Using/Setting up Keynotes in Revit

[Anonymous]

Hi Guys,

It's been awhile since I had to use keynote in Revit.  I remembered having set up a file that is externally linked to Revit that everyone shares. But then it sometimes get corrupted due to so many people accessing it and improperly saving it.

So, 5 years later, how is Revit allowing us to use keynotes.  Is it still clunky like before, or is everyone using a third party software (add-in) to manage their keynotes within Revit?  Thanks.

[Anonymous]

I'm more or less used to text in the paper space, or using a legend/drafting view. However, we're looking at the Keynote feature within Revit that you compile as a text file that Revit can read.

Something along these lines:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OU8LUimVhGU

It seems clunky at first sight, and many of us were against it. We've since test piloted it in one of our offices and reviewed and it seems pretty good! Doesn't match exactly what our office standards were before, with numbered bullet paragraph style (since it's a table), but you can modify the table styles to look pretty darn close to what you need.

Some of the nice features is that you can have a typical list of notes, but! those notes only get applied to the page that the keynotes exist on. You can also renumber and reorder the keynotes list as needed.

[Anonymous]

Thanks. This video was done in 2016. I wonder if any new features from 2020 would have a more convenient way to setup keynotes in Revit.  I think what I did 5 years ago was similar to what the video was showing.  I don't know if you run into too many people getting into that keynote file and corrupting it.  I know each discipline would need to maintain their own keynote file and sub-discipline like Power/Lighting/Technology would still have to maintain their own files.

[Anonymous]

That's a good point. We're strictly mechanical in our office, and its just a matter of yelling at the one who messed things up :).

[ToanDN · Accepted solution]

Nothing has changed.

I use Excel, not Notepad, to edit the keynote file.  After done editing, do a save as back to the original TXT file, then do another save as to an Excel file and leave it open.  One reason is that from 2016, Revit won't accept the keynote file if it is still open in another program.  Another reason is that I can come back to edit the data quickly without having to reopen/convert from TXT to Excel again.

It works alright and it is much easier to edit in Excel than in a text editing program.

[Charles.Ball · Accepted solution]

I know you selected another post as a solution, but have you looked at Note Blocks? Here's a great video.

https://youtu.be/5prYvj-WoPE

We use this for small projects. We still use the Excel to .txt file like @ToanDN for everything else. 

[iainsavage]

Pros and cons with both methods I think.

Symbols can’t be placed in 3D views which would limit the Noteblock method, but otherwise it is probably more flexible and the schedules more customisable than keynote schedules.

I’m also not sure why, in the video you shared, the author didn’t make the number and text parameters “type” rather than “instance” then all type 1 would be the same note, all type 2 the same etc without relying on the “Itemize every instance” method that he showed.
Interesting though.

[Charles.Ball]

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@iainsavage wrote:

I’m also not sure why, in the video you shared, the author didn’t make the number and text parameters “type” rather than “instance” then all type 1 would be the same note, all type 2 the same etc without relying on the “Itemize every instance” method that he showed.

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I believe if he did that then you couldn't have multiple number 1s. So if you watch the whole thing he has a demo plan and a new plan. He uses the number 1 for both but they are two different notes. he uses the "view type" parameter to control the visibility. Maybe. I don't know for sure. 

[iainsavage]

Thanks, I understand now (being honest I didn’t watch the whole of the video).

I was thinking mechanically and I can’t think of many occasions when I would want the note to be different in different views but I get why that might be the case Architecturally.

Thanks for clarifying.

[Anonymous]

Thanks Charles.Ball.  

On this Textnote, has anyone tried using a circle, instead of the generic box as an outline of the textnote? 

Thanks.