NOTICE: Autodesk Seek's transfer to BIMobject

[rudi.roux]

Hi All, 

For the regular Autodesk Seek users out there, take note that Autodesk Seek will be transferred to BIMobject. 

Read the Press Release HERE and visit BIMobject HERE 

"BIMobject AB (“BIMobject”) announces today that it has signed an agreement with Autodesk regarding transfer of the operations of the Autodesk® Seek business to BIMobject. As part of this arrangement, BIMobject will assume the operational responsibility of providing Autodesk® Seek customers with high quality building information modeling (BIM) content services on the BIMobject Cloud."

[davidtetro]

BimObject is HORRIBLE! Bring back SEEK...PLEASE!!! I have spent nearly 20 minutes trying to navigate through all the filters just to find something that would have taken me 0ne-tenth of the time in SEEK. Plus, all the 'generic' Revit content that was available in SEEK is not available in BimObject.  This is very disappointing...

[jlott2]

As you can see, I haven't posted here before. The closing of Seek has driven me to my first post. BIMobject is pretty much worthless. It's just a site for manufacturer's to advertise their products with their BIM content. Not being able to find generic families for Revit is a big problem. Looks like RevitCity will be my first stop for families from now on.

[Anonymous]

I want to know what will happen with:

Autodesk Revit Model Content Style Guide and
Autodesk Seek Metadata Style Guide,

do they still have them as main Standards?

[Anonymous]

I used the new Seek/BIMObject for the first time today. I had difficulty finding plumbing fixtures because BIMObject uses European terms like basins for sinks and WC (water closets) for toilets. North American users will have issues finding things that have different common names in Europe/Asia.

After awhile, I noticed some graphic icons across the top that act as shortcuts to search on different types of components. That would be more helpful if it was more noticeable. At first I guess I dismissed them as decoration on the webpage rather than helpful icons.

Otherwise I like BIMObject. They have way more content than Seek had. If they can make the site usable for people from all countries, I think it's going to be a great addition. Autodesk wasn't doing much with Seek, and all BIMObject does is specialize in content.

That said, don't be shy about letting them know what works and what doesn't for you. Hopefully they'll be responsive and fix stuff like this.

[Anonymous]

I strongly disagree - after found something you like in seek, you have to undergonso many steps with zip-file creating, downloading, unpacking and inserting the families into your project, when with BIM-object you just get the family directly in your model. Just like that. And the sheer amount of objects...nor to talk about the incredible value for the producers.

[davidtetro]

Michael, I was able to clearly find what I wanted in SEEK and in very short time. It downloaded right in my Google browser and I dragged it right into my model. The only time I had a zip file is if I had downloaded a family with a type catalog.  Took me two clicks and I was done. Not sure of what you are talking about.

In BIMObject, I have no preview of the item after I find it, just a pop up window with about a dozen icons with poor descriptions of the items. Nor are there any of the generic items that were in seek. The items in BIMObject are all available from manufacturers websites so it really has no benefit. Plus, all those items were already available on SEEK. 

It it is clumsy, lacks Autodesk Revit content that was readily available in SEEK such as 2D content and 3D content of legacy REVIT items. It may seem to work for you, but it is an utterly useless item for my workflow and has cut back at least 30% of the content I utilized.

I find I have less available content and waste more time trying to find what I need in BimObjct over SEEK. As a sole proprietor whose does all the design and drafting of the projects, this adds up to a lot of wasted time over the course of a project. In addition, spending thousands of dollars a year in subscription to maintain my software license, I feel this is a slap in the face.

I am making three times as many clicks and navigating through pop ups to filter file types and various families. It is not more streamlined than SEEK at all. But, if you feel spending more time finding things, then BIMObject is for you....

[BarryBebart]

This is extremely annoying. The lack of Revit legacy objects and, most important the lack of generic objects, is an exceptional problem. Much early design work is produced specifically with GENERIC objects for simplicity and speed. Once the project was developed more specific objects were selected. Now I'm stuck selecting the most generic of a manufacturer's item.

Plus, now that I've downloaded a manufacturer's object, is the sales rep going to start harassing me since they have my email and telephone number? Will BIM Object become as obtrusive and snooping as Google and GMail? Are Sales Reps and manufacturer's going to receive automatic reports of project names and addresses from their potentially snooping objects detailing where their objects are being used and will my client privacy be breached? Will the objects contain links that report back to the manufacturers regarding the bim object placement and usage?

Are the Revit generic objects still available somewhere in the autodesk website?

[BarryBebart]

Further, the generic objects are (were) terrific start-points for creating and modifying as your own custom Revit families. The fact that they are simple and generic made them perfect start-points. Now I will have to find something close or similar from a manufacturer and strip all of the manufacturer's information out of the model.

[rudi.roux]

Hi All,

I'll try and get someone from BIMobject onto this thread. They can then go
through user concerns and answer accordingly.

[Anonymous]

Barry,

We have 2 different issues here. Generic and Producer Content.

Let me start with Generic. Generic representation and content is a strongly localized issue. Swedish generic symbols and objects and their graphic representations differs a lot from their, say German, Finnish, Russian or American counterparts (Being Swedish myself, I must say I had not much use of the old Autodesk generic content on seek or factory libraries, nor did many of my countrymen...). How these generic libraries should be built, what actual content should be included, named, parametrisized (is that even a word?) is a localization issue. Very much so.

But I agree with you that there is a big demand for generic content. But who should be responsible for (and pay for) creating such content? Autodesk? BIMobject? In fact, some countries do have a standardized nationally defined library of generic content (although not many have created the actual content for any major CAD platform, just done the definitions). So, You want generic content and many, many more want generic content. There is obviously a market for that. A local market. Why not start earning money and do it and sell it yourself? I would be very surprised if not Autodesk or BIMobject would be very open in helping You distribute this.

On the other hand, and here comes my second issue:

Is not the Generic approach an old one, representing the non-BIM, traditional, linear way of doing projects? Where the architects begin on low LODs and the hand over, slow, error and misunderstanding-filled relay race between stakeholders starts...

Have you seen any other industry that approaches their design process in this way? Manufacturing? Computer? Car? Clothing?

Is it not this traditional, historical, non-digitalized way of doing our stuff that is the main reason the international AEC/FM industry is a complete wreck? (Google "construction industry inefficient" and learn how poorly performing this market really is)...and according to many this is due to lack of digitalisation and old way of leading the processes.

In a BIM world, most stakeholders come together really early on in the process and we try to get as close as possible to the real world issues as possible. And thus, we do simulations, visualisations and calculations. From start, and throughout the process. This includes of course cost estimation and even procurement. When the AEC/FM market becomes a "true" industry (and not a poorly adopted handicraft market), we will handle all the transactions digitally and directly. Many actors will be directly included from day one of the design process and still be around after the building is built providing BIM services to the FM aftermarket.

I firmly believe the need for Generic content will be overshadowed of the need for correct, real data regarding everything from cost and regulations to environmental impact and beauty in design. And when we go IoT...this will not even be an issue anymore, we are going to demand the real specs, data and ID:s provided by the manufacturer from day one. Even for something as simple as a window or a chair or a brick.

Today, I'm sure you agree on this - there is often a major flaw in the generic approach, when we spec wrongly, because of false assumptions as we do not know the exact specifics, regarding just about everything, from dimensions to functionality of equipment. Which means time loss, cost increase and quality loss.

And finally, architects do want to do nice visualisations early on (which you do not achieve easily with generic objects). And we do want to have some sort of check of the costs and performance of just about everything right from the start.

And as using true producer content, in a truly wonderful BIM program as Revit, as it is represented by objects, it is very easy to replace brand A with brand B, right? Exchanging one chair with another is a matter of switching a post in a Revit Schedule, or changing fonts in word. And having a provider of an immense library of just about any product out there, world wide. On every important CAD platform. There is a huge market opening up for every part of the industry right now when Autodesk and BIMobject started to collaborate on this. Where designers, builders, producers, facility managers and just about everyone may connect and communicate directly and create new services and markets. A win-win-win concept really. Can you see it?

So maybe, the loss of generic is not that bad, is it?

[davidtetro]

Michael,

Contrary to what you are saying, when you are beginning a design, you have no idea what manufacturer you are going to use for, let's say a toilet fixture or a door or a window. So, you grab one from the standard Revit family from the content on your computer. You may not want to have to select a Kohler toilet, a Marvin window or a Ceco door. You may want a generic toilet, a genetic window, a generic door as a placeholder. Or, in many projects, leave the choice to the Owner. Or, maybe the Owner has not decided yet. You do not always want, or necessarily need, to select and be locked into a manufacturer. That is the beauty of Revit, you do not always have to put in a 'real' object. Especially in the beginning where you are working on a projects' form, spatial relations, and overall design and code review. You can then add more real world content later as necessary to replace those generic items if need be.

this is true when working on existing buildings. You generally leave the existing items as generic. There is a value to vanilla items in Bim.

Being in large firms in the beginning of my career, and running my own firm for over 15 years, that is the design process that is the most successful. You do not waste that time of product selection in the very beginning.

But, ok.

Now, let's take an elevator, for example. There is not one in the Revit content resident on your computer. It is not available 'out-of-the-box'. It was available on SEEK. Not available on BIMObject. What do we do now? Yes, we can grab one from an older project. Heck, I can grab lots of stuff from older projects. But, the point of SEEK was to avoid that and make the process of design smoother. But there was a lot of stuff available on SEEK that was generic, that I had yet to access, but now need.

Generic objects do not need to be built. They are built already. They exist in all the languages. They already were within SEEK. 99% of the work is done. You have to pay nothing. Autodesk already made it. It is a question of getting it up into BIMObject webpage.

In addition, there were lots of annotation objects in SEEK that are not available in BIMobject. These are not real world items. They are generic annotation. The argument of using real world objects in Bim are lost here since they are not 'real' objects.

SEEK was available to all of us Revit users. We did not ask to switch to BIMobject. Maybe Autodesk should have thought of this. Or, maybe allow all that generic content into the generic libraries that get loaded onto your system on install.

Not every one uses Revit as a full BIM solution as you say.  Give us the content we had always had access to. Let the Revit users decide what real objects they want to place into their models and what generic content they want in their models. 

Somehow, Autodesk and BIMobject need to figure this out. I sure as heck never asked for this switch over from SEEK.

[Anonymous]

David,

a LOT of the original Autodesk generic content is in your standard installation library on your hard drive if you did a standard installation (if you have a non-pirated version of Revit, that is), have you checked?

By searching by Category, I find 28 different lifts on BIMobject site: https://bimobject.com/en-us/product?category=32 - test it yourself.

And still - your taste of generic content is NOT what I like, I want Swedish generic content if any. And I know Germans, Norwegians and Croatians and others who also would like their countries generic standard libraries to be their for them...although no one wants to pay for it...imagine the cost for Autodesk...how much more would you be willing to pay extra for a localised generic content for every country?

Finally, you are describing the old design process. And how it has been working fine with you. Well great. It shows not much resemblance to how the same process works traditionally here in Sweden. Nor in Finland. Or Germany. And my point was to show that, even if it still is valid for doing things in the old way, albeit with modern CAD tools, it will become quite obsolete in a true BIM process.

[davidtetro]

Then let us keep SEEK. Bring us SEEK back.

[davidtetro]

Michael - I have performed a search for elevators. I found two items from Schindler in Revit format. I am in the US so I am not sure if that has something to do with what you had discovered verses what I have discovered.

Believe me, I am not arguing that your thought process for BIM is not accurate. As a matter of fact, I really like the BIM method.

All I am saying is that we had a rich library of generic content ON TOP OF all the great models and families available by all the manufacturers.

All I want to see is the generic content that was available on SEEK - which is not available on a full install of Revit - made available to us NOW. We had access to up until BimObject took over.

Believe me, I was a long-time AutoCAD Architecture user and since taking on Revit about 5 years ago, I have yet to look back.

But, if you think there is no value to generic families, then you are missing out. Having a generic family of toilet partitions installed in a model with low metadata and less parameters is great when you just need to graphically show toilet partitions in an existing building. Especially when the project is concentrating on something that has nothing to do with toilet partitions. I do not know, maybe that is because I come from a hand-drafting education.

But, generic content keeps the model slim and light. Generic content is great for items in the model that you really have no need to have specific parameters for.

On the other hand, I do swear by manufacturer's items for my projects. Trust me, I do.

But the generic content is still necessary. We need it.

[Keith_Wilkinson]

That's quite the sales pitch but I'm with David here - generic families are critical IMO.  

Before I go further though I should stress most of our work is D&B

The way we work is as follows;

We produce our own generic families to reflect design intent and contains parameters key to ensuring the correct product is supplied  this might be elements such as structural opening, finish, opening mechanism etc.  This is in turn supported by a detailed specification. 

Once the contractor decides what product they want to use nobody wants to have the hassle of going back and swapping out families and checking that that process has worked correctly.  Instead the simplest course of action is, at that point to populate predefined parameters with the necessary product data (for example COBie fields) - this can easily be supplied by the manufacturer / supplier and tallies directly with what has been supplied.

On the flip side, if I use a manufacturers product how do I know that that data contained within it is correct?  Also how can I be sure I have the correct family?  Often the are important but subtle variations that really only a specialist will be aware of the differences.  Worst of all what happens if I put one manufacturers families in the model and the contractor decides to use something else.I then I have data in my model which is incorrect.

I get that you are a business and your business is producing families for manufacturers but in many instances I'd question how useful they really are.  Give me a good generic just about any day of the week.

[BarryBebart]

David and Keith both bring up a very good point regarding work in existing buildings. Most of my practice is commercial office interiors which inherently means that I'm doing work within an existing building. When modeling the existing conditions I specifically want generic components for speed, simplicity , minimal file size and minimum meta-data content. I dont know who manufactured the existing toilets in the base building restroom, not the doors, nor the elevator nor the exterior windows. (I likely won't even model the elevator and will simply show as line-work). Its unimportant for my project. but I do need to show the toilets and toilet partitions somewhat accurately if I'm doing finishes renovation work within the restroom and to adequately show the scope of work for building permit purposes (or to show areas of non-work).

The generic models were perfect and essential for this use.

I have a project right now where we are going to simply repaint the existing toilet partitions in a finishes renovated restroom. I dread sifting through BIM Object to find generic toilet partition components that only need to look somewhat like the photograph that I have of the space. I'm only going to present to the client perspective views and an isometric view of the restrooms alongside finish samples. No rendering is needed.

Further, on projects that are competitively bid, I purposely want generic components for many items because I dont know what manufacturer's products will ultimately win the bid and be installed. My schedules likely will not indicate the manufacturer's name or product numbers. For some products I use certain manufacturers content (especially lighting) because they represent a "best in class" product line or because the manufacturer has a very extensive product line that will allow for easy substitution by other competitor's products. But, when I can, I'm often going to make the product generic - even going into the model to strip out manufacturer's information if it impedes or is cumbersome for generic schedule generation.

Genericizing an item within the model depends upon the product and the market. For instance, for interior door frames and interior doors, here in the US there are dozens of manufacturer's who make the same products. Ill never use a manufacturers product or indicate a manufacturer in a schedule. The specifications will list about eight or so local manufacturers for door frames and doors that are all acceptable. For the lighting though I'll likely use the Focal Point or Phillips Lightolier models and product lines because they are "best in class", have fantastic BIM models and easy to navigate websites and very extensive product lines. Other manufacturers can bid comparable products but my drawings will indicate that the design is based upon manufacturer X, provide "or equal" product and the schedules will indicate product information, model number etc.

[Anonymous]

Hello all,

So BIMobject are going to join in with the conversation and of course we welcome constructive feedback now the transition has finished. What I read mainly above is the ability to search for content quickly and efficiently. 

To help with this we have completed two tasks. First created a quick three minute video on how best to use search found here - https://youtu.be/vukgs2kForg

Second we have created BIMobject Talks which is a series of helpful sessions (15mins with 15mins Q&A) every Tuesday. The first one is next week (Tuesday 7th March). To sign up please go here - http://info.bimobject.com/webinars

[Keith_Wilkinson]

What is your thoughts on the issue of Generic families - i.e. non manufacturer specific.

[BarryBebart]

Easy availability of generic objects is critical to Revit. Don't get me wrong, Revit is a great product - I'll never go back to autocad except for pure raw drafting work - but one of the inherent weaknesses of designing a project in Revit is how very quickly the user is forced to start getting technically specific about objects and items. For instance, if you mass out a simple house with a pitched roof, in a few minuets you need to start thinking about what roof you are using. Compare the workflow of Sketch-Up vs Revit. For Sketch-Up you keep massing away on your simple house and the roof is simply an extruded pitched mass. Delving into minutiae about the roof substrate can easily interrupt the workflow. When manually sketching, your pencil doesn't stop and ask you what type of asphalt shingles to use on your roof before you can proceed with designing the roof.

The more Revit can allow the user to stay within the "generic" at the early stages of a project the better product it can be. The generic components speed-along the early design process and don't act as obstacles to one's mental workflow. Much early design work is produced specifically with GENERIC objects for simplicity and speed. Once the project is developed, more specific manufacturers objects are selected. 

For my work specifically, I do interior office projects and additions to buildings. I'm always modeling existing buildings and for that use, generic model components are essential. They are compact, have limited meta-data and are easy to find and use. An existing window is an existing window. All I care about are the dimensions and placement and configuration. I dont even really care about material or color. Sifting through Bim object to find the simplest, most generic, similar manufacturer's window is a massive time-suck and extremely annoying and inefficient. Out of the Box revit does have a very good generic object library but Autodesk Seek had an even larger library. These components are missing in Bim Object. Further, you could specifically search for generic objects in Autodesk Seek. that search option allowed for speed and efficiency in object searching.

One last point, the generic objects are (were) terrific start-points for creating and modifying as your own custom Revit families. The fact that they are simple and generic made them perfect start-points.