We are pleased to share how Lemay, an award-winning architectural firm, uses Ideate Software tools.

Jean-Marc Demeo, Gestionnaire BIM Principal at Lemay said, “Our teams are motivated by design challenges. You can see, hear and feel the energy as they work together to explore options and create solutions.”

Lemay project: Bellechasse Transport Center

To help them stay focused on creative thinking, Lemay provides the best technology, including Autodesk Revit software and Ideate Software applications. 

“The Ideate Software portfolio is awesome. Our teams are really happy with the tools,” said Jean-Marc. “Ideate Explorer is a strong and stable tool we use every day and Ideate StyleManager has been a huge game changer for many people in our company.”

Here are some ways in which Lemay uses Ideate Software tools:

Ideate Explorer

• BIM Coordinators in charge of quality control use Ideate Explorer to get a quick view of a model and its current state
• Staff saves time by using Ideate Explorer to easily find specific items / families that they know are in a project 
• Everyday Revit users address model warnings fast and efficiently by using the Warnings Manager component of Ideate Explorer 

Ideate StyleManager

• BIM Coordinators love using Ideate StyleManager to understand the use of filters and to wipe unused ones
• Staff uses Ideate StyleManager to find duplicate linestyles, fill patterns and other styles, and to merge them

“Our goal is to develop software that solves persistent challenges with Revit software,” said Glynnis Patterson, Director of Software Development. “We’re always happy to hear from well-known and well-respected companies like Lemay who trust our products to help them achieve their goals.”

Read more about Ideate Software and Lemay. 

Every day, our Ideate Software Support team fields all types of questions from AECO professionals all around the world. We recently had a support question from a large UK engineering company that wanted to easily isolate unused Revit view templates, select multiple templates, and then delete them. Their existing process was to review each view template and try to see if it had been used within the project. We were pleased to tell them that Ideate StyleManager makes the process so much easier. 

Ideate StyleManager will automatically display the usage of the Revit project's view templates without requiring use of the Analyze button. A view template can be used by a view and by a view type. Simply SHIFT Select on all the unused view templates and delete them with one click. Note: ‘View Template” does not apply to family files, so Ideate StyleManager is disabled when editing .RFA files.

You will see clearly into your Revit projects with 20/20 vision and Ideate StyleManager.

Please review the following Help article for more information on using this tool to manage your templates.

 
Use Ideate StyleManager to find Revit information beyond Styles and Materials

Notice that all the view templates were used 21 times in this example. Someone should be playing Blackjack!

Visit our website for more information on our Revit productivity tools. Give them a try with a free trial version, or subscribe today. 

About the Author

Richard W. Taylor, Associate AIA – Technical Evangelist 
Richard has more than 30 years of experience working for companies that develop architectural and engineering software solutions, such as Intergraph, Bentley, and Autodesk. He has over 20 years of Revit experience, and he was part of the original development of Revit while at Revit Technology Corporation. He worked for 12 years at Autodesk, where he presented, taught, and worked to improve features in Revit. Richard holds both a Bachelor of Science in Architectural Studies and Master of Architecture from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. As Technical Evangelist, Richard works with AECO clients worldwide, developing and consulting on BIM solutions. Find Richard on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Looking to learn more about Ideate StyleManager? Would you like step-by-step instructions on how to use it to analyze, delete or merge non-standard Revit styles? You can find all that and more on the Ideate StyleManager playlist on our YouTube Channel or our website.

Visit our playlists anytime to access short videos, webinar recordings and a customer webinar.

Short Videos

1. Why Ideate StyleManager for Revit provides an overview of the software’s functionality
   
   
    
2. Introduction to StyleManager for Revit covers three examples:
   1. Assessing the risk of style deletions
   2. Batch-merging materials similar materials into approved standards
   3. Deleting CAD import styles
      
      
       

Webinar Recordings

1. Unwrap the Value of Ideate StyleManager provides a deeper dive into the software’s functionality and several demonstrations
   
    
2. Ideate StyleManager – Fundamental Training demonstrates how to assess the risk of Revit line style deletion, fix and standardize Revit materials and manage duplicate styles
   
    
3. Cleaning up Imported CAD Styles with Ideate StyleManager focuses on the styles that automatically import when you link to an AutoCAD file
    

Customer Webinar 

1. Hitting a High Note – Tuning your Revit Template with Ideate Software and Brian Mackey

Is there a process you’d like us to demonstrate in a video? Please let us know. We want you to have answers at your fingertips, so you can get back to using the software to streamline Revit workflows.

Watch the recording of this 30-minute webinar to learn how to keep your Revit models clean and organized by quickly and efficiently purging unwanted styles and other information using Ideate StyleManager.

Ideate StyleManager aggregates essential graphic style and visibility controls within a single solution and identifies the source of non-standard styles, so you can:

• Safely delete styles that can’t be deleted or purged in Revit software 
• Merge non-standard styles into standard styles 
• Forensically analyze the usage of all styles to understand the true scope of a deletion 
• Clean up Object Styles, Line Styles, Line Patterns, Fill Patterns, Materials, Material Appearance Assets, View Filters, Templates, and Scope Boxes 
• Understand which views are using which View Filters

In this webinar, I focus on the imports that can clog your Revit model when you import or link information from CAD files, like MicroStation, AutoCAD, or IFC.  My examples are from an AutoCAD file, because it’s the most common. 

Visit our website for more information on our Revit productivity tools. Give them a try with a free trial version, or subscribe today. 

About the Author

Richard W. Taylor, Associate AIA – Technical Evangelist 
Richard has more than 30 years of experience working for companies that develop architectural and engineering software solutions, such as Intergraph, Bentley, and Autodesk. He has over 18 years of Revit experience, and he was part of the original development of Revit while at Revit Technology Corporation. He worked for 12 years at Autodesk, where he presented, taught, and worked to improve features in Revit. Richard holds both a Bachelor of Science in Architectural Studies and Master of Architecture from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. As Technical Evangelist, Richard works with AECO clients worldwide, developing and consulting on BIM solutions. Find Richard on Twitter.

San Francisco, CA, 10/29/2019 – Ideate Software, a veteran Autodesk Developer Network member and provider of applications for Autodesk Revit software, is pleased to report the tremendous success of its newest Revit productivity solution, Ideate StyleManager.

“We started getting positive comments almost immediately after launching Ideate StyleManager this past June,” said Glynnis Patterson, Director of Software Development at Ideate Software. “Many customers had provided input as beta testers during its development, and they had high expectations. I congratulate the entire software development team for meeting and even exceeding those expectations.” 

Ideate StyleManager addresses problems that occur when styles associated with content load into a model along with the content, or when users create non-standard styles. Managing those unwanted styles in Revit can be time consuming and risky but ignoring them can cause publishing errors and end-user confusion. Ideate StyleManager fixes the problems by making it easy to:

• Delete styles that can’t be deleted in Revit software 
• Merge non-standard styles into standard styles 
• Analyze the usage of all styles to understand the true scope of a deletion 
• Clean up Object Styles, Line Styles, Line Patterns, Fill Patterns, Materials, Material Appearance Assets, View Filters, Templates and Scope Boxes 
• Understand which views are using which View Filters

One company using Ideate StyleManager is Mackenzie, a provider of professional design services in the Pacific Northwest. When talking about Ideate StyleManager, Rusty Gesner, an Associate Principal, Director of CAD/BIM at Mackenzie, said, “It’ll save you a lot of time by ensuring your efforts at cleanup and standards maintenance don't cause inadvertent side effects.”

He continued to say that you’ll appreciate Ideate StyleManager if you’ve ever been frustrated by:

• Searching and drilling down to determine if and where styles are used
• Making sure there won't be collateral damage if you modify a style
• Cleaning up the issues caused by importing and exploding a DWG
• Combining duplicate styles

“We appreciate Rusty and the entire Mackenzie firm,” said Glynnis. “Not only do they use and promote our solutions, they also participate in beta testing, helping us achieve our goal of developing software that solves persistent problems encountered by BIM professionals in architecture, engineering, construction, and building owner workflows.”

Read more about Mackenzie and Ideate Software.
 

About Ideate Software
Ideate Software empowers Revit users to gain unprecedented control over their data. Ideate BIMLink, Ideate Explorer, Ideate Sticky, IdeateApps, and Ideate StyleManager were all developed to solve persistent problems in architecture, engineering, construction, and owner (AECO) workflows. Ideate Software solutions enable Revit users to save time, increase accuracy, improve project deliverables, and elevate design.

Autodesk, the Autodesk logo, ATC, and Revit are registered trademarks or trademarks of Autodesk, Inc. and/or its subsidiaries and/or affiliates in the USA and/or other countries.

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