Saving revit 2009 files to 2008?

[gthornton]

Hello,

I was wondering if there is any way one can save a revit 2009 version to an older format(revit 2008 )? or opening a 2009 file with revit 2008?

Please can anybody help?

Thanks

[bcgatti]

Saving backwards is not possible with Revit.

[Andre Carvalho]

If you don't mind losing information, you could try generating an IFC model from the 2009 version and try to import it back in Revit 2008...

Andre Carvalho

[DFik.200426]

Let me understand this ... I am working in Revit 2009 while a consultant is in 2008 and there is nothing supplied by Autodesk to allow converting back? Yet another reason why Revit will not succeed.

[Andre Carvalho]

Let me understand this ... I am working in Revit 2009 while a consultant is in 2008 and there is nothing supplied by Autodesk to allow converting back? Yet another reason why Revit will not succeed.

No, there's nothing supplied by Autodesk.
Yes, IMHO, Revit will succeed anyways.

Andre Carvalho

[dhurtubise]

No, there's nothing supplied by Autodesk.
Yes, IMHO, Revit will succeed anyways.

Andre Carvalho

I think Revit has already succeeded :-)

[BIMTom]

Let me understand this ... I am working in Revit 2009 while a consultant is in 2008 and there is nothing supplied by Autodesk to allow converting back? Yet another reason why Revit will not succeed.

Most database programs are like that. If you upgrade to a new version, the old version can never open it again no matter what you do.

[zanzibarbob7]

I always have the latest version of Revit and I also have the latest version of Microsoft office, which has Word. I often have to save a file to an older version of Word so it can be read on the other end. There is an option for doing that. I'm not sure if that means in Revit, "the latest updated version," or just that cycle year. It would be good to do, but I understand Autodesk may be trying to avert the use of pirated copies or keep subscribers up to date. I would still like the option.

[sfaust]

I don't think it has anything to do with piracy, I think it has to do with spending the extra development resources to figure out how to write a very complex database system back to an earlier version.

word is not really a fair comparison. Word files are simple text with some formatting, and they are used by a very broad range of the business world, which means they are likely to be passed around and worked on by several different people or offices. Revit on the other hand is a very specialized and very complex database file generally only worked on by one project team.

I would rather they spend the time devoloping new features than backward compatibility. Just my $.02

[RobertB]

[Word] is not really a fair comparison. Word files are simple text with some formatting...I have to agree with you and disagree with zanzibarbob7. There are features in Word 2007 that will not convert or be saved when saving a new format down to the old format. In a Word document, the losses are fairly easy to determine. Imagine trying to determine what went missing when saving to an older version of Revit. <shudder>

[Steve_Stafford]

The only thing preventing a consultant that is currently using 2008 from collaborating with "you" is their subscription status. They can work with you using 2009 even if all their other projects are in 2008 as long as their subscription is in force. Technically all they'd need is a single seat of 2009 (for each user) even if they didn't have a valid subscription for their remaining seats. A Revit firm that abandon's subscription is truly setting themselves up to NOT collaborate... Autodesk definitely has us coming and going on this point.

A "team" of firms using Revit really MUST agree WHEN to upgrade to another version. One part of the team arbitrarily deciding to do so will unfairly burden the others with the timing of an upgrade. It is not necessarily a hard thing to do, normally, but it is very likely to be inconvenient depending how soon the next deadline is.

As said in an earlier reply, not providing backward compatibility has been and continues to be truly motivated by a greater urgency for moving forward than working out the complexity of supporting firms that don't "want" to upgrade. Anyone trying to truly collaborate with all disciplines right now will agree there is MUCH that needs to be done for every discipline to allow greater and tighter integration of our data.