Relay for Revit - Adding .dyns to Ribbon

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Adding .dyns to your Revit ribbon has been a “hot topic” for quite some time. Even recently we have seen others do this in very clever ways.

I won’t link all of the other ways on this post as there are already a lot of posts on here about them

With all of this development, I became curious about how one could go about doing this, so I started investigating.

After reading these posts on the forum, (here and here, I managed to get something that mostly works. :grin:

After spending a little time creating and documenting the tool, I am pleased to say that we open-sourced it (under the GPL-3 License).

If you are interested, check out the documentation here:

and the Github here:

and it in action here:

20200925-relayUsage
20200925-relayUsage817×174 95.9 KB

and a picture of a cool duck here:
:duck:

Keep in mind that the tool is provided “as-is” and open-source. It should not be considered a full “production-ready” tool.

*Edit: If you end up using the tool and make a sweet ribbon, please share the screenshots here! :blush:

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Cool
Give some more credit to the guys that
did half the work and its even better.
Love it.
It prevents making money for some
All the better.

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Started my sweet ribbon :slight_smile:

Video: https://autode.sk/341S5t0

Image:

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What would happen if there are multiple versions of Dynamo installed? Currently using Dyno with R19 & R20 and have split packages due to dynamo V1.3 & 2.3 and there is no issue there. Looking at how to continue using a ribbon with R21 as the latest dyno update won’t support R19 due to the dynamo version.

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Revit 2019 has Dynamo 2.0.4 so I would say to give it a shot with that setup. (Relay is built against the Dynamo 2.x.x API)

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Oh this is shameless self promotion but we do support that very easily in Orkestra :slight_smile:https://www.orkestra.online/

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Very cool. I mentioned Orkestra on the notion documentation for the tool too. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Hi John,

I would like to use the very useful “Relay”.

Unfortunately it does not start with Dynamo 2.6 and Dynamo 2.10.
“The file or assambly “file://c:…\Relay.dll” or a dependency of it was not found. The operation is not supported. (HRESULT exception: 0x80131515)”

Is it possible to adapt it to Dnamo 2.10? There are unfortunately too many non-programmers in the world :-).

Best regards

Rolf

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Hey @rolf.archi,
Have a look to NonicaTab in Autodesk App Store. Both versions are supported in Dynamo 2.0 and later versions as well. You can set up your Dynamo scripts as Revit buttons in 2 clicks. No coding required!

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Hi Nonica.io,

NonicaTab is also good.

It consumes too much space (only one command per column) and unfortunately only 12 “free” commands :-(.

Best regards

Rolf

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Chill out man.

You’re a really annoying user, you’re all over the forum promoting your tool, even in this topic which is promoting another tool. If you have created a topic for your work, let it flow, if not, create one.

I’d like to see you helping others in the forum by solving some topics, instead of just repeating your promotional mantra…

Regards,

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Did you follow the installation steps exactly from here?

You need to unblock the DLL as specified in the article.

In my example on that page specifically, I demonstrate how to install for Revit 2020 which uses Dynamo 2.6 I believe.

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Hi John,

the instructions were of course followed exactly.

In package “Relay for Revit 1.0.2a” is missing the file “Relay.addin”.

Also with the “Relay.addin” from the source the tool unfortunately does not start (Revit 2021 + Dynamo 2.6 and Revit 2022 + Dynamo 2.10).

Tested with “Revit 2021 | Dynamo 2.5.0”?

Best regards

Rolf

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The specific exception you get

seems to be a result of not unblocking the DLL. After unzipping you mist right click on the DLL and select “unblock”

https://thebuildingcoder.typepad.com/blog/2011/10/revit-add-in-file-load-exception.html

In the future I might provide an installer for this, but this tool was meant to be open and free and providing installers and all that adds to the “overhead” for a free tool. :grimacing:

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Hi John,

the dll “from another computer” was locked (Windows is getting more secure!). I have read about this, but never had such a problem before.

Now “relay” works perfectly and will be a very big help here.

Thanks for creating and sharing the code (keep it up) and fixing the installation problem.

Best regards from Berlin and “Make Dynamo great”

Rolf

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So glad to hear it! Thanks again for testing the tool. I have a few things going on this quarter, but I am hoping to work on that tool a bit more further in the spring. There are quite a few new features folks (including myself) would like to see. :slight_smile:

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:loudspeaker: Relay Version 1.2.1 Update:

:new: New Features:

  • Tooltips are now supported using the built-in Dynamo graph properties. No extra steps! :partying_face:
    adding description in graph properties - introduced in Dynamo 2.12 with migration back to Dynamo 2.6.0
    adding description in graph properties - introduced in Dynamo 2.12 with migration back to Dynamo 2.6.0

  • resulting tooltip in UI
    resulting tooltip in UI

  • Revit 2023 Now Supported

  • F1 Contextual Help Added if URL in graph properties is filled out
    image

:gear: Changes

  • Supported Versions of Revit now include 2021, 2022, and 2023. Users have reported success with versions older than 2021, but use in those versions is definitely at your own risk.
  • Sample graphs for Revit 2022 and Revit 2023 have been revised to account for the node size changes.

:thinking: Where to Download?

:interrobang: Disclaimers / Good to Know

  • If you are going to test the tool please be sure to thoroughly read the documentation here.

  • Keep in mind that this variant of the tool is provided “as-is” and open-source with limited support (I only have so much time on my hands :disappointed: ). It should not be considered a full “production-ready” tool in its open-source state.

Also, remember to always have fun and you know what, go take a walk outside today, you deserve it. :wink:

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Awesome tool! Took me a minute to figure out the references in visual studio.

The recommended data-shapes UI is not very institutive (for me) in making graphs like the select elements node is. Is there a way to launch dynamo player so that I don’t have to rework my input nodes so that dynamo player defaults to the [script.dyn] subfolder where the buttons are stored? Maybe adding multiple buttons; one to launch the player and the other to run the script, perhaps Automatic mode and manual mode?

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Glad you like the tool!

Can you elaborate a bit more re: Dynamo Player? Relay specifically works where it runs Dynamo UI-Less.

If the question is regarding making Relay open the Dynamo Player UI, unfortunately, that is not doable (to my knowledge). This was meant to fire off DYNs from the ribbon quickly, and as far as I know, Dynamo Player’s UI is pretty off-limits in terms of external access.

There are other options (some paid) if you want inputs to be recognized automagically. Orkestra, Nonica, etc.

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Yes, Opening the Dynamo Player UI was my question exactly. I’m frugal and don’t like paying for something I can do myself. I added some watch nodes and found my issue was just some lists needed flattening so It’s not as difficult as I thought. Fortunately, I don’t have that many scripts to update with the UI so Relay is going to workout for me just fine.

1 Like