Hide entire category - unhide selected elements of that category

[HVAC-Novice]

I have an example of a ceiling view. In that I show what is one the ceiling, but also what is above. and what i want to do is, hide an entire category (for example all ducts/pipes), but only show a few of those elements if they are important for the specific trade. This is to make it less cluttered.

It seems Revit is good in showing all elements of a category, and hiding a select few. However, I want the opposite and struggle.

Just for an example i use "Lighting Fixtures" that are on the ceiling and "Pipes" that are above the ceiling. But it could be any category. 

I tried to hide the entire category (in VG of the view template). Then I selected "Reveal hidden elements" and the hidden pipes and lighting fixtures became visible. So far so good. I hoped, i could select the few elements of those categories and just set them to "unhide". But here is where my struggle starts:

- I can't select elements above the ceiling

- the Lighting fixtures i can select, but they don't have the option to unhide just that one element

Is there a better way to do that? 

What i don't want to do that is manually hide all elements I want to hide. If there are 100 elements of a category, i may want to hide 99 of them. 

One example why I would want to do that would be if I want to keep a Lighting plan clean (hide all pipes), but one pipe or duct might be relevant to the lighting installer (like supposed to install light under that duct)

Edit: And to be clear, I want to make those selected elements visible permanently for use in construction sets. not just temporarily 

[RDAOU]

@HVAC-Novice 

you posted an image Unhide by filter; instead leave the category visible and use a filter to Hide all what you do not need.

Example: add a comment “IFC relevant” or some other instance project parameter of your choice such as a Yes/No parameter named “Isolate” and set it to all MEP related categories.

• set a filter using either of the above with a condition “Not Equal to”
• add filter to the view 
• check the visibility box in the filter to make them invisible 

[HVAC-Novice]

i had thought of adding a yes/no parameter and use filters. But what stopped me from that was:

- I would have to at some point "select all" in a view and make them invisible, and then show the hidden (by filter) ones and change the checkmark for the few i want to show. Unlike the "hide" command, there isn't an "unhide" button. i guess I would have to disable the filter temporarily. 

- if i add more elements of the undesired category (I design multiple trades), i would have to "hide" the new elements again. for example, i i have HVAC and lighting. i would hide all pipes. but later in the process i add more HVAC pipes, and have to hide those new pipes again. 

- In multiple disciplines i may want to hide different categories. so, a single yes/no parameter wouldn't suffice. i could create multiple parameters for each discipline, but fear this is creating a Hydra. 

On a project, I often design lighting, electrical, plumbing, HVAC (also Fire Alarm and Sprinklers but I don't actually model those in detail to place pipes etc... so those don't matter here)

My hope with the regular "unselecting of category" was that during design I leave it all invisible. but I use the "Reveal Hidden Elements" to see if there is a conflict or something I want to show to that trade, and then just make that one element permanently visible. 

And this doesn't help me now, but i created an idea:

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/revit-ideas/permanently-unhide-selected-elements-from-a-hidden-catego...

[RDAOU]

You are somewhat overcomplicating it. What you are after should not need more than one filter to Hide everything in a category except a select few.

You stated in the OP that you do not wish to hide/unhide them by element one by one yet in your following reply, which a read more than twice, what you described sounds like you are hiding/unhiding elements randomly just to get them out of the way. Moreover, its not clear whether you have any particular rule or set of rules on which pipes should be hidden and which should remain visible. Which makes idea you are suggesting as manual as any tool in Revit can get.

[HVAC-Novice]

I want to "hide all except a selected view". and those selected few elements i want to pick from the view. 

and those selected few elements won't have a parameter or specific property. The decision of hide/unhide is based on if those elements would be important to a trade. 

For example, a lighting plan does not need to show ducts. Except, the few ducts that may be relevant to light fixtures. 

[RDAOU]

So you are selecting the elements to hide manually?

How about a dynamo graph that inverts selection and hides all except what you have selected. Same time logs the selection you made in a named saved selection so that you can reuse? Meaning

• first run you select what u do not want to hide of a specific category
• run graph in dynamo player
• it logs ur selection under saved selections
• inverts the selection and hides all
• Ising a toggle switch it reveals all what you have hidden

When you want to rehide it would use the saved selection so you won’t need to deselect one by one