLink in unexpected ways such as connecting elements to barcode data for material tracking, or using it as a method to translate an entire project into a foreign language.

Most gratifying to us, however, was learning about the time saved. On average, Ideate BIMLink survey respondents report 20 hours of time saved per project!  To be fair, our standalone customers are reporting an average of 11 hours per project while the network customers are reporting and average of 32 hours.  The great news is that either way these are very significant savings and indicate that the payback period for a purchase of Ideate BIMLink occurs during the very first project. Download our Return On Investment (ROI) calculator today to see how much money you could save with Ideate BIMLink.

We also want to congratulate the winner selected from our pool of survey respondents: Tamara Youssef. Tamara is a BIM Specialist who works for Dar Al-Handasah Consultants out of their Lebanon office and won an iPad2! Thanks to all our customers for helping us identify and solve BIM data management problems.

Try the 30-day Trial version of Ideate BIMLink today.

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. In a previous life Glynnis spent many hours looking at blueprints with a scale, highlighters, and a scratch pad to develop detailed cost estimates.

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Avoid Takeoff Blunders in Revit Projects

The days of actually sharing Building Information Models are finally upon us. At Ideate we’re seeing a high degree of RVT sharing going on out there, not only across A/E disciplines but also into the construction field. Obvious hurdles still abound as we struggle to define BIM deliverables and what constitutes a “constructability” model but it’s exciting nonetheless to see so much progress in the past two years.

As we see more owners and contractors performing detailed takeoff analysis derived from Revit models we’ve become more attuned to the unique challenges of trying to leverage someone else’s data. It’s difficult enough to “walk through” a project you are not familiar with, and even more difficult to comfortably assess the data behind the model when you yourself are not the creator. 

To that end, I thought I’d share a few tips to help avoid some of the common mistakes that can be made when using Revit for quantity takeoff purposes. 

Phasing and Schedule Data Challenges
Architects and Engineers most typically use phases to graphically represent demolition, existing, and new construction conditions within a project. This allows, for example, items that are existing to be shown in a lighter lineweight, and items that are being demolished to either be displayed as dashed or not be shown at all. Ideate has had many support cases where quantity takeoffs were not giving the expected results due to phasing considerations. Using the wrong Phase Filter on a Schedule can radically impact the takeoff results. 

Each of Revit’s model elements are assigned a Phase Created and Phase Demolished value, as shown. These assignments give Revit the ability to display Views and Schedules as a snapshot in time. When the schedule is created a Phase is identified, as shown. This acts as a filter on the schedule.  In this example, any Wall that has a Phase Created value of “Phase II” will not display in the schedule.

 

Consider the simple floor plans shown for Phase I and Phase II of the same project. Each schedule has a different combination of Phase and Phase Filter settings. These phase settings can be edited from the Properties dialog when the Schedule is the active view.

Note that the temporary wall, shown dashed, is visible in both the Floor Plan View and in the Schedule. Depending upon the Phase Filter the temporary wall could be excluded even if the Phase is set to “Phase I.” Additionally, this schedule includes walls that are existing. Is this desired for your takeoff?

In Phase II, another room is created. The Revit Schedule, when set to Filter on “Phase II” can include only the items created during this Phase OR can be set to show both the new items and the older items. The Phase Filter called “Show Previous + New” will cause the Existing, Phase I, and Phase II items to display. It cannot, however, be used to only show Phase I and Phase II items and it will also not include any temporary items from the previous phase. 

So, Before You Start the Takeoff...
If you’re using someone else’s RVT to generate a takeoff, bear these tips in mind:

1. Start by reviewing the Phase settings which can be found on the Manage tab under Phases. Review both the Phase and Phase Filter Settings to understand the lay of the land. 
2. In order to get a complete picture of the elements on a per phase basis, you may want to have a Schedule for each Phase and use only the “New” Phase Filter. 
3. Additionally, while not as prevalent, Design Options present the exact same set of issues with respect to quantity takeoffs. Revit Schedules may or may not reflect information about the set of data upon which you should be basing the takeoff. Design Option data creates duplicate elements. In some instances the Design Option data may actually be old and not relevant to the bid. 
4. The best course of action is to review the Design Options directly with the architect or engineer prior to starting the takeoff.
5. Lastly, Ideate BIMLink can provide peace of mind to the quantity takeoff process by including the relevant phased and design option-based information in-line with the element data. In this short Quantity Takeoff and Phasing video you’ll see how Ideate BIMLink can represent all element instances. You can then use Excel to decide which elements should be part of your takeoff.

Learn more about Ideate BIMLink at www.ideatebimlink.com.

Want more information on Phasing or Design Options? Ideate offers custom online training during convenient lunchtime hours on these and other construction-related topics. Review the online Revit training topics then contact Ideate's Training Department for more information.

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Glynnis Patterson is a registered architect and the Director of Software Development at Ideate, Inc. In a previous life Glynnis spent many hours looking at blueprints with a scale, highlighters, and a scratch pad to develop detailed cost estimates.

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One of These Things is Not Like the Other!

Recently,  I received a Support call regarding Ideate BIMLink.

The customer was distraught because he exported all his data using Ideate BIMLink and when he tried to import back to Revit 2012, he was presented with this error:

Unable to Import Excel Spreadsheet. Excel Columns Do Not Match Link Properties

I racked my brain for a moment, made a few calls and we all agreed that it could have been one of two options.

1. After exporting from Revit, The columns have either been reordered, or deleted in Excel.

--OR--

2. After exporting from Revit, The Ideate BIMLink link definition has changed.

In talking with the customer, I narrowed it down and found out that he had reorganized the Excel workbook to use in a presentation (Option #1). This was the root of the issue. But how do you fix it? Or better yet… how do you avoid it!? Let’s first understand what actually happens here.

Ideate BIMLink relies on the fact that when the link is exported, the columns will stay exactly the same as its initial state. You may replace the values of the columns but the order and organization of the columns and rows really need to stay put! This way when you import the data… Ideate BIMLink knows where it needs to go.

Great, so how do you avoid this? Let’s say that you are like our customer and need to create a presentation from your Ideate BIMLink data.

Here’s how: Excel Links.

Using a feature that has been in Microsoft Excel for some time now, you can reference data from an entirely different workbook. A visual example:

Image Credit: Microsoft

You can see here that the Data from “source.xls” is being pushed to “linking.xls” using the  excel links function. In cell “C5” the formula is “=[source.xls]Prices!A4” This references the worbook, worksheet and cell and pastes its value into our new cell.

To read more about Excel links, check out this page from Microsoft’s website.

Using this functionality allows us to leave the raw data from Ideate BIMLink alone (allowing us to import/export at will) and create a new presentation workbook that stay up-to-date to leverage our data. A very easy and valuable way to handle this situation.

Thanks for reading!

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Matthew Nelson
MEP Solutions Application Specialist
Matthew has a deep understanding of Autodesk products. He studied Mechanical Engineering at SUNY Stony Brook. He has been a BIM manager and CAD manager for a leading international consulting services firm utilizing AutoCAD MEP, Civil 3D and Revit MEP. During that time, he focused his skills on understanding the dynamics of inter-discipline coordination on large scale civil and building engineering projects. At Ideate, Matthew provides training and support for Revit MEP, Navisworks and AutoCAD MEP. @MNelsonIdeate

Get it. Know it. Use it.

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