Revit Spark

[MikeJarosz]

Anyone tried the Revit Spark program? It looks like Autodesk is considering a "Revit Lite"



http://labs.autodesk.com/utilities/spark/overview/

[cdatechguy]

Played with it a little....actually played more with the wind tunnel....

Oh, and I hear they don't want it called Revit LT...

[Steve_Stafford]

You're thinking of Vasari, no wind tunnel in Spark.

Spark is Revit without a number of "advanced" features like: Worksharing, rendering, View filters, Groups, In-place families, massing, analysis, trusses, shared coordinates, point clouds, sunpath, API, Parts/Assemblies, Design Options, Adaptive Components.

That makes it a bit "lighter" than full Revit

[cdatechguy]

Oh.....

Yeah, thats right.... I did download Spark and tried it out though too...

[ajayholland]

I downloaded and installed it on our ancient home computer. It has all the functionality of Revit 6.0! With the ribbon.

For current Revit users it is pretty useless. Spark files are not interchangeable with Revit files. There is no worksharing. I'd say right not Spark's biggest attraction is that it is free. A good way for new users to become familiar with the program when the 30-day trial runs out.

~AJH

[BrenDillon-IHA]

If it's significantly cheaper I can see it being tempting for sole practitioners. Seems like a viable option for doing residential work in particular.

[cdatechguy]

I downloaded and installed it on our ancient home computer. It has all the functionality of Revit 6.0! With the ribbon.

For current Revit users it is pretty useless. Spark files are not interchangeable with Revit files. There is no worksharing. I'd say right not Spark's biggest attraction is that it is free. A good way for new users to become familiar with the program when the 30-day trial runs out.

~AJH

It doesn't work with current files is because its a newer version than 2012...

[MikeJarosz]

I have heard that if you install it on the same machine with full-strength Revit, Windows will reassign Spark to open real .rvt files, which it can't do. Then you're in trouble.

[Steve_Stafford]

Yes, did that on my computer. It's Revit.exe so file associations are adjusted for the latest version. I never double click on Revit files so I don't get tripped up by the issue, which happens with all the versions of Revit, whichever is installed last is associated.

[ajayholland]

It doesn't work with current files is because its a newer version than 2012...

That's not what I meant at all. All versions of Revit will open and automatically upgrade files created in earlier versions. The same automatic upgrade applies to Spark.

Revit files cannot be opened in Spark. They can be linked. When linked, objects in the linked model cannot be copied to the clipboard as they can in Revit.

This strategy is obviously by design, and the intent is not to allow Spark to be used with Revit in some kind of dual-platform methodology. That's OK with me. It's their software. I like the idea of Spark and an easy (and free) introduction to Revit and BIM.