IFC Referencing

[shorter]

Just wondering...

 

Who finds this useful?

 

Or put another way, how much time have you wasted referencing an IFC versus importing the IFC once, and then referencing the imported model?

 

Given the IFC, like DWG re-imports every time you update the reference, and does not if you import and then reference, I am wondering whether I am missing something.

 

IFC generally tend to be a lot bigger than DWG, increasing the time wasted waiting for it to update the reference.

 

When importing first, It is possible to edit the imported model, e.g. delete extraneous content, reclassify objects, clean it up, and generally reducing it's size, even exploding all IFC entities and reducing it to the base geometry (who needs the data inside an IFC when working in VW?), before referencing it.

 

Seem IFC referencing is nice to have but possibly a bit of a red herring?

[zoomer]

I also prefer importing everything in a shuttle file before referencing

by Viewport. For the reasons you mentioned.

In some cases I import more than one external file into a single

shuttle file (e.g. when all sources use same DWG Layers and such)

 

The only problem for me is, in case you need to really update your

sources in the shuttle file,

VW Viewports do not recognize updated Layers of References

by Name - but by some UUID.

And when you try to re-import a new Layer, delete the old Layer

and rename the new Layer import to the previous name,

the referenced Layers in your DLVP will change visibilities !

 

So as a workaround, in your import shuttle file, in case of a geometry

update, you will need to

- import on a new VW Layer but keep the old geometry Layer.

- delete all old geometry on original Layer

- select and move all new geometry from new to original Layer

- save shuttle file

- Update reference in work file.

This way your DLVP references will stay intact.

 

 

And the general problem for me about References in general,

direct referencing into Layers is useless as updating will

overwrite your visibility changes. So DLVP referencing recommended.

But DLVP Crops are not compatible with 3D View Windows.

[shorter]

We use Layer Referencing, with internal viewports, exclusively so we can utilise the 'Ignore Source User Origin' button which ensure reliable referencing relative to the internal origin, critical for reliable coordination.

 

As a consequence we get no issues with the way graphics and visibility is set by design layer viewports.  We don't use them.

 

Some of the issues you mention are resolved by having some sort of documented standard but getting everyone adopting it is tricky.

 

When they do, it's very efficient.

 

DWG file names don't change.  Therefore layer names don't change.  Therefore, you simply re-direct the link to another file, and any viewport visibility is maintained.

 

IFC is another matter since few using Revit appear to realise that level views don't have to be called 'Level 0'.