Restore project to an older date in revit sever

[Anonymous]

Is there a way to restore a project, that is shared via Revit server, to an older date? Case in point, 4 months ago, one of our projects went through some significant changes after we already completed our construction documents. Unfortunately, we didn't create a backup of the Central Model right then and there, and of course now we need to go back to that completed set of construction documents.

All local copies of our work stations have copies going back only a few days, so no luck there.

Does anyone know of how we could restore a project to a few months ago? We do have backups of the whole Revit server, including all the project directories. Would it be as simple as just replacing the current (June) project folder with the folder from like February, after making a backup of the current model of course?

[Lance.Coffey · Accepted solution]

Thank you for the question @Anonymous, and welcome to the Autodesk forum!

I’ve generally seen two approaches to backing up Revit Server:

1. Backup the Project Folder: This involves locking the server (so that there are no in-flight operations when the backup is created), making a copy of the Project Folder, and then unlocking the server.
2. Creating backup local RVT files: This could be done manually, through a backup process on the workstation, or using the Revit Server Model Creation Command-Line Utility.

Now based on the information provided so far, it sounds like you have a backup of the project folder (and RVT folders contained within), but this was made without first locking Revit Server.

You should be able to test if the backup you have is viable by, going through the following steps:

1. Lock the server.
2. Move the current model folder to another location (so that you have a backup).
3. Copy the corresponding model folder from your backup to the project folder.
4. Unlock the server.
5. Confirm that the model can be opened/sync’d.

The following help topic has info on the process as well: Restore a Previous Version of a Server-Based Central Model

If you are looking to restore all of the models on the server, on step 3 & 4, you could move/restore the entire Project Folder (instead of the model folders contained within).

If one or more of the models within the backup is not usable, you can restore your files by reversing the process (lock the server, move the bad model folder out, copy the working backup back in, unlock the server).