Share and learn how-to tips, workflows, and general knowledge articles about Informed Design and the future of the Industrialized Construction industry.
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Looking for some quick tips on how to be successful with Autodesk Informed Design for Inventor?
Read on to learn more...
Tip #1: Stay up to date with the latest release and updates of Inventor
- Informed Design currently supports Inventor 2024 and later. Earlier versions of Inventor are not supported.
- We strongly recommend keeping current with the latest Inventor hotfixes and any dot releases, as they may involve changes and improvements that future versions of the Informed Design add-in may leverage.
Tip #2: Inventor Project Structure
- All files related to the Inventor Project to be published using Informed Design must exist under a single root folder with no external dependencies such as links out to common Library files, Content Center components, or Vault folders. Any sub-folder structure under the root folder in the Inventor Project is permitted.
- Only include the files (i.e. parts, assemblies, drawings, etc) in the root folder that are essential for the Inventor model to work as a template for creating the various configurations it supports. Informed Design works by using Inventor running in the cloud, where it can open your Inventor Model (the one you publish) and reconfigure it as you can on the desktop. Files not required to reconfigure the model on the desktop are also not required in the cloud.
Note: The root folder size of the assembly selected cannot be greater than 500MB. - Include a single dedicated Inventor Project File (.ipj) in the root folder
- The Base Inventor Model (the Product to be published) can be an Inventor Part or Assembly file.
Tip #3: Pack & Go is Not Supported
- Inventor/iLogic Projects often involve files (i.e alternate parts and/or sub-assemblies). The Pack & Go utility is unable to detect these files due to the lack of direct references to the base model; therefore, they will not be included in the zip file result. Informed Design will do the job of zipping all files included in the Inventor Project root folder at Publish time.
Tip #4: Input Parameters
- In Inventor, create User Parameters for all Parameters to be adopted into the Informed Design Product Definition, including those intended as Input Parameters and those also required for any math and/or logic needed to calculate configuration-related parameters.
- User Parameters must be defined in the Base Model (i.e. root assembly or part) to be published, as these are the parameters that drive the main configuration Inputs.
- Use an iLogic rule to push these parameter values down into the sub-assemblies and parts to reconfigure the model.
- As a best practice, corresponding Parameters in the sub-assemblies and parts should be given the same names as the Parameters in the Base Model for clarity and ease of use when defining the rules.
- You should also consider using Parameter names that are as close as possible to the Input names you want to expose to the Revit User when they are using your Product and interacting with those Parameters as options for configurations. The final Input label text that appears on your Product Form can be set using Codeblocks.
- Define initial Multi-Value lists for Input parameters in Inventor so that you can take advantage of the codeblocks that will be automatically created for these upon adoption into a Product Definition. Refinements to the values list for each parameter can be made with the resulting codeblocks.
- Set the "Key" flag for all Input Parameters in the Inventor Parameters dialog. This will make it easy to identify and filter for these Parameters during the adoption step in the Product Definition.
Tip #5: Base Model Orientation & Insertion Point
- Use the UCS and Insertion Point commands found in the BIM Definition Ribbon (the BIM Definition Add-in gets installed automatically along with the Informed Design Add-In for Inventor) to specify the desired orientation and insertion point for use when placing Product Variant Instances in Revit. If you don't specify the UCS and or Insertion point using the BIM Definition commands the default orientation and insertion point can be established as follows:
- Create or constrain your Base Model (an Inventor part or assembly) in the desired orientation for default placement in Revit taking into consideration that the default X,Y,Z orientation (i.e. which way is up) in Inventor and Revit are not the same.
- Create or constrain your Base Model in a position such that absolute 0,0,0 in Inventor is where you want the default insertion point for the Revit Family to be.
Read more: Informed Design: Understanding Insertion Point, UCS, and Placement Plane commands.
Tip #6: Adaptive Components
- As a best practice, it is recommended to avoid the use of Adaptive components in your Inventor models because of the potential for broken links that will cause problems when publishing a model or during variant generation.
Tip #7: Inventor Add-Ins Restrictions
- Inventor Add-Ins other than iLogic are not supported on Autodesk Platform Services (APS) Inventor Automation API. This service is used by Informed Design to generate configurations of your Product when requested by a Revit user. Therefore, you must build the model to be published with core Inventor functionality & techniques without the use of specialized Add-ins such as Tube & Pipe, Cable & Harness, Frame Generator, Content Center, Design Accelerators, etc.
- The exception to this rule is that static content (i.e. content that does not change when the model is reconfigured to generate a variant) generated from these add-ins can be included in your model if such content retains no dependencies on the presence of these specialized add-ins that cannot be resolved on DA4i.
Tip #8: Inventor Design Doctor
- Make sure there are no Design Doctor issues left unresolved in your Inventor Model before attempting to publish it to Informed Design.
