The Shared Parameters feature allows Company Admins to manage the company’s shared parameters file in a single location and provides an update history.
The Shared Parameters tab is visible to all users, but only Company Admins will be able to upload and manage their shared parameter files to UNIFI. To do this, access the UNIFI Web Portal by clicking on the globe icon on the left side of the screen in UNIFI.
A browser window will open with the UNIFI Web Portal. Select Shared Parameters from the left side of the screen.
User Functionality
Since users have read-only access, they are limited to viewing, sorting, and searching the current company shared parameters. A button in the UNIFI Revit add-in notifies users when changes have been made to their company’s shared parameters, so they can sync the latest version to their local machine and access the shared parameters in Revit to be added to a family or project.
Within the Actions menu, users can only download a copy of the current shared parameter file (which can be used with Revit) or export the data to a CSV file (which cannot be used in Revit).
On the Update History tab, users can view and download all versions (including deleted versions). They can also download the originally uploaded file, if desired, for reference.
Users can also compare what has changed between the two selected versions. To do this, they would simply select the box next to the versions they want to compare and then select Compare Selected Versions.
This will display a window that highlights what values have been added, removed, or changed.
Company Admin Functionality
In this section, we'll talk about the different additional features available to admins.
Admins can upload additional shared parameters by clicking the Select File button and selecting a shared parameter file to upload.
UNIFI will check to ensure the file selected is a text file in the proper shared parameter file format.
With all new uploads, the admin has the option to include a comment that will be displayed next to the applicable version on the Update History tab.
If the uploaded shared parameter file takes longer than 30 seconds to process, it will become a “Pending Version” and you’ll see the following message:
The file will continue processing in the background and another shared parameter file cannot be uploaded until it is fully processed.
If no conflicts were found during processing, the changes will automatically be applied. If conflicts were found, the user can click “Resolve Pending Conflicts” to review and resolve pending conflicts to complete the upload or cancel the pending version.
When uploading shared parameter files, UNIFI will append new parameters (unique by GUID), check for duplicate GUIDs, and will ignore parameters that already exist in the database. If the admin attempts to upload data that contains no new parameters or changes to existing parameters in the UNIFI database, they will be shown an error message that no differences have been detected and given the option to cancel the upload or try again.
If the system identifies duplicate GUIDs, UNIFI will display a Resolve Conflicts dialog. In order to complete the upload, the admin must resolve each conflict by selecting to keep either the original value or the new value (indicated by the exclamation point). They can also view which parameters will be added or unchanged and modify their comment before completing the conflict resolution.
Pro Tip: The system is only checking for duplicate GUID values. If it finds multiple parameters with the same GUID, they will be presented as a conflict to be resolved. Other duplicate values, such as parameter name, may exist without conflict.
If admins would like to edit parameter values directly in the Web Portal, they can do so by selecting the Edit Parameters option within the actions menu on the Manage Shared Parameters tab.
Once in edit mode, admins can rename parameters, change their group (including creating a new group), change the Visible and User Modifiable values, add a description, and/or delete parameters. Any changes from the current values will be detected and the modified parameters will be selected and highlighted in yellow. Parameters to be deleted will be selected and highlighted in red. The admin can revert any individual parameters by unselecting them. Once they are satisfied with the changes, they will need to click Save Selected Changes and those changes will be applied and a new version will be generated.
On the Update History tab, admins can hover over any version to download it, restore it as the current version (which will create a new version that matches the state of the restored version), or delete it. If they entered a comment when a shared parameter file was uploaded, it will appear under the Comments column. If not, or if they made a change within the portal, UNIFI will automatically populate the Comments column with a summary of the number of parameters that were added, removed, and changed.
Deleted versions are hidden by default but can be viewed by selecting Show Deleted Versions in the top right of the screen and these versions can be undeleted if desired.
The ability to directly manage shared parameters within the UNIFI Web Portal will save BIM managers and their content creators time by making it easy to manage a standardized set of shared parameters and always know they’re using the latest and greatest shared parameters, minimizing any re-work.
