Project Phases Disappeared

[ArmandD]

Since upgrading to and using Revit 2017 (Building Design Suite Premium) we have had three projects (so far) that have somehow lost all the project phases.  There is no Existing phase, there is no New Construction phase.  You cannot create any new phases.  If I import phase settings from another project and then switch a plan to new construction phase (or any phase) the graphic filters still won't work, the spaces disappear, new spaces will not recognize walls and/or space separations. 

Up to now, we have not figured out what causes this.  Can't recreate it.  But, when it happens, the project is pretty much unfixable.

[ArmandD]

It has been happening to us at our company since version 2017 was first released to the public. So it has been over a year now. Lots of man hours lost every time it happened.

[dan.stine]

I would not expect it to be fixed in 2018, as Lace indicated, the link he provided would be updated when a solution is found. I happen to know they are hoping to get a model AND a journal file that can be run against the file to reproduce the issue.

I think this started in 2017. I also think it only happens when using the Spline Wire command (not just the Esc key on wire in general). When we stopped using the spline, in favor of the arc, wire command the problem has stopped.

Before that, it happed several times per week towards the end of a project when staff were doing a lot of circuiting and adding wire. The electrical department was checking the Phases dialog before and after a Sync w/ Central to catch the problem.

[ArmandD]

I have already provided multiple models and journal files to Autodesk support, and have documented exactly how to reproduce the issue. This was all done via a support ticket months ago. So, they do have files and know how to reproduce the issue. Now just waiting on the fix.

[hidlayarchitecture]

The error occurring after canceling the wiring command makes sense as that was what I was doing before the phases disappeared. I did not have this problem in Revit 2017. 

[dan.stine]

The model provided has to be before the corruption and when you drag and drop the journal file on that file, it has to reproduce the phases problem. Usually, it does not work because you have other projects open, families open or others working against a worksharing project. Those things break the "script" from running fully.

Hopefully they can figure this out some other way  - or with the files we have all provided so far. But I am just telling what they told my they need to help solve this issue.

Fun stuff! Or, not so much:)

[NateBrush]

It is so frustrating to use a tool (arc wires) for years and then have it take a step backwards. It really undermines confidence and sense of value.

But I guess it is what it is. Thank you all for the suggestion to always check the phase table before syncing. That has become our new standard procedure while circuiting. I'm always grateful that you all take the time to support your peers.

[MattKincaid]

Just wanted to add my vote to the list of fixing this bug in 2017.  It cause problems with Addins too (see link below).  The 2018.1 fix is cool, but I would suspect users with 2017 projects will be looking for a bug fix in their version as well.

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/revit-api-forum/view-phase-parameters-missing/td-p/7348224

[mastjaso]

It's honestly just straight up unacceptable that this bug still exists in Revit 2017.

Autodesk needs to learn how to support and patch it's products, or open source them. It's f***ing ridiculous that a bug this major in their flagship software has existed for 8+ months with no patch or fix. 

Everyone who reads these forums needs to complain to their BIM managers, company partners, and anyone involved with product procurement about Autodesk's ridiculously lack luster support. Stop abusing your monopoly and start supporting your multi-thousand dollar subscription products. 

[pkolarik]

I don't know if it's the same exact problem, but the symptoms seem pretty close to the same. We had something along these lines happen very recently in a Revit 2016 *plumbing* model. However, due to the nature of the user working on said file we don't know  (and the user certainly has no idea) if he did something to it directly or if it's something along the lines of the bug written about here.

But if it is the same issue, it's not just tied to using some electrical component/commands.

[mastjaso]

So for anyone coming across this right now there are some other things you should know. 

There is a DocumentSynchronizingWithCentral event that you should add this check to for workshared projects. Subscribing to only the saving events will work for RevitServer projects, but those events are NOT triggered by BIM 360 / Collaboration For Revit projects during syncs. 

Additionally, for some reason BIM 360 / C4R projects suppress TaskDialog's during a bunch of events (thanks for documenting that Autodesk), so you should replace any TaskDialogs with MessageBoxes from System.Windows.Forms. 

Finally, when you do subscribe to the synchronize with central event, you can cancel it through the args object. I suggest implementing this so that you prevent your users from syncing a corrupt model back to your server. 

I'm working on getting permission to just release the add-in I made here for everyone to use, but the decision is presently stuck above my head. I want to again reiterate how absolutely unacceptable it is that Autodesk didn't at the very least develop this add-in themselves and release it to all their customers when there's such a major bug in their product. We now have the partners of our firm involved to express their intense displeasure to Autodesk over their piss-poor support of this issue and I suggest anyone who comes across this try and do the same. 

[pkolarik]

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@pkolarik wrote:

I don't know if it's the same exact problem, but the symptoms seem pretty close to the same. We had something along these lines happen very recently in a Revit 2016 *plumbing* model. However, due to the nature of the user working on said file we don't know  (and the user certainly has no idea) if he did something to it directly or if it's something along the lines of the bug written about here.

But if it is the same issue, it's not just tied to using some electrical component/commands.

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I wish I could just edit my original reply, but apparently that's not an option.

So, we were able to fix our issue here. (despite having been told that this method wouldn't fix it... one of the guys on the project just went and tried it anyway and it worked)

He used "Transfer Project Standards" from the plumbing starter file. He transferred over the Phasing into the broken model and the phasing issue was fixed in that broken model, then went in and tweaked a couple settings after that to fix another secondary issue we were having that was related to the phasing issue.

Now things are working again.

[dan.stine]

Good news... https://bimchapters.blogspot.com/2017/11/revit-201723-update-mep-phasing-issue.html

[pkolarik]

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@pkolarik wrote:

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@pkolarik wrote:

I don't know if it's the same exact problem, but the symptoms seem pretty close to the same. We had something along these lines happen very recently in a Revit 2016 *plumbing* model. However, due to the nature of the user working on said file we don't know  (and the user certainly has no idea) if he did something to it directly or if it's something along the lines of the bug written about here.

But if it is the same issue, it's not just tied to using some electrical component/commands.

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I wish I could just edit my original reply, but apparently that's not an option.

So, we were able to fix our issue here. (despite having been told that this method wouldn't fix it... one of the guys on the project just went and tried it anyway and it worked)

He used "Transfer Project Standards" from the plumbing starter file. He transferred over the Phasing into the broken model and the phasing issue was fixed in that broken model, then went in and tweaked a couple settings after that to fix another secondary issue we were having that was related to the phasing issue.

Now things are working again.

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Heh.. okay, so an update to my update. While the above "fixed" our issue in that it restored phases to our model and restored the ability to utilize phasing without crashing said model, it didn't totally "fix" the phasing issues in our model.

It appears now that any piping that was modeled prior to the phases disappearing/being deleted is in a state of "confusion" more or less. Any accessories trying to be placed into that piping will not break the pipe nor will it take on the piping system's properties.

The solution that we've found so far (other than manually breaking the pipe after insertion and connecting it to the accessory) is to switch the status of the entire model's phasing to "existing", then back to "new construction", and then do that for each individual pipe prior to attempting to insert any accessories.

I have no idea how phases disappearing affects electrical modeling down the road, but it appears to have long lasting effects on piping.

[Anonymous]

Just ran into this issue on a project that we are two weeks out from sending out.  This is a major problem and the fixes so far have not yet completely restored the functionality.  Just as pkolarik mentions there are issues with piping and in our case it the piping modeled before fixing the phases will not connect in any way to new piping (ductwork is the same).  I really worry about issues w/ circuiting on the electrical side as well and not knowing what issues we might discover in the next days, weeks, year.  I would really like to resolve this so that we don't have to continue with these phase issues but not knowing what we may lose with fixing is not that appealing either.

Our project is in 2018 and looks like the 2018.1 update looked to fix this.  I'll have to check that all of our users have the latest but seems like it should have been resolved out of the gate w/ 2018 considering the timeline of these posts.  what a pain!

[NateBrush]

Did you contact Autodesk? They were able to recover our model.

I feel your pain! I hope you get it fixed and functional in time for your deliverable.

[mastjaso]

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@Anonymous wrote:
I'll have to check that all of our users have the latest but seems like it should have been resolved out of the gate w/ 2018 considering the timeline of these posts.  what a pain massive loss in economic productivity this was for every company that experienced it!

ftfy

And again, thanks Autodesk for promptly and immediately patching the issue and releasing a complete addin to monitor for corruption and alert users in the meantime. /s

But in less bitterly sarcastic news yes, autodesk is able to recover the model if you contact them, it'll just take a day or two, and you'll want to make sure they do it right, the first time they "recovered" our phases they associated the wrong phases together and we had to send it back.

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