Dealing with file paths

[MiWolff]

Yes, I do realize that I should have asked this yesterday (last Monday of the month event), but here goes:

How are users to deal with paths of decals and families that are kept inside templates? Paths of image files point to the templates' authors local drives. This does not seem to be a problem unless you host a project on B360/ACC. I have occasionally run into missing file paths on opening the project file.

The second thing that is regularly contained within templates are the file paths to the included families origins in the authors' respective environments. These only appear when you first try to edit one of the families and save it before writing it back to the project afterwards. If you happen to be in the same environment as the original author you are offered with the original path to where you may or may not have writing rights.

Should users set up B360/ACC projects that have all their families and images uploaded to the project environment? Followed by a reload from cloud path for every family? Will these paths be updated when all .rfa files exist within the same path as the newly created project?

Can somebody from AD confirm that this is not a problem?

[ToanDN]

I think you need to install Desktop Connector and provide the path from it.

[Lance.Coffey]

It sounds like we are looking at three different items:

• Decals

Decals can be placed from imported or linked images. So one option would be to import rather than link.

Revit 2023 introduced support for cloud/server based Material Textures, and Decals.

• Material (appearance) textures

As mentioned above, support for server/cloud based material textures was added in the 2023 version. For guidance on prior versions see the following article: Sharing material appearances with other Revit users (some of this into could also apply to decals)

Material Appearances have the added benefit of the Additional Render Appearance Path feature. Where you can specify another location to look for missing appearances (see link above).

• Families path

As the family is loaded (and not linked) this is more of a workflow issue (the family won't be missing, but you would need to know how to handle editing/saving the families). Info on this topic is available here: Family Reload... opens the wrong directory from where the family is saved in Revit

Additional Info: For a list of supported file types for using with Revit and the Desktop Connector, see the following help topic: About Autodesk Docs Connected Drive Integration with Revit

[MiWolff]

Thank you @Toan and @Lance.Coffey for looking into it, the two screenshots I enclose show the images manager in Revit 2022 which has an old file path saved. They come from the templates that accompany the Australian and the German dataset. The two .bmp images in the first contain no paths (set to relative) which is what I had expected.

The thing about the material image textures that sometimes go awol, does not currently concern me, although I would find it helpful if Autodesk products would only install a material catalogue just once and keep that updated. Even if that means an older version of a product installed might benefit from a more recent install. Right now every Revit version on my machine comes with its own medium and lo-res materials.
The answer to my request concerning the file paths somehow remaining inside families that are loaded into a project, I read as DO NOT BOTHER, REVTI NEVER TRIES TO RESOLVE THESE PATHS ON LOADING YOUR TEMPLATE.

Ah, and I do have the desktop connector in place and reasonably updated; it is just that sometimes it does not resolve the paths fast enough for Revit to find them all. Then on entering the linked files manager and a simple (manual) reload does the trick.