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6 Ways I’ve Got Your Back in Worksharing – How to Keep Your Job Using Revit

by Carol Dunn

The point of worksharing is to improve the quality of a project’s design and construction. If it doesn’t feel like that sometimes, following are a few Applied Software expert recommendations for enhancing your worksharing productivity.

Ownership:

Revit will ask you if you want to save objects you work on, then it gives you the option to relinquish ownership or not. You should relinquish ownership of all elements you work on when you’re ready to close your project drawings. The relinquish option was intended for “at risk” work, which means offsite and not secure. If that’s the case, there are other solutions for protecting your work. If you don’t relinquish, you’re just asking for trouble, so always relinquish.

Backups:

The default number of backups is 20. Many people set their default number to 2 or 3 backups. If you do that, realize that you are limiting your ability to restore a backup if it’s ever needed. Sometimes users have to go back 5 or 6 versions until they find an appropriate backup to restore. Which is more expensive, your data storage space or your data? Data, by far. If you’re limiting the number of backups because you’re short on storage space, get more storage.

Ownership of Objects:

Try to avoid “Checking Out” objects. If you do, and then set it to editable, you will have just checked out that entire workset, and no one else can work on anything in it unless you give permission. It’s better to “borrow” the object you want to work on. Revit will then loan it out to you as a borrower. If you synchronize the drawing, it will still be available for other people to work on in turn. Be a borrower more often than you check out. Only check out a workset if you really need to own it and lock everyone else out of that entire workset.

Moving a Central File:

Do not move a Central File using Windows Explorer. If you do, the Central File becomes lost, and your local files will no longer be able to connect with it. To move a Central File, open it directly from the new location, then detach the workset from Central using “Detach and Preserve Workset.” Use “Save as” to give it a new name at the new location. By this method, users must create a new local file, something you should do anyway. Revit will reestablish the connection for you.

Routine Maintenance:

To prevent file corruption, at least weekly, do a routine maintenance. Everyone needs to be out of the project drawing(s). Open Central File with AUDIT turned on. You can “Purge” at this time if you want to do a little clean up. Then “Save as” and compact the file when you give it a new name. Choose the “Make new Central File after Save” and “Compact” options. If you have not been doing this regularly, you might see the file size drop by as much as half after going through this process.

Create new Local Files regularly (at least daily). If you’re concerned about doing this, just select “Append Timestamp to Existing Filename” so you’ve got it covered. This is huge for keeping your files smaller and more manageable.

Publish regularly:

This is the way you get your backups, not just the way you share. If you don’t have any published versions, you have nothing to restore when you need to access a backup. In Revit, specify the views you want to publish, make them viewable in BIM 360, synchronize with the Central File, then go to Cloud Models and publish your file.

When you have your team members’ backs, your efforts will reward you by making you all more productive and more impressive to the people who matter.  With each enhancement, your value on the project will increase, whether it’s with your team manager, the contractors or the project owner.

For more Keep Your Job Using Revit blog posts see:

• How Watching Cat Videos Can Actually Help You Keep Your Job Using Revit,”
• “A Good Pasta Meal Can Help You Keep Your Job Using Revit”
• “How to Keep Your Job Using Revit – Less is More.”

If you’re not a Revit power user yet, get some Revit power. Contact the experts at Applied Software for Revit training or Revit optimization services.