I always get the question asking can you change the default value for input from feet’ to inches” in Revit.  I always let users know that the input is what ever your projects units are set too, so Feet and Fractional inches will default to feet for input, however change the default setting to simply fractional inches and that will be the input (same in true for meters vs millimeters).   I let users know that they don’t have to use the ‘ and ” symbols, instead use the space bar or if you are a ten key person then use the hyphen key (1’6.5″ or 1 6.5 or 1 6 1/2 or 1-6.5 or 1-6-1/2).  At our ROMBiS meeting, our local BIM user group, a great tip came up about having a dim style set to inches thus allowing a user to type in inches with out having to use any of the tips above, no matter what the project units are set to.  The disadvantage of this is a permanent dimension string will have be associated with the element before it can be used for input.

There is also an old tool called Revit InchWorm if you wanted to check it out, I personally haven’t used it in a very long time so not sure how well it works with newer releases of Revit.

When a new release of Revit comes out I spend alot of time Right clicking with items selected and RC on different grips etc.  I do this because inevitably there is some new undocumented feature in each release that I find.  While in Revit 2013 I thought I had found a new one, only to realize that it was there in 2012 and I had just missed it.  In AutoCAD when you moved the dimension text from it’s home location there was a command called Dim Home that would put the text back to it original location.  Over the years I had just come to get used to the fact that there wasn’t anything like this inside of Revit, you just had to drag the text back to the original location.  I found out that in Revit 2012 if you RC on a dimension that has been moved there is a new option to Reset Dimension Text Position.  This does however reset all moved text back to it’s original location.  In the image below all of the 4″ dimensions will go back to the home position if this is selected.