IN THIS ARTICLE:

You have collected information for an Element in Layer and now you want to be able to tie it back to a REVIT Object.

This will enable you to click on an object in REVIT when using Live Link and see all the pertinent information about it.

Also allows you to update parameters of your REVIT Object using Sync Rules.

Auto Lookup Fields are powerful Fields in that they create connections between Layer Elements and REVIT Objects.

The main prerequisites for these connections to be established are:

i. Your REVIT Object to have a parameter that can be used as a matching agent

ii. Your Layer Element to have a Text Input Field whose content matches exactly that REVIT Parameter

In this example we will connect an Element from our Product Specs Category to a REVIT Furniture Object using the Type Mark Parameter.

Under your Furniture Model Category create a Display REVIT Parameter Field as below

(Tip: The name of the Field will be later used in our Lookup Field to point to the Type Mark Parameter)

2. Expose the REVIT Parameter to be used as a link

Under Select Parameter to Show choose the Type Mark Parameter from the drop down menu.

You can also decide to expose other Parameters such as Level or Keynote as you can display those in your Lookup Field should you decide to later. The most important one for this example is the Type Mark.

(Tip: For a Room Data Sheet workflow, you can decide to expose the Room Name and use that as the matching agent to connect a Room Data Sheet to a collection of Rooms that share the same Room Name)

In your Product Spec Element that you want to connect to your REVIT Object, create a Text Input Field that will contain the value of the REVIT Object's Type Mark.

For this example we want to connect our Armless Lounge Chair Element in the Product Specs Category to our 12 Chair Object from REVIT.

Our 12 Chair from REVIT has a Type Mark of CH-1.

Hang in there we are almost done!

One more step to add our Auto Lookup Field and create the connection 🔗 !

In this step we will create a Lookup Field under our Product Specs Category.

I will name this Field Levels of this Chair in Model. Short name, right?!

Well, I want to expose the Levels of every Chair 12 Object from my REVIT model that we exposed in Step 2 along with the Type Mark Parameter.

Create a Lookup Field

This time you will need to pick the Automatic Option of the Lookup Field.

This will prompt you:
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​i. With the Automatic Criteria dropdown boxed displaying Source and Target and

ii. The Field to Lookup dropdown box.

Source Category will always be the Category you are creating the Lookup under.

Source Field is looking for the Field in the Product Specs Category that contains the value CH-1. You got this, this is the Item Tag

Target Category will be the Category you are connecting.

In this case we are connecting to our Furniture Model Category. (Model categories have R next to them)

Target Field is the Field that contains the Type Mark Property.

YES! It is the Identity Field from Step 1

That creates the Connection between Layer and REVIT Woo-Hoo!

Now for the very last step, I promise!

The Field to Lookup dropdown box allows you to select Fields and previously exposed Parameters from the REVIT Object that it the Lookup is connected to.

Since in this example I want to see the Levels that my Chair 12 belongs to I will choose the Level Parameter from my Identity Field.

WE DID IT!

We created the connection between REVIT and Layer!

(Hot Tip: To get quantities, such as the amount of Chair 12 Instances you can toggle the list switch icon inside the Lookup Field to expose more options)

Did we miss something?

Not to worry! Just email our support team at help@layer.team ✌️