New Feature in Revit 8

[Jit]

So guys what are the new features in Revit 8 ?

[A3D]

Lol, messages about Revit 8 are coming every other 5 minutes.
Tomorrow morning I'll check the forums the very first thing...
This time I hope to see some info about new features :)

[beegee]

Too many to mention in one go, but my personal favorites are :-

Edit loaded families. Select a family in a project, open it for editing and reload the revised family back into the project, on the fly.
Export to 3D DWF. An absolute killer this one. Send your clintsa dwf for them to play with in 3D. They can make walls, roofs etc transparent or hide them, view elevations, perspectives. Fantastic !
Schedule and tag nested families.
Text Width factor ( a small one, but a good one ) You can expand or condense text. Text imported from or exported to dwg retains its width factor.
Interference Checking. Detects overlappinggeometry between elements of selected categoroes. ( Huge )
Continuous Footings. Automatically applied below walls.Graphic Control of Lines in Walls, Roofs and Floors.
Disallow Join Allow Join Right Click.
360° Bearing for Property Lines ( Invaluable for those parts of the world that use this method )
Enough ? There's tons more, but I'll leave some for other posters.

[Scott D Davis]

Scheduling across nested families!

[A3D]

Image support is it there?
I mean images in the model as part of families or just stand alone (trees and stuff like this for elevations)

Do the structural members join properly now?

[beegee]

Concrete beams will jon to create wall, beams, columns or foundations with cleaned intersections.


>>Do the structural members join properly now?

[A3D]

Hurray!

As a Revit newbie, the fact that the structural elements didn't join scared the hell out of me... it almost made me reconsider starting with Revit instead of other BIM solutions.

You know, in the beginning you start with basic things... and if one of those basic things doesn't work... Pheeew, damn good news

Thanks beegee

[beegee]

Before you get too excited, note that I said " concrete", I didn't say steel or timber.

I know the joining of all structural elements is under active review by the developers, but I can't say if these other element types will join cleanly in the 8.0 release.

[A3D]

Ya, I've noticed that, but as most of the Spanish building structures are made of concrete, I still consider it big news ;)

[Joef]

Not only can you edit loaded families but you can load a family you are editing. There is a button for "Load into Project". click on it and it loads into your choice of open projects. Very nice.

[Jit]

Did we get a new Annotation leader arrow ?

[Mr Spot]

Did we get a new Annotation leader arrow ?
Not that i noticed...

[Mr Spot]

Not only can you edit loaded families but you can load a family you are editing. There is a button for "Load into Project". click on it and it loads into your choice of open projects. Very nice.
Also projects will remember where the original loaded family was loaded from. Click a family in a project, and click reload...!

[Chad Smith]

Woohoo, our official 8.0 product CD's have just arrived. 8.0 is awesome. :Puffy:

[Alex Page]

arghhh...no better site tools!

[Scott Hopkins]

Woohoo, our official 8.0 product CD's have just arrived. 8.0 is awesome.
Hey, Wait a minute! I am only a few hundred miles away from Autodesk and you blokes down under get your new Revit CD's before me? How is that possible? :neutral:

[trombe]

yo,
mine arrived this morning at 7:30 am, April 26.
trombe

[funkman]

Woohoo, our official 8.0 product CD's have just arrived. 8.0 is awesome. :Puffy:
yep....just got mine too!!!

[Wes Macaulay]

Right click on a wall end and you can disallow the wall join. That's going to save me a lot of time.

[MartyC]

Got mine!!!

Ha, all you naughty people that complained about the release date, and the downloads and.....Autodesk, have been made to wait an extra day. Like being sent to the 'naughty room'.

Autodesk employed the SuperNanny for the product release obviously!!:)

CheersM

[Chad Smith]

Sweet, the CD comes with a SDK (Software Development Kit).

Time to dig out the ol VB6 Pro and see what we can do. Haven't done any API programming since I used AutoCAD. 8-)

[Dimitri Harvalias]

And you're excited about this Chad? :???:
Enjoy. :smile:

[Marek Brandstatter]

Time to dig out the ol VB6 Pro
Except you gonna need VB.NET

[Jit]

got mine, loaded and registered

[Chad Smith]

Except you gonna need VB.NET
I haven't played around with it yet, but according to the 'Getting Started.doc':

Supported Programming Technologies
COM
The Autodesk Revit API can be accessed fully by any COM compliant language such as Microsoft Visual Basic or Microsoft Visual C++. COM based application should make a reference to Autodesk Revit 8.0 API or RevitAPI.tlb contained in the Revit Program directory. The Microsoft Common Language Runtime may also need to be referenced depending on the properties, methods and interfaces that you use. To add a reference to this component browse for MSCORLIB.TLB. This is usually located within a sub folder of the directory WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET.
.NET
The Autodesk Revit API can be accessed fully by any language compatible with the Microsoft .NET Framework, such Visual Basic .NET or Visual C# etc. .NET based application should make a reference to RevitAPI.dll contained in the Revit Program directory.

[Jit]

No Image support!!!!!!

(Moderator note: Please explain????)

[Scott D Davis]

The PDF writer has been officially replaced by the DWF writer.

Thinking to self: Will the old Hyperxpress PDF writer still work with Revit 8.0?

[nrenfro]

Has anyone recived their mailed copy? I noted that on the download page their is a PDF of a 642 page user manual. Dose this ship with the disk? I always got a kick out of the little pampthlet that had been included. Really I wonder it a fulll blown user guide is nessary

[Thomas Cummings]

The PDF writer has been officially replaced by the DWF writer.

Thinking to self: Will the old Hyperxpress PDF writer still work with Revit 8.0?
Scott,

After installing Revit 8 I am still able to print to "Revit PDF Writer 4.2"

Which is a relief to me since I am a Design/Build firm working with homeowners who all have Adobe Reader but I would be reluctant to ask them to download DWF Viewer. At the least it is an imposition, at the worst I would be their new IT guy (unpaid).

[Scott D Davis]

Thomas, good to know! Let's hope it continues to work, as it will be unsupported.

Did you install Revit 8.0 concurrently with Revit 7.0? I'm hoping that when Revit 7.0 uninstalls, it does not remove the PDF writer 4.2. It was a separate install, so it will probably remain.

[rhys]

Scott,

After installing Revit 8 I am still able to print to "Revit PDF Writer 4.2"

Which is a relief to me since I am a Design/Build firm working with homeowners who all have Adobe Reader but I would be reluctant to ask them to download DWF Viewer. At the least it is an imposition, at the worst I would be their new IT guy (unpaid).

I'm pleased to hear this, the pity is that Autodesk are not, it seems, supporting the new 3d PDF writers, understandably as they a pushing DWF. This looks good and works well. BUT Microstation are making much of this decision and hyping the Adobe 3D PDF functionality in their product. My clients like PDF's and if Autodesk don't support them my "Microstation competitors" may look good to clients who have PDF's as a standard and can't be bothered or are unable to install Autodesk proprietary technology.

[Thomas Cummings]

Yes Scott, I had the installer remove Revit 6.1, but not 7.

[A3D]

No Image support!!!!!!

(Moderator note: Please explain????)

In an earlier post I was asking if Revit 8 allows you to insert an image and display it without rendering in elevations, sections, etc.
The images I'm talking about would be used for entourage purposes (i.e trees or people) or logos.
Further more it would be interesting to know if Revit supports alpha channel images (say a tree on a black background would display only the opaque part of the image - the tree itself - leaving the black background transparent).

Another use would be textured models in real time without rendering. While patterns can help understand a design better, a model covered in textures would be even more realistic.
(also this would help a lot when mapping materials).

I think Jit was referring partially to some of the things mentioned above.

[J. Grouchy]

Looks like nobody caught this one...
They've improved the measure tool to allow for a chain, for picking or drawing...and the distance now shows up in the toolbar above!!!

(See attached image)

[Dimitri Harvalias]

This is why some of geeks actually read the release notes :)

[hand471037]

In an earlier post I was asking if Revit 8 allows you to insert an image and display it without rendering in elevations, sections, etc.
The images I'm talking about would be used for entourage purposes (i.e trees or people) or logos.
Further more it would be interesting to know if Revit supports alpha channel images (say a tree on a black background would display only the opaque part of the image - the tree itself - leaving the black background transparent).

You can do this now with RPC's and can make your own RPC's for free (as long as they are 2D only).


Another use would be textured models in real time without rendering. While patterns can help understand a design better, a model covered in textures would be even more realistic.
(also this would help a lot when mapping materials).

Now this would be cool! It would make Revit more like Sketchup/Max/Maya/Blender in that you could see a simple representation of a material bitmap or whatever 'realtime'.

[ilya.bass]

The PDF writer has been officially replaced by the DWF writer.

Thinking to self: Will the old Hyperxpress PDF writer still work with Revit 8.0?

all existing PDF writers will work (Pinebush, Adobe, CutePDF), more or less like any other printer drivers.

[ilya.bass]

In an earlier post I was asking if Revit 8 allows you to insert an image and display it without rendering in elevations, sections, etc.
The images I'm talking about would be used for entourage purposes (i.e trees or people) or logos.
Further more it would be interesting to know if Revit supports alpha channel images (say a tree on a black background would display only the opaque part of the image - the tree itself - leaving the black background transparent).

Another use would be textured models in real time without rendering. While patterns can help understand a design better, a model covered in textures would be even more realistic.
(also this would help a lot when mapping materials).

I think Jit was referring partially to some of the things mentioned above.

well you could put these things in as decals of background in AccuRender environment. I take it that not everyone has patience to use it?

[J. Grouchy]

This is why some of geeks actually read the release notes :)

Alas...I had only read the "What's New..." pdf...
:screwy:

[Architeria]

Seeing as I'm a newbie with a trial version, I was particularly eager to learn about one particular feature: that of cost. When I began looking into Revit several weeks ago I scoured the AD web site and found no mention of a purchase price for Revit 7 but there was a nice article on subscription explaining how beneficial it was to the consumer because they didn't actually have to buy the product, only pay to use it. So I do find a subscription price list and see that Revit is $695 and I'm thinking yeah, I can afford that, that's a deal. So then I dutifully call my Authorized AutoDesk Reseller and talk to a salesman who quotes me a price of $3398 for the software plus the $695 subscription and I start thinking hmmmm, this is getting into some serious cash.

So today I go back looking on the AD site and find a price quote for Revit Building 8 at $4695. Does this really mean the basic software package went from $3398 to $4695 or have they decided to roll the mandatory subscription fee into the mandatory purchase price? As impressive as the product is, I don't think that's going to swell the ranks of the Revit User's community.

My thanks for any insights anyone might provide.

[Paul Monsef]

So today I go back looking on the AD site and find a price quote for Revit Building 8 at $4695. Does this really mean the basic software package went from $3398 to $4695 or have they decided to roll the mandatory subscription fee into the mandatory purchase price? As impressive as the product is, I don't think that's going to swell the ranks of the Revit User's community.

My thanks for any insights anyone might provide.
$3398!!! I think they quoted you the AutoC*D price! I'd say Revit would fall around the $4.5k mark, even ADT has a sticker price over $4k.

And, as far as i know, first year subscription fee is mandatory > after that it's optional.

[Lashers]

Philip,
If you use AutoCAD already, why not try to get a cross grade? I works out cheaper . . .

[Architeria]

Thanks Folks. I was a little suspect of the salesman's understanding of the product but I was hoping he had the subscription idea wrong. But as he said, "that'd be too easy." Indeed.

I really wasn't suprised at his numbers because I knew that ArchiCAD was $4k so this put Revit at $4100 including a years worth of upgrades; seemed reasonable. I'm afraid this new price info puts an entirely different light on my choices.

Incidentally, I don't use AutoCAD. I did use Generic CADD many years ago on my dual floppy Tandy but have been doing other parts of the business (real estate, development) for the last ten years and did very well with a consumer product, FloorPlan Plus 3D for my limited needs. Not exactly parametric but it was 3D! Only recently has it looked like I could benefit from having a tool like Revit so I've been doing the tutorials with my new trial version and hanging out here as well to get a sense of the community. I must say I'm impressed by the level of professionalism and the willingness of the experienced to share their knowledge. As good as the product may be, I get the sense that it will be this community that it will decide its ultimate success.

Regards

[Gadget Man]

Boy,

You've got it cheap across this Big Lake (or my reseller ripped me off dry...)! :shock:

[Wes Macaulay]

Resellers get a base price from Autodesk which they markup and sell. The markup is pretty similar from dealer to dealer, but the amount the dealer knows varies greatly!

Autodesk's site might only be quoting the MSRP if you will -- I don't really know.

Given the small price difference between AutoCAD and Revit, it's hard to justify AutoCAD now. Revit can pay for itself in less than a year, and may help you win jobs you might not have gotten otherwise. It's bloody expensive to be sure, but cheaper than buying a pickup truck full of tools should you want to try your hand at carpentry instead.

If there's just one of you, then you have to look at whether you've got the jobs and cash flow to justify it. One-man bands get the most value of Revit. I suspect sole proprietors can do twice as much work in Revit as can be done in AutoCAD or other 2D CAD apps.

If you're a firm of more than one user, I tell people to buy seats one or two at a time. It's too costly, and it's pointless to buy a LOT of software if no one's going to use it. Get a seat, get someone using it, get someone else using it, buy another seat, etc.

[Damo]

I did use Generic CADD many years ago on my dual floppy Tandy ......Now that takes me back. Think it was 1993 when I first used Generic CADD with a large A3 digitiser tablet, although my earliest memory of using CAD was a McDonnell Douglas system called GDS, in a large dark room, no windows, dual monochrome monitors (1987).

Anyway, I digress.

[PeterJ]

They shipped you over from small-town Ireland and locked you in a darkened room? I thought that practice ended long before 1987.

[Damo]

They shipped you over from small-town Ireland and locked you in a darkened room? I thought that practice ended long before 1987.You mean it wasn’t compulsory?

[Joef]

I still have the disks and manuals for Generic Cadd sitting on my bookshelf. When Autodesk bought it they gave a free upgrade to AutoCAD LT, but unfortunately the LT they gave us was not upgradable.