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  • Getting Started Guide

    • Getting Started Guide for Ideate Annotate

    Ideate Annotate   Ideate Annotate can be found on the Ideate Software tab on the IdeateApps ribbon. This tool is designed for anyone who is responsible for construction documentation.
    There are three primary workflows in Ideate Annotate, each have it’s own dedicated Getting Started exercise below: Browse, Review and Tag. 

    Browse  ▲   ▼

    Use the Browse tab to view annotation elements on a per project, per view, or per sheet basis to ensure documentation meets the project standards for the deliverable. 

    This tab displays 2D annotation elements (text, tags, generic annotations, dimensions, spot elevations, stair paths, detail components/items, filled regions, etc) depending on the filters selected.

    In this exercise we will use the Revit sample file named rme_advanced_sample_project.rvt.

    find tags by numbers with Ideate Annotate

    1. Open Level 1 HVAC Plan View.
    2. Start Ideate Annotate and activate the Browse Tab.
    3. On the Display drop-down make sure that Active View is set.
    4. We want to find a mechanical equipment element that is tagged as “1-6” in order to make an edit. In the Search Bar type “1-6”. The selection pane is filtered showing the mechanical tag.
    5. Double click once on Mechanical Equipment Tags to expand the element tree.
    6. Double-click again on the last item in the tree called Boxed Instance go to the element within the view.
    7. Select the checkbox next to Boxed Instance to select the tag. 
    8. From the Revit properties palette, change the Orientation of the tag to Vertical.
    9. Annotate can stay open while you do other Revit work. To change the tag value of the mechanical equipment
      • Touch on the Revit screen once — this will deselect the tag.
      • Touch on the mechanical equipment element to activate the Properties Palette.
      • From the Properties Palette, find the Mark value and change it to “1-7”

    Review  ▲   ▼ 

    The Review tab within Annotate is designed to ensure the legibility of tags, text, dimensions and other annotative elements found on published sheets. Within Review you can find and fix common annotation problems such as clashes between tags, text, etc.

    1. Continuing in the same Revit file, activate the Review Tab in Annotate.
    2. From the Revit Project Browser, open E201 – Unnamed Sheet
    3. Within Ideate Annotate, change the Display drop-down to Placed Views and Sheets.
      • This will display the partial analysis results for any annotative element that exists on a view that has been placed, or on any sheet.
      • The partial analysis state is ignoring any Annotation Clash or Other Not Visible issues, which take more time to analyze and display.
    4. Double-click on (1) Elevation Marks with No Elevations, then double-click on Elevation 5. This opens up Level 2- Lighting Plan.
    5. With the Elevation 5 highlighted, select the red x from the toolbar area to delete this unused elevation mark.
    6. Next, move the Full Analysis toggle to right. When the dialog appears, click on “Yes, begin”. This will reveal any Annotation Clash or Other Not Visible issues for annotative elements that are on sheets or placed views.
    7. Select Other Not Visible to expand the list, then select Floor Plan: North Level 1 Lighting Plan, then select Wire Tags.
    8. Double click on the first M_Wire Tag.
      • A Show Cropped Element dialog box appears, choose Yes to uncheck the view’s annotation crop.
      • Zoom out to see the annotations that are not within scope box.
    9. Within the same view, expand the Lighting Fixture Tag list and double-click on the first tag. Notice that the zoom does not work as expected. This is because the tag is not visible for a reason other than the annotation crop value.
      • With the tag still selected, pick the XRay button from the toolbar area, then pick Find Element.
      • The XRay results report the reason the tag is not visible is that the lighting fixture associated with the tag is also not visible.
      • Pick Fix again to learn why the lighting fixtures are not visible.
      • The XRay results report that the reason the lighting fixtures are not visible is the view crop.
      • Pick Fix again to un-crop the view to see all (88) lighting fixture tags and all (4) wire tags that were previously not visible.
    10. These tags are not necessary given the original view and annotation crop settings. Deleting these tags will prevent them from unexpectedly displaying later if the view crop changes. Select the Revit undo command to revert the view and crop settings...

    ... then use Annotate to select and delete these elements.

    Tag  ▲

    Use the Tag function in Annotate to automatically place and update tags based on logical rules.

    In this exercise we will use a different Revit sample file named rac_advanced_sample_project.rvt.

    1. Open 01 - Entry Level - Furniture Layout View.
      • We will use a built-in rule to automatically tag all rooms that are larger that 10 square meters.
      • Since this is a Furniture Plan, we don’t expect that the smaller Rooms will have any moveable furnishings in them so not tagging the small rooms is ideal.
    2. Start Ideate Annotate and activate the Tag Tab.
      • The Rules pane displays four rules that can be applied this view to automatically tag Revit elements.
      • In order for an element to be taggable it must meet both of these conditions:
        • The Revit Category is visible in the view.
        • There is a Revit Tag loaded for the Revit Category in question.
      • The Revit Categories that meet these conditions here are Doors, Rooms, Walls, and Windows.
    3. Select Room-Ignore_Small from the list of Rules.
      • Notice how most, but not all, of the Rooms in the view are selected in the Revit drawing area as per the name of this rule (...Ignore_Small).
    4. Select Add Tags  to continue.

       
    5. Expand the Overrides section at the bottom of Annotate to display the default settings for this rule.
      • Observe the setting for the Tag Type: and Position:
      • Pay attention to the location of the Room Tag for Vest. 101
      • With the room preselected, you can see how the tag is placed on the centroid or Reference of the Room which does not correspond with the center of the room

         
    6. With the Room Tags still in your active selection, and the Overrides section still expanded.
      • Change the three settings as shown below and click Add Tags to instantly see the update.

         
      • Notice the tags now contain the Room Area and the position has shifted to be the center of the room and the Area of the Rooms are now being reported as well.
    7. If you want to modify the rule in your project to always work this way, you can easily do that in the Settings as shown below.

    Learn more about Custom Tag Rules

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