Monday, February 10, 2014

View Worksets

View worksets are created by Revit whenever a view is created. We don't need to do anything. When we add annotation to views they are assigned to the view workset. Using the library metaphor they are like shelves for annotation books (dimensions, detail lines and detail components, text, tags and symbols). Building elements like walls, doors and windows are associated with User Created Worksets and we do manage them. We don't manage View Worksets.

We don't have to deliberately borrow a view workset as a separate task either, it just occurs as we do things within an active view or to a view's properties. If we change a view's property, like Detail Level for example, we become a borrower of the view workset. If we move a tag in a view we borrow the annotation from the view workset. Revit evaluates our actions and responds with the necessary element borrowing.

It is reasonable to say that we can ignore View Worksets (also Families and Project Standards Worksets), as seen in the Worksets dialog. It is also technically true that we can make any of them editable deliberately, for example by using the workset dialog, but it isn't necessary because Revit lets us transparently borrow view properties and elements as we interact with them in our project.

It IS important to make sure we relinquish View Worksets (true for all worksets too) when we use Synchronize with central.

2 comments:

Eduardo M. said...

Thanks for this Steve. After searching everywhere even Autodesk help, no one seems to care about this topic!!! I'm about to start my first workshared project and have been researching a lot but I'm being extremely cautious because I know how you can easily get trapped dead end in Revit. I am most interested in getting DRAFTERS to complete my views and sheets. Can you suggest websites or info on that?
From Eddy Kriegel I read that one shouldn't work or alter the central file. Does that mean NEVER again? If so, on which file do I manage all the views, sheet schedule, etc?
Greetings

Steve said...

You can review my Worksets/Worksharing post summary, a link is on the sidebar of the blog.

Consider picking up a couple Revit books, anything by Paul Aubin, Daniel Stine and/or published by Wiley should help set your course.

Don't forget Autodesk's own help documentation.