Add links to features using rules

Link rules allow you to use attribute data in feature and scene layers to automatically link BIM 360 documents to GIS data. You can create links by specifying the attribute that contains the URL of the document in the Autodesk Construction Cloud or by specifying the Autodesk Construction Cloud identifiers for the project and document item. Complete the steps in the following sections to add links to features using rules.

Create a Viewer URL rule

If you used ArcGIS Pro to create web maps and web scenes using the BIM Cloud Connection, you can use the SharedView attribute or any other attribute that contains a valid URL to an Autodesk document to automatically link the document URL to features.

1. Click the Select Layer drop-down arrow and choose the layer you want to add the rule.
2. Click Add.

   The Add Expression dialog box appears.

3. Click the Rule drop-down arrow and choose ViewerUrl.
4. Click the BIM Viewer Url drop-down arrow and choose SharedView.

   If your Autodesk document URLs are stored in a different attribute, choose that attribute from the BIM Viewer Url drop-down menu.

5. Click OK.

   The link rule is added to the table below the map.

Now you're ready to add more links or share your project.

Create a BIM Document rule

The BIM Document rule is used by the georeferencing process to create links between the Documents and Issues feature services and the source data to which they refer. You can create a BIM Document rule by providing the BIM 360 Project ID and Item ID of the document from BIM 360.

1. Click the Select Layer drop-down arrow and choose the BIM Document or Issue layer to which you want to add the rule.

   Note:

   The BIM Document and Issue layers may contain existing link rules that were created by the Locate Engineering Documents and Locate Issues tools on the Tools page.

2. Click Add.

   The Add Expression dialog box appears.

3. Click the Rule drop-down arrow and choose BIMDocument.
4. Click the BIM Project Id drop-down arrow and choose projectId.
5. Click the BIM Item Id drop-down arrow and choose itemId.

   Note:

   You can use ArcGIS analysis to perform spatial joins between the Documents and Issues feature services to allow these rules to apply to other feature services of interest. For example, a high-consequence gas pipeline that did not originate from BIM 360 can be linked to the relevant BIM 360 engineering documents by assigning the [projectid] and [itemid] values based on spatial joins with georeferenced documents.

6. Click OK.

   The link rule is added to the table below the map.

Now you're ready to add more links or share your project.

Create a BIM Document Name rule

The BIM Document Name rule can use any attribute that contains a document name to create links to its source data. You can create a BIM Document Name rule by providing the BIM display name of the document from BIM 360 .

1. Click the Select Layer drop-down arrow and choose the feature layer to which you want to add the rule.
2. Click Add.
   The Add Expression dialog box appears.
3. Click the Rule drop-down arrow and choose DocumentName.
4. Click the DocumentName drop-down arrow and choose the attribute that represents the document name.
5. Click OK.

   The link rule is added to the table below the map.

Note:

The value in the attribute of the selected feature layer searches for documents in BIM 360 with a display name that matches or contains the attribute value. The search is case sensitive for the attribute value, which means the attribute value as lower case, upper case, and with the first letter of the value capitalized also matches the search.

Now you're ready to add more links or share your project.

Create a Schedule Feature rule

The Schedule Feature rule allows you to link a schedule table to the schedule feature layer.

1. Click the Add button to the right of the Select Layer drop-down menu.

   The Add Expression dialog box appears.

2. Click the Rule drop-down arrow and choose Schedule Feature.
3. Click the Schedule Join Field drop-down arrow, then select the attribute you want to use for the join rule (typically "Id" or "Name").
4. Click the Feature Layer drop-down arrow, then select the layer in the currently selected map or scene that you want to link.
5. Click the Layer Join Field drop-down arrow, then select the layer field you want to use for the join rule.

   The Layer Join Field setting is used to select an attribute in the Feature Layer table that joins with the schedule.

6. Click OK.

   The link rule is added to the table below the map.

Now you're ready to add more links or share your project.