Back in the AutoCAD
days typically a CAD Manager would manage all the AutoCAD templates &
blocks. Everything was available to all the design staff to use but they were
not freely allowed to edit templates or blocks. This became a "check & balance" that made sense because it's
much easier to manage a standard if there is not a "free for all" on
it. If there was a "free for all" then drawing sets would not be
consistent and things would run less efficient. This is why a CAD Manager
typically has had things like templates and blocks locked down thus the term
"CAD Nazi" became widely known.
With the switch from
AutoCAD to Revit I have noticed that standards can get very messy very quick in
Revit. There are several ways this happens. A few ways I have seen this happen
is copying from other projects, transferring project standards or the model was
never setup properly to begin with so designers just made things up on their
own. For example often times a designer doesn't even know that they copied in
several viewport types, text types and line types from a few different projects
when they copied a few details.
Let's take a step
back and make sure we are clear on the different types of standard items in a
Revit model that can impact consistency between several disciplines:
System Families -
Callout Types, Dimension Styles, Text Styles, Elevation Types, Grid Types,
Level Types, Section Types, Viewport Types (View Titles)
Component Families
(Symbol & Tag) - Title Block, Callout Head, Section Head, Section Tail,
Level Heads, Grid Heads, North Arrow, Graphic Scale, View Title, Revision Tag,
View Reference, Room Tag, Space Tag, Keynote Tag
*Discipline Specific
Tags (Door, Window, Duct, Beam, Panel, etc.)
Project Settings -
Line Weights, Object Styles, Project Units, Phase Settings
Most people might
not know that most of these items can be made editable in the Worksets Manager.
For example if the Callout Types were made editable by someone with the
username "BIM Manager" when a designer goes to try to edit a callout
type it will give a permissions message saying "You do not have
permissions to edit this element BIM Manager has ownership of the Callout Types
and will need to relinquish". Below I will go through how I have been
using the Username and Worksets so users cannot edit these standard elements.
This forces them to ask the BIM Manager to update a title block, symbol or
project setting rather than working in a silo or going their own way.
Step One:
Change your
username. Go to the Big R and Options. Change your username. I have been using
something obvious so they know they need to contact me before editing the item.
BIM Manager, BIM Coordinator,….BIM Nazi if you like to live dangerously. DO NOT FORGET TO CHANGE YOUR USERNAME BACK AFTER
SYNCING AND CLOSING THE MODEL!
Step Two:
Open up each model
and go to worksets. I select the following and make these editable:
Project Standards:
Families:
Callout Heads
Elevation Marks
Generic Annotation
(Graphic Scales, North Arrows, etc.)
Grid Heads
Level Heads
Revision Cloud Tags
Section Marks
Title Blocks
View Titles
Views:
Any views used to
coordinate the model that you do not want designers to edit
Step Three:
After I make the
worksets above editable I also go into the model and "borrow" the
levels and project basepoint. If a level gets moved or deleted it can cause
major problems. Same with the base point.
Syncing and Closing Model:
When you sync the
model uncheck all the boxes circled in the image below. This will sync but it
will not relinquish all these elements you took ownership. When you close the
model be sure to "Keep Ownership of Elements". If you relinquish you will have to open the
model and check everything out again. After repeating this 10-20 times you will
get these memorized and it will only take about 2-3 minutes to go through this
process in each model. This could save valuable time fixing problems after they
happen.
DO NOT FORGET TO CHANGE YOUR USERNAME BACK AFTER
SYNCING AND CLOSING THE LAST MODEL ON THE PROEJCT!
