Dynamo and Grasshopper for Revit Cheat Sheet Reference Manual

Welcome to the Dynamo and Grasshopper for Revit Cheat Sheet Reference Manual. This manual is a collection of side by side Dynamo and Grasshopper examples in a one-page summary format also referred to as "Cheat Sheets".

Dynamo and Grasshopper are both visual programming languages that, among other things, read and write to Revit.

The ability to automate and extend the functionality of Revit for projects is extremely helpful and using Dynamo and Grasshopper allows that to happen. Since they both are similar it made sense to create a reference manual that shows how to do the same example in both Dynamo and Grasshopper. Grasshopper examples are shown on the left in green and the equivalent Dynamo examples are shown on the right in red. Notice that Dynamo and Grasshopper concepts are embedded in each example. See the image below for a breakdown on how to read the cheat sheet format. It is important to read all the notes, steps, and annotations on each page to get an understanding of how each example works.

This manual is intended for Dynamo users who want to learn Grasshopper for Revit, Grasshopper users who want to learn Dynamo for Revit, and users who are new to both Dynamo and Grasshopper and want to learn one or the other. This manual is also intended as a quick reference for current Dynamo and/or Grasshopper users at all levels. This manual will introduce the readers to a more introductory level of practical Grasshopper and Dynamo for Revit concepts.

There are hundreds of nodes in Grasshopper and Dynamo and it would not be possible to show all of them in this manual. Also, this manual focuses on out-of-the-box nodes for Grasshopper and Dynamo to give the readers a good understanding of what is available after install. If custom nodes are used, then the example will mention it. Also, just like the nodes, this manual could not possibly cover all subjects of Grasshopper and Dynamo so instead it focuses on Grasshopper and Dynamo examples that are important to their interaction with Revit.

This manual is intended to show concepts and not entire workflows through various examples. Each example is intentionally small and typically contains no more than 8 nodes. These concepts could be combined to make more complex scripts.

This manual is broken down into four major parts. Part 1 focuses on Grasshopper and Dynamo geometry. Part 2 focuses on the Revit database and how to use Dynamo and Grasshopper for Revit. Part 3 focuses on how to create your own custom Dynamo and Grasshopper nodes using C#. These concepts could also be applied to other programming languages. Part 4 focuses on interoperability and how to move geometry and data from Rhino to Revit and from Dynamo to Revit. There is a Table of Contents and a Node Index to help readers quickly find specific nodes or examples.