Can Keynotes be tied to CSI

[crarchitect]

Hello Revit users,

No, I am not talking about that hit TV show Crime Scene Investigations (although it would be cool to see some crime scene reconstructions done with Revit.) I am referring to the Construction Specifications Institute. Many architectural firms have been including the CSI number in the keynotes. This allows a quick reference to the specifications, and is especially helpful in providing a back check for your keynote's correctness and clarity.

Right now we have started using a separate CSI field in the keynote, with the appropriate field in the sheet's keynote legend. However, it seems like we might be strong arming a solution that could be more elegant. Has anyone been using the CSI numbers?

Thanks in advance,

[noah]

I too would like to know how others are doing this. I just started playing with keynotes and my first reaction was to add a csi field. I'm also interested in knowing how others handle code related notes - do people tie these to keynotes or just generic notes. Anyone willing to post an example or two?

Thanks!

[PeterJ]

I'm editing a large spreadsheet at present which has a range of notes associated with their CiSfb references. I use the reference and some form of tag to make up the type name and then I can use it for other fields if I need to. The advantage of using Excel to do the editing is that I can edit more easily than in the family editor and then dump it out to a type catalog so that in theory I can have a standard type catalog that covers steel frame, timber frame,load bearing masonry etc, all tied to their CiSfb codes and then just pull in the things I need.

You could very easily substitute the CSI codes for the CiSfb ones or a more basic uniformat arrangement. When it's complete I'll post for people to take a look at.

[hand471037]

Note block Schedules, Type Libraries, and Keynote Families are really great when used together. I'll post a how-to when I get a sec...

[SkiSouth]

See if the tutorial on keynotes (http://forums.augi.com/showthread.php?p=88760#post88760)I posted helps.

[SCShell]

Hey there,
Here in Tucson, one of our user group genius guys did exactly that. It looks like exactly what you are looking for.
Jake, if you're out there, please post your method of doing this.
If he doesn't, I will try to duplicate his method for you.
Steve

[crarchitect]

WOW, what a great response from the Revit community. Thanks a bunch for the link to the your tutorial, Skisouth. I have just done a quick read, and I am quite interested in better understanding the details of the type catalog.

As mentioned, we are currently using a more basic KEYNOTE symbol, which includes an Esheet Type Parameter identifying each sheet that gets that note. The Esheet parameter is the one we sort our individual sheet keynote schedules by.

This is an extra step putting the Esheet reference into each note AFTER it gets placed on a sheet. Is there a way to have the notes automatically know the sheet they are on?

Am I asking for Artifical Intelligence here? Will that be part of the 9.0 release? ha.

Thanks again everyone, I hope to incorporate these methods and share our experiences.

[hand471037]

This is an extra step putting the Esheet reference into each note AFTER it gets placed on a sheet. Is there a way to have the notes automatically know the sheet they are on?

No, unfortunately you have to tell the note which sheet it lives on if you want sheet-specific Keynotes. Or at least as for as I know from when I tried that with Revit 6.1. Just setup a shared parameter within the Annotation Family called 'sheet number' and then you can set up filtered Note Blocks for the per-sheet notes. Not completely automatic, but still a step better than doing it manually.

Pulling the keynotes from a type library is a great thing, however, for you know that everyone in the office is pulling the numbers and notes from the same list. Type libraries are pretty easy to make. It's simply a list within a .txt file, where the first line is a special format to tell Revit which parameters of the family your specifiing, and the following lines are the actual parameters, with each line corrisponding to one type within the family. Name it the same as the Family and put it in the same location and Revit will find it and pull it up automaically. It's how the Steel Details and Structural Elements work, so you can look at those if you want an more complex example. Type Catalogs can drive anything, and I think this is really a untapped area of Family Generation.

We don't do per-sheet notes, we do project-wide, so the combo of the note-block & Keynote family & type library works pretty well for us.

[archjake]

Okay Steve, Here it goes.

I've attached a quick keynote tutorial file. It gives the basics behind keynotes.

I've also attached a keynote family that uses a type catalog that draws on CSI numbers. It is a work in progress and would need more specific numbers to beak down the categories for it to be of a real use. The benefit of the type catalog is that not all CSI numbers would have to be in the project but would be easily accessible.

Our office breaks down the numbers like the Cad Standards suggests. ex.: 09000.A.01
Hope you all get the idea.

[SCShell]

Nice job Jake!
Steve