CAD import within family -> how to delete associated import categories?

[Ning_Zhou]

if import is within families then deleting family instances won't automatically remove associated import categories, the question is how do you know these associated import categories if family instances already being deleted?

[jeremytammik]

Dear Ning,

Happy New Year to you and thank you for your query.

I am not aware of any official way to retrieve these specific elements.

What class do they have? What properties? How can you identify them?

This looks to me like one of those typical questions requiring you to dig through the Revit database elements and their properties in detail.

The kind of stuff you can explore using RevitLookup, or, if you need to evaluate methods as well as properties, may require more flexible API interaction, e.g. in the Revit Ruby or Python shell:

http://thebuildingcoder.typepad.com/blog/2013/11/intimate-revit-database-exploration-with-the-python...

Certain element relationships can currently only be determined using unofficial and completely unsupported element id relationships, that are certain to change in the future:

http://thebuildingcoder.typepad.com/blog/2011/11/undocumented-elementid-relationships.html

Finally, please take a look at this interesting discussion:

http://thebuildingcoder.typepad.com/blog/2014/09/debugging-and-maintaining-the-image-relationship.ht...

Maybe that solves the issue for you as well?

I hope this helps.

Best regards,

Jeremy

[Ning_Zhou]

thanks Jeremy and Happy New Year too!

i assume the only solution is to
1) either properly name these layers before importing into Revit family, then it can be removed based on these names in Revit project file
2) or purge Revit file throughly, then these imported stuff will eventually be removed

attached for your info.

Cheers,

Ning

[jeremytammik · Accepted solution]

Dear Ning,

Yes, indeed, that sounds like the way to go to me.

Cheers,

Jeremy