topic Re: Cad Link Layer Visibility when Linking All Layers - Why Does Revit Do this??? in Revit Architecture Forum

Cad Link Layer Visibility when Linking All Layers - Why Does Revit Do this???

BigBeam — Fri, 16 Feb 2024 19:04:24 GMT

When linking a cad link, there are 2 options for layers: All and Visible. I would like to use All but Revit "assumes" that when you select All, layer visibility is turned on for all layers without honouring the actual layer visibility in the CAD file (ie. on/off and frozen/thawed).

This is a very dangerous assumption because we don't always want to turn all layers on when linking All (we often see consultants keeping remnants of old designs on frozen layers so its not part of the current work). If we select visible then we lose access to information on frozen layers which doesn't help either.

When linking All layers, Revit really should honour the layer visibility in the source CAD file.

Re: Cad Link Layer Visibility when Linking All Layers - Why Does Revit Do this???

SteveKStafford — Fri, 16 Feb 2024 20:18:59 GMT

That is not consistent with my testing using All during linking.

There is a quirk with DWG linking that have Xrefs that layers will appear that shouldn't be visible. I wrote a blog post about that.

Re: Cad Link Layer Visibility when Linking All Layers - Why Does Revit Do this???

BigBeam — Fri, 16 Feb 2024 21:24:32 GMT

Yes, my issue is with layers in xref's. As you state in your article, the issue is transient which is why I have been pulling my hair out trying to figure this out. My cad link is massive, it takes a couple of minutes to load so testing takes along time for me.

Re: Cad Link Layer Visibility when Linking All Layers - Why Does Revit Do this???

SteveKStafford — Fri, 16 Feb 2024 21:33:45 GMT

The "solution" is to make sure each XREF is assigned to a unique layer that you can turn off in Revit. If that single layer is turned off then Revit will not show any of the Xref layers. Our Civil and Landscape teams assign all of their XREFS to either C-XREF or L-XREF and our teams know to make sure that layer is turned off when they linked files from either discipline.

I don't know what broke in the overlay/attachment logic but it has been broken for many years.

I forgot that I wrote a follow up post, sigh.