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Subelement

Public Class

An object that represents an element or a subelement within the Autodesk Revit project.

Inheritance Hierarchy

System.Object
Autodesk.Revit.DB.Subelement

Namespace: Autodesk.Revit.DB

Assembly: RevitAPI (in RevitAPI.dll) Version: 25.0.0.0 (25.0.0.0)

Syntax

public class Subelement : IDisposable

The Subelement type exposes the following members.

Properties

Name

Description

Public Property
Category

Retrieves a Category object that represents the category or sub category of the subelement.

Public Property

Document

The document in which the subelement resides.

Public Property
Element

The element in which the subelement resides.

Public Property
IsValidObject

Specifies whether the .NET object represents a valid Revit entity.

Public Property
TypeId

The identifier of this subelement’s type.

Public Property

UniqueId

A stable unique identifier for this subelement within the document.

Methods

Name

Description

Public Method
CanHaveTypeAssigned

Identifies if the subelement can have a type assigned.

Public Method
ChangeTypeId

Changes the type of the subelement.

Public Method
Static Member
Create

Creates an object representing element or subelement.

Public Method

Dispose

Releases all resources used by the Subelement

Public Method

Equals

Determines whether the specified object is equal to the current object.
(Inherited from Object)

Public Method

GetAllParameters

Returns all parameters of this subelement.

Public Method
GetBoundingBox

Retrieves a box that circumscribes all geometry of the subelement.

Public Method
GetGeometryObject

Retrieve one geometric primitive representing given subelement.

Public Method

GetHashCode

Serves as the default hash function.
(Inherited from Object)

Public Method

GetParameterValue

Obtains the current parameter value of this subelement given a parameter id.

Public Method

GetReference

Obtains the reference to this subelement.

Public Method

GetType

Gets the Type of the current instance.
(Inherited from Object)

Public Method
GetValidTypes

Obtains a set of types that are valid for this subelement.

Public Method

HasParameter

Checks if this subelement have given parameter.

Public Method

IsParameterModifiable

Checks if given parameter of this subelement is modifiable.

Public Method
Static Member
IsValidSubelementReference

Checks if given Reference identifies either a valid element or subelement.

Public Method
IsValidType

Checks if given type is valid for this subelement.

Public Method

SetParameterValue

Sets a new parameter value of this subelement given a parameter id.

Public Method

ToString

Returns a string that represents the current object.
(Inherited from Object)

Remarks

Subelements provide a way for parts of an element to behave as though they were real elements without incurring the overhead of adding more full elements to the model.

Many Revit features (for example parameters, schedules, and tags) were designed to operate on Elements. As a result, the Revit code needs to represent objects as Elements for them to participate in those features. This can lead to scalability problems, because every Element adds overhead and adding many Elements may decrease the performance of the model. An alternative is to use Subelements. An element can expose a set of “Subelements” that it contains, specifying characteristics like their category and parameters, and certain Revit capabilities will treat those Subelements the same as ordinary Elements. For example, a Subelement may contribute geometry to the main element and may be able to be selected independently of its parent Element. It will possibly have its own (settable) type as well as an assigned category which can be different from its parent Element.

In the API, the new Subelement class is used to refer to either an Element or a specific subelement of a given Element. It is typically directly related to a Reference to either the Element or the specific subelement. Note that creation of new Subelements for a given element is not done generically. Instead, the given Element may provide the ability to modify it’s definition, resulting in the creation of new Subelements.

Examples of Elements which may have Subelements in practice include:

To get access to a particular Subelement, you may use any of the following: