Better Functionality for Legends!!

[ndjabiras]

1.  Ability to Tag Legend Components

2.  Ability to rotate Legend Components

3.  Option for "Floor Plan View" for Floors, Ceilings, etc.

4. Ability to Override Graphics, apply Filters, etc to Legend Components

Work arounds for these issues are too many, and leave too much room for error.  A legend should be representative of the items in your model.  It should have as much functionality as your floor plans do because it is meant to be a visual guide of the items in said floor plan.  MUST HAVE FULL FUNCTIONALITY!

[mbootsUJVFW]

It seems that every single time I'm trying to do something that should seem exceedingly obvious to do in a legend component, I find out that, for some reason, Revit has not added these basic functionalities. This includes:

-Rotating Legend Components (Seriously, this should be basic functionality)

-Legend Components use Family Type parameters (No reason for a component to use arbitrary sizes for parameters when we have component types that already have our needed sizes specified)

-See all Legend Component sides (Some legend components can be viewed on all 6 sides, but other types are only visible on 1 or two sides, even if the actual family has all sides visible and modelled)

-Make Legend Components actually line up with how they're modelled (If a component is modelled right- way up in the family, there's no reason for it to come in sideways as a legend component)

-Make Legend Component views line up with the Family Views (The 'floor plan' of a legend component should match the floor plan view of a its family component)

-Change Legend Component sizes (If a component has instance parameters, it only makes sense to be able to adjust those parameters for the legend component)

-Reference Planes in components should work in Legend Components (If a component has a reference plane in its family, there is no reason to not be able to use those references to align the legend component as well)

Legends and Legend components have so much potential for showing standard dimensions for fixtures, repeated details, and all sorts of other possibilities, but as they are right now, legend components are not just underutilized, but are outright unusable - to the point that it's fair to consider them fundamentally broken, and to be avoided, and have had these problems in every edition of Revit, even though this is a major function of Revit, with legends being an incredibly important part of any decent drawing set. The list is have provided is some of the most egregious, basic functionalities that have been ignored by Revit, but I am sure that the full list of functionality that should be added to legend components is much, much longer. There is no excuse for leaving these assets so fundamentally broken for so long. If every single forum question looking for advice on how to use legend components instead redirects to using literally anything but legend components, that should be a clear sign that these are broken and need fixing. 

[emilian-teodor_pop]

I am still wondering why in the last 15 years Autodesk was not able to implement this:  

3.  Option for "Floor Plan View" for Floors, Ceilings, etc. 

to allow the users to show the finishes in a Legend... It is indeed a MUST HAVE!

[Kev_D]

@emilian-teodor_pop pay your $2000+ to go to AU and ask them nicely. 😂

[Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard]

I had a video call with the Revit product Manager and he was not convinced we needed proper Legend support, it's just not something he cared about.

[ndjabiras]

@Samuel.Arsenault-Brassard @This is very disappointing. I keep holding out hope. And it is still desperately needed 

[Lars_Jeppesen]

LoL...not sure if that's actually serious. Surely not..... 

.....surely not....

My assumption is that these Autodesk Revit 'managers' are IT biased without any practical construction experience sadly. One would think that to identify and resolve issues with anything, one should go to the horse's mouth...and ask.

I had the same experience many years ago, going back to study to get my piece of paper proving I knew what I was doing after doing it for 5 years already in the real world. Ironically, I ended up lecturing in multiple subject matters whilst being a student. At least the lecturers were aware that they hadn't worked in the industry for considerable time and knew their limitations insofar as relaying experience/knowledge to the students.+

One gripe I have here with Autodesk (if what you say is true), is that we all pay an extremely hefty ongoing subscription cost for software that really hasn't taken any considerable leaps in development in about 12 years(?), more like small hotfixes and updates.

[ian_shafer3WG7T]

I suggest that legends have an instance parameter allowing view numbering.  As it stands now, the fact that legend views can appear on multiple sheets makes view numbering unavailable. 

However we use legends to deliver standard details in models that hold multiple project deliverables, rather than having many (many) duplicated drafting views.  But these must sit on the sheet without a view number/.

It seems to me that an instance parameter of some kind would permit view numbering for legend views, allowing them to appear as 'regular' views' for printed deliverables.  And these views could be properly references at least in RFI's or in verbal discussions.  Hear's hoping ...

[njones9JJCA]

Add a way to rotate legend components

[wr.marshall]

This has been asked for numorous times in this thread: Better Functionality for Legends!! - Autodesk Community

@kimberly_fuhrman-jones please combine

[smichaudRMVUD]

5 things that drive me crazy with legends. 

• Have instance parameter control of components
• be able to rotate them into the correct orientation not just "View format"
• View type of component. section of a pipe is not helpful plan is. (see pyrevit tool that does this edit in api)
• NEED to be able to put system parameters for pipe, duct, electrical etc into the legend say on a segment of pipe or duct) those define our colors and patterns on single line and double line MEP content. 
• Tags can be placed as a component to give an example of the tag great.  Id also like to (see item 1 of this list and item 4) Tag the pipe and or duct systems so that if a user edits the pattern/color or system abbreviation it updates the legend. 

[adaversa]

Bumping this again in 2025 (it's been almost 10 years since this was first opened, and it's that "young" because the ideas forum was started well after this was highlighted as an issue in industry circles)

Issues like those highlighted above make what should be core functionality unusable for its stated purpose (how many other buttons on the ribbon aren't worth the pixels they take up?). Instead, we spend brainpower on awkward workarounds instead of designing and coordinating, and wonder if the late nights spent fighting the software are really worth it.

It's been 4 years since the open letter that seemed to kickstart development again, even if it was just implementing a handful of low-hanging-fruit type requests. Development seems to have slowed, maybe we need another one?

I've seen plenty of tech demos for software trying to eat in to the market at the edges, I give it only a matter of time before enough of them get together to make a viable competitor product (and use this forum for their "why we're better" list). It's Autodesk's market until suddenly...it isn't. For their own sake I hope Autodesk is working on their own Revit competitor and that's why nothing here seems to get better.

Happy screaming into the void everyone!

[arq_42]

I would add ability to change instance properties