Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Hyperlinks From Revit or AutoCAD to Navisworks

A few weeks ago I gave a little presentation regarding Navisworks and we got on the topic of hyperlinks in Navisworks.  We had a GC that also spoke and she mentioned that they use hyperlinks quite a bit for sending “final” models to the client.  Those NWD’s include a lot of hyperlinks to OE manuals, product cuts sheets, etc.  Someone then asked if you add a hyperlink to an object in Revit, does that come through into Navisworks?

Great question…that I didn’t have an answer for immediately.  I figured it would, but I wasn’t 100% sure.  So I did a quick check and sure enough, if you add a URL (hyperlink) to an object in Revit, it will come through as a hyperlink in Navisworks.  I also tested adding a hyperlink to an AutoCAD Arch door and it worked as well.

Note: I did this test from Revit Arch 2009, Revit Arch 2010 and AutoCAD Arch 2010 using the Navisworks 2010 exporter.

5 comments:

  1. Hello Dwane,
    I see how this is working with a 2D export but cannot get this to work with a 3d dwf or navisworks export from Revit. Do you know if this works?
    Thank you
    Michael Coviello
    TRO Jung|Brannen

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  2. I can only get it to work for a Family and not a specific object

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  3. The exporter will carry forward the URL that is specified in the Type Properties within an object when the file is exported from Revit to an NWC file. When you export the NWC, make sure to check the Options and see that there are checks (in the check boxes) that export out the parameters.

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  4. Bill Knittle, SynergisDecember 2, 2011 at 12:10 PM

    Dwane,

    I sat behind you in Chicago during Design Suites training in Chicago this past September. I'm helping some customers with Navisworks/Revit interoperability issues and amazingly, you came up in a google search. In your post you tested and succeeded exporting a Revit element's URL value to Navisworks via NWC. What about custom URLs in the same object? It appears that the NW Exporter will only take one URL and assign it as the default. How is NW choosing which one is default and why not all of them?

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  5. Hi Bill. That's a great question and I'm not sure I have a solid answer. From the testing that I've done, NW will take the info in the URL prop first. But, when I have "Convert Element Props" checked inside of the NW Export Settings, it took the custom URL prop that I set up (in Revit) as the Default Hyperlink in NW. So it doesn't appear to be an exact science.

    It doesn't look like NW will take all the URL's from Revit and categorize them as "one" Hyperlink in NW. However, if you go to the Props of the object in NW, you will find all URL's that belong to the Revit object.

    Best way to see all the URL's is to right-click on the Hyperlink icon in NW, then choose "Select item...". This will make sure you are selecting the proper object and not a sub-object/geometry of the family.

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