purge unsued view types - or how to see and change what type is used by schedules

[HVAC-Novice]

This seems to be a Revit limitation. I can't delete the unused viewport types. 

I tried to do the official Revit trick . But the "select all" is grayed out and I still don't see them in the purge option.

Then I read schedules could have viewport types assigned. I tried this trick   and deleted my schedules, but the viewport types still can't be purged. 

There seems to be a Dynamo method  , but I can't find the ID of the viewport. they seem to use a "snoop" program, but I'm not able to install 3rd party apps (our IT doesn't let us....). 

Since my problem could be that schedules have the viewports assigned, how can i see or change that without employing a 3rd party software. I saw some hints that included Python etc..... but that is way above my head. 

Are there other ways to delete those unused types? I know this is an old problem, but it looks like people have managed to do that, but I can't replicate any of the tricks for one reason or another. 

[ennujozlagam]

https://wrw.is/how-to-delete-viewport-title-types-in/

[ToanDN]

Legend views?

[RDAOU]

@HVAC-Novice 

Snoop is not the program it is a function in the plugin RevitLookup ... it does what you are asking yes, I have always seen it as an official must have Revit tool rather than a third party. You might want to try to convince your IT to install it, it is a very useful tool. You can find it here https://github.com/jeremytammik/RevitLookup

You can also do the same in Model Checker (which is not a third party) and with using 3rd Party addin like PyRevit or Ideate I believe both have this function 

If you want to do it using Dynamo, you would need to 

1. Get all the view ports in the document
2. Identify what is being used and placed on sheets
3. Change those which are placed yet not wanted
4. then use the Delete node

What you refereed to on the API form is specific to the forum member workflow. copying and pasting graphs doesn't always work. Moreover, there are viewports which are Read Only ie: you cannot delete. What you may delete/purge are those types listed under the type selector

[HVAC-Novice]

Huh, why did Autodesk accept one of the responses as solution? I didn't do that, I just read them the first time and was surprised to see one was a "solution". Anyway..... 

Installation of software requires the vendor to fill out a whole bunch of paperwork about security, EULA and so on. That was decided by IT and our lawyers and there is no shortcut and no small app vendor will deal with this. I'm basically condemned to only use software that cost a lot of $ since a $-5 app developer doesn't spend time doing this. So anything that will install an installation on the PC (inc. Revit add-ons) isn't working. Even if a software vendor is interested in dealing with us, the whole process takes a while. IT installed a software called applocker on our PCs that will prevent any unapproved executables to run. Even approved software I often need IT to help me since they need to install it under their login. 

I tried the "select all" for the viewport types I don't want. But that is grayed out. So normal views don't seem to use any of the view types I don't want. but the purge option doesn't show them. Since I read about schedules also using viewport types, I SUSPECT that is what is using them. But I have no way to see if that is the case, nor do I know how I would change that. 

For some reason I think at some point I was able to do that in the past to my template. But now I see that also has the 5 viewport types (instead of 2 that I want). I ASSUME that got contaminated when I copied schedules from a project into my template that got contaminated. 

BTW: If there is a commercial add-on package that resolves this and many of the other small Revit problems, I'm looking into buying something. But it has to be one software that resolves many of the little Revit short-comings (like copying parameters into a family etc.).

[RDAOU]

@HVAC-Novice 

As far as I know, neither Autodesk nor their admins accept solution on your behalf, it is either you or an expert elite who can do that. 

No view can exist on the sheet unless to it has what is called a viewport (this includes schedules). Some viewports you can edit, some read only and the user cannot edit. Schedules fall under the latter, they have a hard coded viewports of their own which is not listed in the types menu.

• These you can only select by ID
• And if you delete by ID, it will remove the schedules from the sheets 

When you purge viewports from Autodesk.Revit.DB,  you would only be purging the viewport types which are listed under the Type Menu (shown in previous reply) and those of the schedules which where were places on sheets but at one point were removed.

In the image you posted you are not selecting the view port...you are selecting the viewport's title...hit tab one more time ans select the port itself.

If you are unable to install any plugin at all, your options are limited to Revit API or Dynamo or live with them as is 🙂

[HVAC-Novice]

Thanks, I hadn't realized I didn't select the actual viewport. I'm not able to do the "select all". but that still doesn't allow me to purge the viewport types.

So based on what I understand you say, schedules are not the problem here. 

So the best I can do is to rename the useless types so they alphabetically are below the 2 views I actually want. 

Is there a way to prevent viewport types to copy over when i copy views from other projects or templates? I mainly would copy schedules or detail views. 

And this is a long shot. but I'm entertaining the idea to look into one of the big add-in packages that resolve a lot of the Revit quirks. Like this one, or the inability to transfer parameters between families. Is there one that does this? That's a long term idea, so won't help me now. but things like this motivate me to look deeper.

[RDAOU]

@HVAC-Novice 

Now that u can select the viewport, would you post a screen shot of the menu side by side with the properties palette showing what is being selected and the status of the select all?

[HVAC-Novice]

I'm not sure I understand what exactly you mean. the first is when set it to the useless viewport type. the second after I changed it to the one I want and applied to "all in project". the useless types are all called X-something, the 2 top ones are my "useful" viewport types. 

[ToanDN]

You should be able to place a view on a sheet > change it to an useless viewport type > select that view on sheet (not the view title) > right click and Select All Instances in Entire Project > then change to a useful type from Properties.  That should let you purge the useless viewport unless it is the OOTB Viewport1 (it can be disguised under a different name but still cannot be purged).

[RDAOU]

@HVAC-Novice 

Right click and got to select all instances in project ... is it still grayed out? Selectall and change tot the type you need to keep. REPEAT for all types.

once the redundant types are not used, then u can get rid of them

[HVAC-Novice]

I'm able to do what you do. I can "select all" and change them to desired types. But the unused ones still don't show up under the purge. It is actually straight forward, except it doesn't work. I have no rvt linked in. I did that with all 3 useless views. i also changed all useful views to the useless types, but those don't show up in purge either. 

[ToanDN]

---

@HVAC-Novice wrote:

I'm able to do what you do. I can "select all" and change them to desired types. But the unused ones still don't show up under the purge. It is actually straight forward, except it doesn't work. I have no rvt linked in. I did that with all 3 useless views. i also changed all useful views to the useless types, but those don't show up in purge either. 

---

Have you checked Legend views, Assembly Views?

[RDAOU]

@HVAC-Novice 

It is called "Purge Unused" .. They only show if they are redundant NOT USED if they are still used on a sheet they will not appear. Refer to Post 4 above (You need to identify which VP is used where then change their types)

Use the following nodes in Dynamo...they will help you locate which viewport is used on which sheet and could be a good start if you want to develope a more complex graph

[HVAC-Novice]

I only have a keynote legend. I don't use assemblies (nor do I really know what they do). The keynote legend seems to be behave like a schedule. They don't seem to have a viewport type visible to me. 

[HVAC-Novice]

I got some motivation to solve this and found this Dynamo instruction. Unfortunately I'm too stupid to copy my homework from someone else...  🙂

I copied their code (based on older node version) except their logo (which is unlikely to be a problem). The "Watch also shows me the view port types in the project (I want to delete "X"). i also used "Boolean" nodes instead of false/true code. Vut even when I started with the code-nodes for true/false, it didn't work. 

But the program doesn't show me the view port types to select the ones to be deleted:

if you look at the article, it should show the list of view port types inc. check marks to select the ones to delete. 

What am I doing wrong? 

[RDAOU]

@HVAC-Novice not sure what you are working on but just saw the screenshot...the Values input is empty. Connect it to the output from watch node

[HVAC-Novice]

I see, I forgot that one connection. Now it should be correct, but still doesn't work. I added a watch to the data nodes, but it doesn't seem to work. I tried it on two projects (one with 5, the other with 7 view port types). Same result, except the number of viewports it sees changes. 

Does it work for anyone else? Is there a chance there is something that needs to be changed in Revit? 

BTW, there is an idea to vote on. 

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/revit-ideas/viewports-type-hardcoded-cannot-purge/idi-p/7891678

[HVAC-Novice · Accepted solution]

Another annoying issue when inserting views or schedules is, besides the viewport type, you also import another copy of that annotation family. This is an easy delete, though. 

I take no credit. Someone on the dynamo forum helped me.  I made an edit to the code and now it works! I was able to delete those friggin view port types! Script attached. 

[HVAC-Novice]

One problem, I noticed this actually also deletes some of the 2D views. For some reason some of the 2D views must have the view port types "hardcoded" as default. 

in my example, I want to keep the 4 top viewport types, and delete the bottom three. but deleting the bottom three, also deletes some of the views. 

I tried:

- placing all views on sheets and assigning one of the top four views

- not placing any views on a sheet

In both cases, the views get deleted when I delete the viewport type. 

I couldn't find any way to "see" where that default viewport type can be edited. 

Does anyone have an idea, or is this just an unresolvable problem until Autodesk fixes that (like by letting us assign the default view port type)

I'm really bummed out after thinking I finally solved this problem. 

Edit: it also deletes schedules....  i deleted the dyn file from the above posts so that no one inadvertently uses this before this issue is figured out....