Dependent Views, Matchlines, and View References in Revit: by Reid Addis

Dependent Views, Matchlines, and View References in Revit

Author: Reid Addis, Microsol Resources
Date Published: March 24, 2009

Autodesk University Article Link

Dependent Views were added to Revit in Release 2008. The concept behind Dependent Views is to allow you to maintain consistent annotation and View Scale among the main and dependent views while permitting independent crop regions for each view. A secondary result is that Dependent Views allow you to place different cropped portions of the overall View on different sheets while maintaining consistency of annotation and scale across sheets.

Normally when you simply Duplicate a view with Detailing, all of the annotation (text, dimensions, tags, etc.) become independent from the original view along with the View Scale. Thus if you change the value of the original object (adjust a dimension or edit text or delete a Room Tag) in one view, it has no effect on the duplicated object in the independent duplicated view.

This is not the case with Dependent Views. The annotation and view scale are identical across all the views. Change the view scale in ANY dependent or parent view, and it changes the view scale in ALL the dependent and parent views. In addition, the annotation is identical as well, so a change in ANY view again affects that same object in ALL views.

Using the “Getting Started” tutorial that comes with Revit Architecture 2009, I’ve created some Dependent Views of the Lower Level:

View 1

For clarity, I’ve turned on the Crop Region in the Parent View and added some Filled Regions to show the Dependent View Crop Regions. The “purple” area in the center indicates where these two regions overlap. This is where we will add a Matchline and View References in the Parent View to help coordinate locating these adjacent views when placed on different sheets.

Below are the two Dependent Views with the Matchline displayed that was added in the Parent view from the Drafting rollout of the Design Bar:

View 2

In the Parent View, from the Drafting rollout on the Design Bar, I will place a View Reference on each side of the Matchline.

View 3

Notice that as you place the View Reference, the Option Bar gives you the ability to specify which Dependent View is being referenced. Thus the View Reference placed in the West view will target the East view, and visa versa.

Equally critical is making sure that you actually have a Tag loaded from the View Reference Family. By default, this is set to and thus will fail to work.

View 4

The final step is to place these Dependent Views on Sheets, then watch how the View References update to include this information.

View 5

Notice that the View References now show which View and Sheet number the Matchline adjacent view is on.

View 6

I hope this clears up any confusion you may have had about Dependent Views, Matchlines, and View References.

Troubleshooting Revit MEP

A 20 minute video from Autodesk's Harlan Brumm and Jerry Lee Smith covering:

Overview of the Revit MEP Workflow

• Create new project using MEP template
• Save Arch model as central file on server
• Link in models using origin-to-origin
• setting links to be room bounding
• copy/monitor levels
• Setting up views and apply view templates to views
• create levels to account for plenum spaces

Troubleshooting Spaces and Zones

• space not visible in view
• rooms are "unoccupied"

Troubleshooting Revit MEP Performance

• Not following workflow
• not creating logical systems
• large connected duct networks
• complicated families
• poorly connected elements
• Limit color schemes
• place endcaps on open ducts
• ensure flow direction on connectors is correct

Taking Advantage of View Templates

View Templates are preset view properties for your project or for your project template. You use view templates in your project to set views up quickly and to make sure that your views are consisitent with other views in the project. You do not want to be changing these view settings everytime for every view that you create in Revit MEP, but rather you would just apply a view template to a view. These view templates can be included in your project template or used in other projects using the Transfer Project Standards option and selecting View Templates as one of the objects to transfer.

Once you set the view scale, the visibilty/graphics settings, the discipline, the sub-discipline, and other view parameters, you can save those settings as a view template to apply to other views.

You can create this view template from an existing view by right-clicking on a view in the project browser and Create. Then you apply this view template to another view by right-clicking on a view in the project browser and Apply.

You might have multiple views on one sheet. You can apply one view template to multiple views at one time by right-clicking the sheet in the project browser, and Apply View Template to All Views. Once you open up the dialog box, you can clear the checkbox of any property that you don't want all the views to include. So if you don't want all the views to have the same scale, and retain the scale that was set in the original view, then you can clear the view scale property.

While you are applying a view template to a view, you can select the "Show Views" check box. This will show you all of the other views in the project that are of that type, and you can set your current view to the settings of another view without having to create a view template.

Transfer Filters from a Previous View in Revit

There is a fast way to transfer the filters from one view to another whether you have already created the filter, or need to create a new filter for your views.

You can get to the View templates from the SETTINGS pulldown menu, and click on one of the existing View Template names on the left, and Edit the properties of that view template on the right. There you will create a new Filter that will apply to this template. You can also create a new View template on the left, and edit the view properties on the right.

Then you can apply that view template to as many views as you want. You can select multiple views, right click, and apply a view template to them.



If you already created a filter in another view, you can go to the VIEW pulldown menu and create a view template from the current view that you created the filter from already. Then go back into view template settings, and make any additional modifications to that view template. Then select all the views that you want to apply it to, right click, and apply this view template to them.

Displaying room color fills in section views In Revit MEP 2009

To display the color fills and room objects in section views, you need to enable volume calculations. Follow these steps:

1. On the Settings menu, click Area and Volume Computations.
2. In the Area and Volume Computations dialog box, under Volume Computations, select the Areas and Volumes option.

Color fills and room objects will now be displayed in section views.