The Family That Won't Schedule
A project uses a custom door family built in-house. The doors place and cut correctly, and tags read the Mark value. However, the door schedule is missing the Fire Rating column entirely, and the Width column shows blanks for about a third of the doors. The technician added a shared parameter called Fire Rating to the family and reloaded it, but the schedule still does not offer the parameter. The family was originally built as a generic model family and later changed to the Door category. Width is a type parameter in the family, driven by a formula from the type name.
1. Why is Fire Rating absent from the schedule despite being added to the family?
Read the worked answer
Adding a parameter to the family is only half the job; the schedule reads project parameters, not family-local parameters, unless the parameter is shared and bound into the project.
Likely causes, in order of probability:
- The parameter was created as a family parameter (not shared) - it exists inside the family but is not exposed to the project, so the schedule's field list never shows it.
- It was created as shared but the family was not reloaded and the parameter not added to the project via Manage > Project Parameters (or it was added to the wrong category).
- The schedule's category filter or the parameter's assigned categories exclude Doors.
Fix: confirm the parameter is a shared parameter with a definition in the shared parameter file; add it to the Door category in the family; reload; then in the project add the shared parameter to the Doors category if it is not already bound. Only then will Fire Rating appear in the schedule's available fields. Also check the schedule is not filtered to a type that lacks the value.
2. Why do Width values appear blank, and how would you correct the data without breaking the family?
Read the worked answer
Width is a type parameter driven by a formula from the type name. If the formula parses the type name and the name does not match the expected pattern, the formula returns nothing or an invalid result, and the schedule shows blank. A third of doors being blank strongly suggests those types were renamed or created by duplicating and editing the name inconsistently.
Diagnosis:
- Open the family, inspect the Width formula and the exact string pattern it expects.
- In the project, list the door types whose Width is blank and compare their type names to the pattern.
- Check whether those types are actually the same family - a mixed family or a nested family could be supplying the blanks.
Correction, least invasive first:
- Rename the offending types to match the formula pattern, then reload and verify.
- If renaming is unacceptable, change Width from a formula-driven type parameter to an instance or type parameter entered directly, or drive it from a shared parameter populated by the schedule.
Avoid editing the formula to "catch" bad names with nested IFs; that hides data problems. Fix the type names or the parameter strategy, then re-check the schedule for completeness.