- [Instructor] This video, I want to go over
the concept of vrsions
in BIM 360 and a few other miscellaneous management tools
that you might want to be aware of.
I'm going to start here in the BIM 360 portal.
And I'm in the design Collaboration module.
And before I start talking about versions,
I just want to point out a little tool right here
on the right hand corner that allows you
to get email notifications.
So this doesn't really have anything to do with versions
but it is useful, nonetheless,
if it says here every time somebody creates a package
and shares it or consumes it, you can toggle this switch
to get an email.
So if your team is using the shared or consumed workflows,
it might be nice to keep informed with those emails.
Alright, so that's optional something you can set
and that's per user.
Okay, so let's talk about versions now.
There's a couple different places
where we can see different versions of the files
that we're using and they behave quite differently
from one another.
So I want to make sure that it's really clear
and that you understand what the difference is.
So let's start here in Design Collaboration.
I'll click the project model link here
that will open it up in the viewer.
Now it defaults to the Content Browser view over here,
I will switch to the team's view,
and then you can see that I have two models,
Arch model and MEP model.
Arch model is version nine, MEP is version four.
Now this is information only, you can't do anything
with that version here in Design Collaboration.
If I go to the Module Picker and I switched
to Document Management
and then I'm here my Architecture folder,
here's my Arch Model, notice that version nine
shows up here.
Now I can't show you the MEP Model and it's version four
because Douchey who I'm logged in as doesn't have access
to the MEP folder but rest assured it's showing version four
for the users who can see it.
This version ID you can actually interact with.
So if I click on it, that will display the version history
for this file.
And you'll see that this is version nine,
but here's the seven previous versions
that occurred before it.
Now we've already talked about
how you can use the Compare versions button down here
to compare the current one with the previous one.
And you can even change this and compare it
with some earlier one, I'm going to cancel that.
So we already have talked about that in the past.
What I want you to see here is that
there's some other icons beneath each version.
You can copy a version, you can download the source file
of aversion, it's kind of interesting,
and you can make a previous version current.
So that would actually move version eight up
in front of version nine.
Now it wouldn't renumber them,
so it would say version eight now as the current version
and version nine would just slot down behind it, okay?
But if people viewed that current version in BIM 360,
they would be seeing version eight as the current version.
But what exactly do these versions mean?
Those are published versions of the model,
these are not syncs with Central.
Remember that what people see in BIM 360
is whatever you've published.
The only people that see what you're doing in Revit
are you and your teammates within the same firm
or team or behind your own firewall.
So users that have access to the same models
as you and can do sync with Central.
There's also a series of versions being created there
but we don't see those here in BIM 360
that you can only see from within Revit.
So let's take a look at that now.
So I'm going to close this and let's switch over to Revit.
So I'm here in Revit
and I'm going to click the Collaborate Tab.
and to see the versions of the model here in Revit.
I use the Managed Cloud Models button.
Now that displays this rather large
and awkward dialogue box.
It doesn't have the nicest interface,
it's a little antiquated,
and the thing that I don't like about it
is it doesn't give me any indication of my account.
So it only shows me the projects
and it just sort of piles them all in here.
So if you're a member of many projects,
it can be a kind of unruly mess here
to locate the project you need.
Well, I'm going to click this one down here, Nadia's garden.
Cause that's the project that I'm currently working in.
And when I get there for my team, there's only one model.
So it's going to make this part pretty easy,
but it would list all the models
that are part of this Nadia's garden project.
Currently only one in this case.
Now, if you hover over the model,
you will see a couple of small icons appear right here
and here.
The first icon, if I hover over,
it says the latest version is published.
If the latest version was not published,
it would have a slightly different looking icon
that I could click on and publish that latest version.
So this would provide an alternative way
to publish the latest version if you wish.
So you're welcome to use that when you're publishing models.
If you wanted to publish all the models on the list.
and again, I only have one, but if I had several,
there's an icon up here for that
you could choose publish all.
The second icon is the one that I want to talk about.
That's just labeled as Actions
but if I click it, there are two choices here.
Now, relinquish is kind of interesting,
if somebody forgets to relinquish objects,
when they sync with central,
then you can force relinquish with this tool.
Now, of course you want to use that with caution
because if somebody is actively editing those objects,
that could be problematic.
So only use this when you need to,
because somebody has left or been removed from the team
or go on vacation, whatever the case may be.
But this is how you could force relinquish ownership
of all the elements in that model.
But the thing I want to talk about is this one right here,
View versions.
So if I click that, that will go to a new screen.
And this now shows me the complete history
of every sync with Central that's taken place in this model.
If you look over here,
you can see the current version is 34.
So back in BIM 360, we had nine published versions.
but there actually have been 34 sinks
with Central in this project.
Now that's kind of a small number for a typical project.
You might be in the hundreds in your projects.
Well, just the same the complete history is listed here.
And this is also where you see all the comments,
if people are using comments,.
So comments are not required, but it can be nice
because it gives you a little bit of a clue
what was going on in each of these versions
at the time that it was synchronized.
It's the actions column that I want
to direct your attention to here.
Notice that this little icon says restore.
Now I'm currently hovering over sync with Central number 26,
version number 26.
If I were to click this restore,
that is a destructive action.
It would remove all the versions beyond that.
So 27 through 34 would all be deleted
and you could not recover them.
So once you roll back to an older version,
there's no going back.
So you only do this in extreme circumstances
where it becomes absolutely necessary.
But in land-based work sharing, there's a different command
for this it's called restore backups.
Well, to get to that same restore backup functionality
in a BIM 360 project, you have to come here.
So I hope you understand a little bit better now
the difference between versions.
When we talk about versions of sync with Central,
that's behind the firewall within your team
and only other Revit users that have access
to your team's folders would be able to synchronize
and see those changes.
When we talk about BIM 360, we're talking
about published versions that you've made available
to the broader project team everybody using BIM 360.
All right, I'm going to close this now and talk
about one last thing.
You may recall that when we opened the project first time
that we pointed out that we no longer get our username
underneath the file name,
and it's not putting it in the local files copy anymore.
So where exactly is it putting this local copy?
And I did assure you that it is making a local copy
on your local hard drive, but I never did address exactly
where that file lives.
So let's take a look at that now I'm going to minimize Revit
and I have here open in the background,
a windows Explorer window.
And there's a rather long path up here at the top.
So if I kind of click in here and then click again
and just start dragging over this part
at the end of the path is all generated
automatically by Revit.
Those are unique identifiers,
but then that lives in the Collaboration cash folder,
which is in the Revit 2021 folder,
which is in the Revit folder
and the audit has folder and the local folder
under app data.
And if we go all the way back, it's C users,
and of course, this is my username.
Your username would vary here.
Now, if you want to learn more about local files
and some other information regarding this,
I found a really nice article on the subject
here at my good friend, Dan Stine's blog.
If you want to take a look at this article
and read up on it, he talks about the local files
and some of the reasons why you might access
and hem and how you would do that.
So it's rare that you need to access those local copies,
but in the case where you do, it's kind of nice to know
that they're there and how to get to them.
Those are some management tools that you'll need to have
at your disposal.
I hope you have a better understanding of
how versions work now, both published versions
and local versions and also where your local files
actually live deep within your hard drive.