Who dun it?!

[damon.sidel]

Is there a way to look at which user created something (and that something has already been deleted)? I came in this morning to find somebody had accidentally copied a bunch of levels up 1000mm. I deleted them. I synced. Now my manager is asking who did it so that we can educate them to try to avoid the problem.

[antman]

A quick round table meeting, or group email should do the trick.

[DaveP]

There's nothing in the model itself that tracks ownership.
You could, however, go digging around in people's Journal files to see if you could find something about Levels.
Not for the faint of heat, though.

[damon.sidel]

A quick round table meeting, or group email should do the trick.
It was done accidentally, so even if everybody is honest, I don't even think they'd know it was them!


There's nothing in the model itself that tracks ownership.
You could, however, go digging around in people's Journal files to see if you could find something about Levels.
Not for the faint of heat, though.
I found the journal files. How do you use them? They are .rvt files, but I assume you don't just open them in Revit, do you?

[MikeJarosz]

Instead of fixing blame, why not get the whole team together and demonstrate what happened and how to avoid a recurrence? Because there is one central file, a mistake like this propagates into everyone's work, so everyone must understand the consequences of saving to the central file. The guilty party can hide among the rest of the team and learn their lesson without embarrassment.

I once had a project in Acad where someone switched from architectural to scientific units and it went out to the printer that way. When it was discovered, everyone was rounded up into the conference room and interrogated. No one admitted it. Nothing was accomplished and morale was destroyed.

[CADastrophe]

Instead of fixing blame, why not get the whole team together and demonstrate what happened and how to avoid a recurrence?


It was done accidentally, so even if everybody is honest, I don't even think they'd know it was them!

We, like all Revit users using Worksharing, have had similar borderline catastrophic errors. Even though I actually knew who was responsible for a couple of them, it would be more effective to address the team as a whole. And as you mentioned, they were commonly not even aware that they were responsible. Because of that I also stress how easily it is to unknowingly cause such a problem. Singling out someone, even with positive intentions, is not very effective UNLESS that specific user is constantly causing issues and/or refuses to follow preventative procedures.

[damon.sidel]

Instead of fixing blame, why not get the whole team together and demonstrate what happened and how to avoid a recurrence?

I don't want to blame anybody, either, but we can't show how to avoid a recurrence because we don't know how the mistake was accomplished. I only want to figure out who was doing it so we can discuss what they were doing to cause it. I simply don't know and can't find out until I walk through the things they were doing and how.



And as you mentioned, they were commonly not even aware that they were responsible.

Exactly... I don't know how the mistake happened. Once we figure it out, we'll discuss how to avoid it in the future. How does one select a bunch of levels and copy them without knowing about it?! I think the only way to figure it out is to walk through the operations/tasks the person did and try to recreate the issue.

Thanks for all your suggestions. If somebody knows how to work with journal files, I'd greatly appreciate a little guidance.

[CADastrophe]

I found the journal files. How do you use them? They are .rvt files, but I assume you don't just open them in Revit, do you?

I believe that you need to look for the .txt files in that folder, not the .rvt files. Search them for "level", I guess. Good luck!

[jcoe]

To answer the initial question, there is a way to see who created what in the model and who was the last to save changes to an object to central. You need to turn on your worksharing display and select "Owners" from the list. Hover your mouse over the object and the information you are looking for will be displayed. Granted this does nothing for you after the object has been deleted, but if you suspect something is happening in the model, this is one way to track it.

However, that being said, I would agree with others on this topic. The last thing you want to do is point fingers, even if you know that its true. If the behavior persists, then its time to get PM's and other management involved.

[damon.sidel]

To answer the initial question, there is a way to see who created what in the model and who was the last to save changes to an object to central. You need to turn on your worksharing display and select "Owners" from the list. Hover your mouse over the object and the information you are looking for will be displayed. Granted this does nothing for you after the object has been deleted, but if you suspect something is happening in the model, this is one way to track it.

Thank you, this is very helpful information. Now in the future I can catch the offender red-handed and give them a public flogging...

[DaveP]

I believe that you need to look for the .txt files in that folder, not the .rvt files. Search them for "level", I guess. Good luck!
That is correct. The Journal files are named Journal####.txt. The largest number is the most recent.
One Journal file covers one Revit session from the time they open Revit until they close the application. This might cover opening more than one Project, so the first ting to look for is the project name.
Not sure why you have .rvt files in your Journal folder. You are looking at:
C:\Users\(username)\AppData\Local\Autodesk\Revit\Autodesk Revit Architecture (version)\Journals aren't you?
There are .rfa files in there (but that's a different post) but you're interested in the Journal*.txt files.
Once you are in a Journal file, there's a LOT of stuff in there you have to slog through to get at what you need. As Corey said, you can search for "Level" to start with.
Most of what's recorded in a Journal is system-level stuff like painting the View (ProjToPage).
What you want to focus on are the lines that start with
Jrn.Command
That's the stuff the users either pick from the Ribbon or type in Keyboard Shortcuts.
The rest of the Jrn.Command line is kind of cryptic, but you can usually figure out what's hasppening
A few examples:

Jrn.Command "Internal" , "Open an existing project , ID_REVIT_FILE_OPEN"
Jrn.Data "File Name" _
, "IDOK", "H:\Revit\BWBR Families\Manufacturer Content\WonDoor\Door-Accordion-Won-Door-FireGuard_20_60_90_180.rfa" (the file name will be a few lines below the FILE_OPEN command)
Jrn.Command "Internal" , "Create a room , ID_OBJECTS_ROOM"
Jrn.Command "Internal" , "Create a wall , ID_OBJECTS_WALL"
Jrn.Command "Internal" , "Close all windows that are hidden , ID_WINDOW_CLOSE_HIDDEN"

The main problem is that this is EVERYTHING a person has done, quite possibly for hours, so if you have a rough idea of when this problem happened, you can search for the time
There are lines like this all over:
'H 20-Sep-2012 09:18:27.307; 0:<

Good luck and, as Corey alluded to above, remember that Revit is all about the communication, whether that happens though the model or just talking about it.

[MikeJarosz]

I haven't looked into journal files for a long, long time. However, when we launched the World Trade Center, we had Factory people helping us, and they opened the journal all the time. There was a certain element of fun involved. The programmers would write wisecracks and jokes into the journal like "Hey Marty - I thought you fixed that!" This was before Autodesk. They may have since put an end to the fun.

The Marty was Marty Rozmanith. He knew the actual code and how it was supposed to work. I remember one late night when the project had almost outgrown the single-file concept and Marty and I decided to to implement the brand new concept of linked files. We broke the tower off from the bathtub and linked it back in. It worked. From then on, I realized that Revit could handle large projects, a proposition that was very much in doubt in the early days of Revit. [The basements of the WTC are below sea level and are watertight. They became known as "the bathtub"]

[DaveP]

Ah, the good old days!

[damon.sidel]

Thank you, Dave! Excellent description. I just opened one of my journal files and was able to walk through it and find a few commands that I remember doing. I am now armed with knowledge... we'll just have to wait to see if I choose to use it for good or for evil. MWA-HA-HA-Ha-ha-haaa!

[dfriesen]

Granted this does nothing for you after the object has been deleted, but if you suspect something is happening in the model, this is one way to track it.

Yeah, I like that feature.

To find when an object was deleted, you need to go through the backups (Collaborate / Restore Backup), and check when the object was last there. Just be sure to use the SaveAs option, not Rollback, unless you really do want to go back to that version.

[CAtDiva]

To answer the initial question, there is a way to see who created what in the model and who was the last to save changes to an object to central. You need to turn on your worksharing display and select "Owners" from the list. Hover your mouse over the object and the information you are looking for will be displayed. Granted this does nothing for you after the object has been deleted, but if you suspect something is happening in the model, this is one way to track it.

I recently heard this trick in a webinar and shared it with an appreciative co-worker. Very helpful!

[david_peterson]

I believe CTC has an add-on that will just exactly what you're looking for. It track who creates what, modifies what, or changes anything. Or at least I know they were working on it. I'm not sure if they've made it available, but that's where I'd be looking. It's like the worksharing monitor on steroids.