Translating Custom Parameters from Revit to Power BI: A short VIM Cloud Guide

Hey BIM folks,

I'm often asked how to get custom parameters out of the dry, technical world of Revit and into Power BI. This challenge resonates with many AEC pros - and their BIM adjacent stakeholders - so let me share one way it can be done using cloud.vimaec.com.

Original Article: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7090405923633975296

Setting Up: Introducing VIM Cloud

The first thing you need to do is get your VIM up into VIM Cloud. VIM Cloud allows you to convert the VIM into a Power BI template of your choosing. Whichever template you choose serves as your launchpad for customizing in Power BI on the Desktop.

Once the report is made, download it. The downloaded file is a .pbix file - the native format that Power BI desktop opens its projects into. What's great about this process is all of your widgets remain intact, including the 3D viewer.

Customizing Parameters: Enhanced Visibility

One of the primary focuses of this tutorial is to enhance the visibility of custom parameters, specifically, custom shared parameters. I'm told these parameters hold a lot of key project data and getting them on display throughout the project process is of high importance.

In the video tutorial, we adjust a table and introduce a pie chart to the Power BI report. The pie chart shows how many of the shared parameters actually have populated data - a pretty sweet insight.

Results: A Customized VIM Template Report

And there you have it! A simple yet effective update to the VIM template report that includes enhanced customization. This makes the report more insightful and useful for everyone, from project managers to stakeholders.

Coming Up: An Automated Pipeline

So this is where we start, because VIM Cloud will (very) soon become part of an automated pipeline. In my next video, I'll introduce how to use that modified .pbix file to VIM Cloud as a new custom template, just for you.