AutoCAD Electrical 2012 Custom Components - Network Sharing

[rwydesk500]

I'm currently working toward a network sharing of custom electrical components. I've created a custom folder on a network drive and copied all of my custom components there. I've also included that network folder into the AE search path so it knows to look there first.

Shouldn't the Menu Icons also be placed there so others can reference the Icon Library from the network?

[testsubject]

Rick,

You can one step further and locate the Menu.dat file on the server as well.

Doug McAlexander has a good write up on how to "network" the package.

http://ecadconsultant.com/tips.html#Networking

[rwydesk500]

Hi Bob,

I am familiar with Doug's section on this. He did not appear to address the handling of Icon menu file.

However, I think the files you are refering to are the ACE_JIC_MENU.DAT and ACE_PANEL_MENU.DAT files. If I COPY my custom ICON Images to the network drive (as I've already done with the custom components, but different folder?), and COPY these DAT files to a the network location (what folder?), then I should be able to open the project properties and add the appropriate path to the DAT files by selecting the DEFAULT button, right?

Thank you.

[electricman1]

Another approach may be to create a batch file which copies/replaces files on user's hard drives. I have experienced both methods which include keeping everything on a mapped drive vs periodic local hard drive updates..

The mapped drive approach is great, but depending on the network lag you may run up a lot of complaints. I've seen dozens of CAD users leave early because a server/network is down. Not something management appreciates.

[rwydesk500]

I'm not sure how to write a batch file that would do that and I'm not sure what kind of network lag I'll be experiencing yet.

Maybe I'll just copy the libraries from my hard drive to the network drive and then back down to hard drive on another machine. Since I'm only dealing with one other user, it probably won't be a big deal to maintain after the intial 'dump' (Not exactly automatic though).

Thanks for the input.

[rwydesk500]

If Autodesk came up with a component etransmit that grabs all of the appropriate files from my hard drive, place them into a similar directory structure on the network so others could do an 'erecieve' back down to their hard drive, I would be 

[metal_pro2]

There are some programs out there that might help with what you want to do.

check out this previous post it might help.

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/AutoCAD-Electrical/Shared-ACE-information/m-p/2430818#M17241

[Anonymous]

Hi Rick,

The Icon Menu (dat files) are considered Temp files... and you DO NOT SHARE TEMP FILES!

(dat files are stored in the roaming user profile) 

That said, depending on the number of users you can get away with doing this.

Typically if you have more the 5 users your network is bogged down...that little dat file consumes a lot of bandwidth. (I have seen it slow down a 1GB line, it CONSTANTLY runs in the back ground)

If you have more then 5 users, or plan on having more users, or have a bad network to begin with, you should look into the vault. (you already own it [the base version anyway] if you have ACADE)

You can use the vault to store drawings, templates, projects, customization files, libraries, dat files, etc.

It gives you the benefit of local files (as you grab a local copy to work on, so you get the best performance), and the ability to share the files (the vault maintains a write protected copy on the network, so you get the security on the files).

It allows the user to take a copy (check out) of the database with them on the job site, to make changes, and when the return to the office (or VPN in) they can check in the file to share the updates with everyone (for drawing the will be flagged, for database or dat files they have to go through the vault client not the vault addin in the product). They need to "get" the latest copy.

You can take it a step further by writing a macro that syncs the files when you start up the computer. 

You would end up mapping to a "C:/vault workspace" with all of your files.

I would explain it further but, I suggest researching the Vault first to see if it would help solve other business problems. (like Change orders, item masters, lifecycles, revisions, etc; which are part of the PAID versions of Vault)

I hope this helps,

Regards,

James Alger

SolidCAD  

[rwydesk500]

I'm returning to this issue again - Regarding the network sharing of custom components...

Correct me if I am wrong: If custom components need updated on a network, Read Write access is necessary.

I don't have Write access to the network location where our components are. As a result, when I try to modify an existing custom component via Symbol Builder (the components open in the editor as Read Only), I am not able to save them back to the network location.

As a test, I thought I might be able to at least save the modified component to my hard drive, but it appears not to save. If I was able to save to my hard drive, I could at least direct another person with Read Write access, to periodically update the network components for me.

Has anyone experienced this problem? If so, how did you resolve it?