How to Find Linework Overrides in Revit

The Linework tool is much misused in Revit - it seems like a quick and easy way to make individual lines look the way you want.  In reality, it wastes much more time than it saves - this is because it is so hard to undo or change later on.  My advice to Reviteers is to use it as a last resort when every other method cannot or will not work - instead you should use sub-categories, filters, view visibility overrides or even object styles.

What does a BIM or Model Manager do to figure out when the Linework tool has been used?  Well, it is basically guesswork.  All you can do is set the linework linestyle to <By Category> and then hover the cursor over any lines that you suspect might have been tampered with using the Linework tool.

Why is this inconsistent with so many other Revit tools that have a 'None' option that sits at the top of the list?  Who knows - it is lost in development history, but it makes training harder.
And why is <By Category> not automatically at the top of the list?  I guess because it sorts alphabetically - but it is very irritating trying to find it in a list.

Once you have managed to select the linestyle of  <By Category> you then hover the mouse over the line and it will probably turn dark blue - which is not easy to spot on a large busy view.

Tip to speed up the search

I know of a quick tip that will help you in the search for overriden lines:
All you have to do is change the 'Pre-selection' colour to something brighter.

• Go to Revit Options
• Choose 'Graphics'
• Spend 30 seconds wondering why 'Selection' and 'Pre-selection' colours are the same, and why dark blue, which is very hard to distinguish when most lines are black in Revit.
• Spend another 30 seconds wondering which $#&*%$#* at Autodesk thought it was a good idea to make the default setting colours both dark blue.
• If the colours are not both dark blue in your options, then you probably need to praise your BIM Manager for changing the Revit.ini file that is rolled out in your company.  Give them a gold star or buy them a drink

• Change the 'Pre-selection' colour to something really bright like red (unless you are red/green colour-blind, in which case choose something else).
• I like to change the selection colour too, although it is tricky to get a good selection that is not the same as sketch lines, and all the other special line types like Area boundaries.

Now when you hover the cursor over any line that has had a linework override applied, it shows up red (or whatever bright colour you chose) - don't forget that it only works when you have set the linestyle to <By Category>

I hope this saves someone, somewhere in the world a few minutes, and eliminates some anguish