March

5

2024

Ideate Software - Deleting Hidden DWGsDWGs and other CAD imports and links can hide in Revit projects and impact file size, performance, and printed output. 

With Ideate Explorer, it’s easy to find and delete these imports. Simply follow these steps:

  1. Start Ideate Explorer
     
  2. Change the filter to <Ideate Audit>
     
  3. Expand the list underneath CAD Imports or CAD Links
     
  4. Check the box by an individual CAD Import or CAD Link and right-click to select “Show Elements.” Ideate Explorer will attempt to find a view where the CAD file is visible
     
  5. Select the CAD file to be deleted and use Ideate Delete to remove it from the project

Note: <View-Specific> is an indication that the CAD Import or CAD Link was brought in while the "Current View Only" checkbox was selected, which causes Revit to treat the element as an annotative, or view-specific, element and not a model element. 

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February

29

2024

With a history of developing Revit addins that goes back to 2009, Ideate Software has a proven record of addressing real issues experienced by real Revit users. In addition to working tirelessly to ensure our products work as promised, we work hard to ensure they are easy to access, install, learn, and use. One way we do help interested parties find and try them is by making them all available at the Autodesk App Store.  

Ideate Software on the Autodesk App Store

Ideate Software on the Autodesk App StoreAutodesk App Store is an online marketplace provided by Autodesk where users of its products can, among other things, find and download third-party addins. As an Autodesk Authorized Developer, we make all our products available on the site, including our five Autodesk Revit addins, presented as a trial bundle. We also make available our desktop solution for automating Revit tasks, Ideate Automation, as well as our Cloud Connector to the Autodesk BIM360/ACC environment. You can access the Ideate Automation trial on the Autodesk App store page.

Keeping with our promise to make it easy for people to use our products, as we have expanded our presence around the world, we have also increased the number of languages in which we deliver our information. That includes the way in which we present our information on the Autodesk App Store. As of today, on the App Store, you can find information about Ideate Software products in English, German, Spanish, French, Chinese (simplified), Japanese, and Korean

To check out our products on the App store, we recommend that you go to the Ideate Software Bundle – Trial page. From there, you will get:

  1. Brief descriptions of all our Autodesk Revit addins. (Note: This page does not include information about Ideate Automation, which is our scripting solutions that runs time-consuming Revit tasks in the background. Find information on Ideate Automation):
     
    • Ideate BIMLink – Use it to push volumes of information from a Revit file into Microsoft Excel for easy editing, and then pull the updated information back into Revit with speed, ease, and accuracy.
    • Ideate Explorer – Get lightning-fast data discovery and manipulation features through its easy and intuitive way to search, filter, quantify and select elements in a Revit model. 
    • Ideate Sticky – Elegantly link and easily update non-BIM data into a Revit project from Excel to Revit, Word to Revit, or PDF to Revit. 
    • Ideate StyleManager –Addresses the challenges of unorganized and duplicate Revit styles that can cause publishing errors, end-user confusion, and even performance issues.  
    • IdeateApps – Streamlines common Revit tasks through set of applications that increase the productivity and efficiency of the entire project team. The IdeateApps collection includes Ideate Renumber, Ideate QuickSelect, Ideate SmartDelete, Ideate XRay, Ideate SpellCheck, Ideate Annotate, Ideate SheetManager, Ideate Clone, Ideate Align, and Ideate ViewCreator.
       
  2. A Description of the Trials
    • No cost
    • 30 days 
    • Includes access to each of the five products. Ideate BIMLink, Ideate Explorer, IdeateApps, Ideate StyleManager, and Ideate Sticky 
    • All are full functioning, except:
      • Ideate BIMLink has a 25-row limit to the data export
      • Ideate StyleManager is limited to testing these three styles: Line Patterns, Materials, and Material Appearance Asset styles
         
  3. Access to the Getting Started Guides for each of the five products included in the bundle. Click the link to “Read Help Document” to get to these guides.
     
  4. Links to Videos

    As of the date of the publishing of this document, we had links to these videos on the site:
     
  5. Customer 5-Star Reviews

    Ideate Software Five Star Reviews on Autodesk App StoreTitles include:
     
    • “Autodesk, Take Note”
    • “Can’t Revit Without It”
    • “Productivity Tools that Deliver on the Promise”
    • “Essential for Every Revit User”

Stay Connected

Want to learn more about our top Revit plugins? Visit our website

You can also check us out and follow us on X/Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram.

If you have any questions, reach out to us. We are here to help you understand and use our Revit plugin solutions

Browse our website to learn more about how Ideate Software tools help Revit users save time, increase model accuracy, improve deliverables, and elevate design. You can give them a try by downloading trial versions or purchasing the bundle for access to our addins for Revit, which includes Ideate BIMLink, Ideate Explorer, Ideate Sticky, Ideate StyleManager, and IdeateApps for six months. You can also get a free trial of Ideate Automation to experience how it can help you automate BIM tasks. 

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February

15

2024

Recently a customer asked if we provide a tool that can report on whether schedules and legends are placed/not placed on sheets. In case you’ve wondered that too, here’s our response: 

Yes! 

It can easily be done with one of the built in Ideate Explorer filters.  

Finding Unused Schedules and Legends with Ideate ExplorerInstructions

Simply go to the Filter menu and choose “Views Unused,” which uses a property we created called Sheet Count that applies to schedules, legends, and any other unused views. We excluded dependent views because those that are unused may still be important. 

With that one click, you will have the information you need. 

Read the Help file for more information.

We made this process extremely easy in the latest release of Ideate Explorer with Ideate Filters.

However, we’ve had this functionality for quite some time with Ideate Query, which is part of Ideate Explorer.

Want to know if you can perform a specific function with Ideate Software tools? Contact our Support team. We are here to help. 

 

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January

15

2024

Customers often comment on how easy we make it for them to download, learn, and use our software. This blog post makes looking up the answers to common workflow questions even easier!

Throughout 2023, we tracked the number of visits to each of our Help file pages. Below are the top Help pages sorted by product. You can bookmark this page, or simply search for “Most Viewed Help Files” for quick access to the content.

For added convenience, we included links to other popular pages at the bottom.

Top Help Files in 2023

IDEATE AUTOMATION

IDEATE EXPLORER

IDEATE BIMLINK

IDEATE STICKY

IDEATEAPPS

IDEATE STYLEMANAGER

Other Frequently Viewed Pages

Have a question about a different workflow? Chances are the answer is on our website. You can also contact our Support team

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December

29

2023

Architects, designers, engineers, and others around the world use Autodesk Revit software to design amazing structures. Explore sample Revit projects on the Autodesk Website to see some working models. Samples on the website include:

This sample file showcases many commonly used Revit features, including:

  1. Architectural, Structural, and MEP models with detail typical in early construction documents
  2. A site model incorporating Civil design completed in Autodesk Civil 3D software
  3. Landscape Architectural design
  4. Commercial kitchen design
  5. The most standard Architecture, Structure, and MEP toolsets
  6. A point cloud file that was the basis for the façades model
  7. Phasing in the façades model that differentiates the existing to remain and demolition of the building elements from the point cloud
  8. Custom fill patterns in the façades model that represent historical bricks in the existing buildings
  9. New Construction phase that includes all work in the architectural, structural, and MEP models
  10. Level 1 set-up that involves three view ranges and the Plan Regions
  11. Three egress stairs and two elevators
  12. Groups used for repeating items
  13. Design options
  14. Customized floor shapes
  15. Solar panels that incorporate custom tapered wall types and a sloped curtain wall type
  16. Incorporated toposolids
  17. Additional views to showcase Revit software’s documentation features
  18. Custom view types and view templates to ensure graphical setting consistency
  19. All view types: Plans, Ceiling plans, Sections, Elevations, Callouts, Details, 3D Views, and a Walkthrough
  20. Area Plans 
  21. Many “Working” views
  22. A Variety of Schedules
  23. A complete set of sheets

Now that you are inspired, want to learn how you can spend more of your time on the exciting design activities possible with Revit and less time on tedious tasks or dealing with poorly performing models? 

Work Faster in Revit by Adding Ideate Software Applications to your Toolset

speedometerAs demonstrated in the Autodesk sample files, Revit has extensive capabilities that can help professionals in the architecture, engineering, construction, and owner-operator (AECO) industries design, build, and operate structures that address complex needs. The software also requires a great deal of manual, repetitive tasks and, when left unchecked, can lead to bloated files that don’t work well. That’s where Ideate Software comes in. 

Ideate Software is an Autodesk® Authorized Developer and a member of the Autodesk Developer Network. Our Revit addins help companies in the areas of building design, engineering, construction, and facilities management get the most out of their Revit. 

Ideate BIMLink, Ideate Explorer, Ideate Sticky, Ideate StyleManager, and IdeateApps are our Autodesk Revit addins that solve persistent problems in AECO workflows.

Ideate Automation is the newest tool in our suite. It is a scripting solution that easily automates repetitive Revit and Ideate Software tasks to deliver consistent and repeatable results. 

Here are some highlights of how these applications will help you reduce the time you spend on model management, so you can discover more ways to use Revit.

Ideate Explorer – Do you spend too much time searching for elements in your Revit model? You are not alone. It’s a common challenge, because Revit comes with a project browser, not a model browser. Ideate Explorer is a model browser that makes it fast and easy to find and delete incorrect, obsolete, and hidden problem items—including imported or linked DWG drawings. You can also find, refine, and revise elements that aren’t in the Revit project browser. The following four features included with Ideate Explorer will reduce the time you spend searching even more: 

  • Ideate Query – Search in parameters for elements like unused annotations, design options, in-place usage, structure usage/area scheme, and revisions
  • Ideate Filters - Filter model elements quickly based on your specified parametric conditions
  • Ideate Warnings Manager – Audit warnings ranked by importance; fix problems with Revit tools while the Ideate Warnings Manager dialog box is open
  • Ideate Navigate – Navigate view-based elements; find unused sheets and views; find and filter legends, schedules, sheets, or views by category and/or keyword; customize work environments without changing the project browser 

Ideate BIMLink – Do changes that require model updates make you cringe because you know you’ll need to spend hours changing elements one at a time? Use Ideate BIMLink instead. With this powerful Revit addin, you can export data from your Revit model into an Excel file, where you can easily view and manipulate large amounts of data. After updating the data, you simply use Ideate BIMLink to import the data back into Revit, and the model will automatically update. 

Ideate Sticky – Is it difficult to communicate critical project details with team members in various locations? Do miscommunications create errors or delays? These are not problems with Ideate Sticky. Use it to live-link Excel, Word, and PDF documents into a Revit model. These “stickies” look nice, are easy to read, and can be updated easily when changes are made to the original source documents.

Ideate StyleManager – Do unused styles clog up your Revit models, cause them to perform poorly, and create documentation errors? That’s because it’s easy to accidentally bring unneeded styles into a model when pasting needed information. With Ideate StyleManager, you can easily analyze, merge, or delete non-standard Revit styles, and you can see the view filters applied to views and clean object and line styles and patterns, text, fonts, parameters, and more. 

IdeateApps – So many Revit tasks are repetitive. They take a lot of time, are boring to do, and open the door to errors. The 10 tools that come in the IdeateApps collection tackle the repetitive tasks performed by Revit users most often:  Ideate SpellCheck, Ideate Align, Ideate Clone, Ideate ViewCreator, Ideate SheetManager, Ideate Annotate, Ideate XRay, Ideate ReNumber, Ideate SmartDelete, and Ideate QuickSelect

Ideate Automation – You and your staff will have more time for interesting, meaningful work when Ideate Automation runs time-intensive BIM tasks silently in the background. You can start a script manually or schedule it to run at a convenient time, like during non-working hours or when you are occupied in a meeting or on a call. Here’s a new video we created with a short, technical overview of Ideate Automation:

 
 

Stay Connected

Connect with Ideate SoftwareLearn more about our top Revit plugins.

Check us out on X/Twitter, LinkedIn, FacebookYouTube, and Instagram.

If you have any questions, reach out to us. We are here to help you understand and use our Revit plugin solutions

Browse our website to learn more about how Ideate Software helps Revit users save time, increase model accuracy, improve deliverables and elevate design. You can give them a try by downloading trial versions or purchasing the bundle for access to our addins for Revit, which includes Ideate BIMLink, Ideate Explorer, Ideate Sticky, Ideate StyleManager, and IdeateApps for six months.

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