Tacit or Riverbed??????

[Anonymous]

We are starting a remote office and are looking at both Tacit and Riverbed?
Can anyone share any light on both of these? Which is better? Why? What
do you use?

[Anonymous]

I can't say which is better since we've only used Tacit. We've been
using Tacit to link our two offices for about a year now, initially over
a DSL VPN and now via a dedicated T1 line.

With Word, Excel, ADT and most other programs we haven't had any issues,
everything has been working well. We have had issues with LDD though.
The problem was that it was difficult and slow to make changes to the
LDD database like creating a new folder, alignment, point group, etc.
It would take several tries to make any change to the database which
gets very frustrating very quickly so we gave up on using the Tacit for
LDD.

Last Friday Tacit announced that they have an update to the software
that is supposed to fix this problem. The issue had something to do
with the Tacit putting the file locks on open files and that conflicted
with the program's (LDD in this case) file locking. My understanding of
the coming update is that it allows us to choose whether a given program
or the Tacit will be responsible for the file locking. We'll find out
in a couple of weeks when the update is issued and installed.

Charlie


CadDog wrote:
> We are starting a remote office and are looking at both Tacit and Riverbed?
> Can anyone share any light on both of these? Which is better? Why? What
> do you use?

[cprettyman]

We've been using riverbed for several months. The only issue so far is that the number of snapshots we get is far, far below what was anticipated. So far below, in fact that the vendor we used ended up refunding some money. The issue, which may appliy to Tacit as well, is that the ACAD Save process (create a tmp, delete any existing BAK files, rename the dwg to bak, rename the tmp to dwg) ends up modifying a lot of blocks on the disk (it's the same basic reason that ACAD is such a disk fragmenting monster).

[Anonymous]

From what I've heard is that LDD is especially "chatty" when it comes to
network access and with the tons of database files such an approch like
Tacit or Riverbed does not work well. This is more of an Autodesk problem.
Also I have heard about issues with .dwl files.

In my opinion there is currently no 100% perfect product out there. I too
need this sort of solution but its just not perfect yet.

--
Dave

"Charlie Peil" wrote in message
news:5144399@discussion.autodesk.com...
I can't say which is better since we've only used Tacit. We've been
using Tacit to link our two offices for about a year now, initially over
a DSL VPN and now via a dedicated T1 line.

With Word, Excel, ADT and most other programs we haven't had any issues,
everything has been working well. We have had issues with LDD though.
The problem was that it was difficult and slow to make changes to the
LDD database like creating a new folder, alignment, point group, etc.
It would take several tries to make any change to the database which
gets very frustrating very quickly so we gave up on using the Tacit for
LDD.

Last Friday Tacit announced that they have an update to the software
that is supposed to fix this problem. The issue had something to do
with the Tacit putting the file locks on open files and that conflicted
with the program's (LDD in this case) file locking. My understanding of
the coming update is that it allows us to choose whether a given program
or the Tacit will be responsible for the file locking. We'll find out
in a couple of weeks when the update is issued and installed.

Charlie


CadDog wrote:
> We are starting a remote office and are looking at both Tacit and
> Riverbed?
> Can anyone share any light on both of these? Which is better? Why? What
> do you use?

[Anonymous]

We used a Riverbed with quite a bit of success at Jones & Boyd in Dallas.
3MB at home, 1.5 at remote, things moved along nicely. It wasn't great for
truly working a project across, but Xrefing across, or doing quick dirty
project work, it was way better than waiting on a courier with a CD or
jumpdrive.

--
James Wedding, P.E.
Engineered Efficiency, Inc.
Civil 3D 2006 SP2
XP Tablet, SP2, 2GHz, 1.5G
www.eng-eff.com
www.civil3d.com

[Anonymous]

When the LDD problem first came up we spent a lot of time with Tacit on
a WebEx connection looking at the issue until they had a good handle on
what the behavior was. Then they spent a year working on this upcoming
software update.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed because it sure would be nice not to have
to completely separate civil jobs by office.

We're on the verge of moving from ADT 3.3 to 2006 (won't that be fun?)
so I'll be watching to see if we have issues with the .dwl files.
Thanks for the heads-up.

Charlie


David Allen wrote:
> From what I've heard is that LDD is especially "chatty" when it comes to
> network access and with the tons of database files such an approch like
> Tacit or Riverbed does not work well. This is more of an Autodesk problem.
> Also I have heard about issues with .dwl files.
>
> In my opinion there is currently no 100% perfect product out there. I too
> need this sort of solution but its just not perfect yet.
>

[Anonymous]

whatever you do, make sure the company you buy it from are experts at troubleshooting.
We bought steelheads through Trace3, and they had to spend at least 20 hours with us over two months to figure out our
issues. They even set up a network on-site with their switches to see if it was our hardware.
We have top notch IT people, they were not having to babysit us.
The issue ended up being a software command in the riverbed system that was undocumented to the non-core programmers at
Riverbed. Luckily, the Trace3 guys were able to talk to the programmers to figure this out.
I cannot tell you how many hours we lost due to the file locking problems before the fix.
We almost gave up, it got fixed last minute.
So be ready for serious problems that take weeks to fix.
Once they are fixed though, its very smooth (here at least).
The technology is essentially being refined still, so don't assume it will work right away.

CadDog
|>We are starting a remote office and are looking at both Tacit and Riverbed?
|>Can anyone share any light on both of these? Which is better? Why? What
|>do you use?
James Maeding
Civil Engineer and Programmer
jmaeding - athunsaker - com

[Anonymous]

James - I remember your problems, and that we apparently haven't had them.
Is this "software command" something that relates to your network and
possibly not ours? Is it something they've now incorporated into current
firmware? We're still not having file-locking problems that I'm aware of.

John

"James Maeding" wrote in message
news:5146142@discussion.autodesk.com...
whatever you do, make sure the company you buy it from are experts at
troubleshooting.
We bought steelheads through Trace3, and they had to spend at least 20 hours
with us over two months to figure out our
issues. They even set up a network on-site with their switches to see if it
was our hardware.
We have top notch IT people, they were not having to babysit us.
The issue ended up being a software command in the riverbed system that was
undocumented to the non-core programmers at
Riverbed. Luckily, the Trace3 guys were able to talk to the programmers to
figure this out.
I cannot tell you how many hours we lost due to the file locking problems
before the fix.
We almost gave up, it got fixed last minute.
So be ready for serious problems that take weeks to fix.
Once they are fixed though, its very smooth (here at least).
The technology is essentially being refined still, so don't assume it will
work right away.

CadDog
|>We are starting a remote office and are looking at both Tacit and
Riverbed?
|>Can anyone share any light on both of these? Which is better? Why? What
|>do you use?
James Maeding
Civil Engineer and Programmer
jmaeding - athunsaker - com

[Anonymous]

We've got a couple Riverbed Steelhead 1000's we've been using for close to a
year and a half. It's substantially increased perceived input between our
offices. We have 2mbit symmetrical wireless connections, (wireless -> fiber
optic -> wireless), between offices.

John

"CadDog" wrote in message news:5143821@discussion.autodesk.com...
We are starting a remote office and are looking at both Tacit and Riverbed?
Can anyone share any light on both of these? Which is better? Why? What
do you use?

[Anonymous]

I believe its part of the firmware of the steelhead devices.
I am not exactly sure.
Trace3 figured it out by recording network traffic and sent it into the programmers.
The programmers said "whats this" and we caught the command.
This stuff is over my head though.

John Schmidt
|>James - I remember your problems, and that we apparently haven't had them.
|>Is this "software command" something that relates to your network and
|>possibly not ours? Is it something they've now incorporated into current
|>firmware? We're still not having file-locking problems that I'm aware of.
|>
|>John
|>
|>"James Maeding" wrote in message
|>news:5146142@discussion.autodesk.com...
|>whatever you do, make sure the company you buy it from are experts at
|>troubleshooting.
|>We bought steelheads through Trace3, and they had to spend at least 20 hours
|>with us over two months to figure out our
|>issues. They even set up a network on-site with their switches to see if it
|>was our hardware.
|>We have top notch IT people, they were not having to babysit us.
|>The issue ended up being a software command in the riverbed system that was
|>undocumented to the non-core programmers at
|>Riverbed. Luckily, the Trace3 guys were able to talk to the programmers to
|>figure this out.
|>I cannot tell you how many hours we lost due to the file locking problems
|>before the fix.
|>We almost gave up, it got fixed last minute.
|>So be ready for serious problems that take weeks to fix.
|>Once they are fixed though, its very smooth (here at least).
|>The technology is essentially being refined still, so don't assume it will
|>work right away.
|>
|>CadDog
|>|>We are starting a remote office and are looking at both Tacit and
|>Riverbed?
|>|>Can anyone share any light on both of these? Which is better? Why? What
|>|>do you use?
|>James Maeding
|>Civil Engineer and Programmer
|>jmaeding - athunsaker - com
James Maeding
Civil Engineer and Programmer
jmaeding - athunsaker - com

[alsaldich]

Full disclosure - I'm the VP of product marketing at Riverbed.

I'd encourage you to talk to more of your peers, and to check out the just released 2006 NetworkComputing "Well Connected" award, which we have just been awarded a Network Infrastructure award for Best Remote Office Solution.
(See: http://www.networkcomputing.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=185303656 )

Riverbed has over a hundred AEC customers, including most of the large architecture firms in the US, and many many small and medium firms; most of them are also Autodesk customers using ADT, Revit, Inventor, LandDesktop and a range of other Autodesk applications.

The basic difference between Riverbed and Tacit is that Riverbed's products are general purpose WAN accelerators that provide powerful acceleration for most business applications used over WANs, including web-based applications (like Deltek Vision), Microsoft Exchange, MS-SQL based applications (like Microsoft Project), LotusNotes, Microsoft SMS and DPM, Network Appliance's SnapMirror, Symantec's NetBackup, and many many more (and of course Windows file sharing).

Tacit's product has long been based on the concept of a file cache, which only affects file system traffic, and provides little to no performance benefit to the list of applications above.

[Anonymous]

How is riverbed going to handle the new os (Vista). I'm told that riverbed
won't be able to speed thing up as much because Vista will encrypt most wan
traffic?


wrote in message news:5153016@discussion.autodesk.com...
Full disclosure - I'm the VP of product marketing at Riverbed.

I'd encourage you to talk to more of your peers, and to check out the just
released 2006 NetworkComputing "Well Connected" award, which we have just
been awarded a Network Infrastructure award for Best Remote Office Solution.
(See:
http://www.networkcomputing.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=185303656 )

Riverbed has over a hundred AEC customers, including most of the large
architecture firms in the US, and many many small and medium firms; most of
them are also Autodesk customers using ADT, Revit, Inventor, LandDesktop and
a range of other Autodesk applications.

The basic difference between Riverbed and Tacit is that Riverbed's products
are general purpose WAN accelerators that provide powerful acceleration for
most business applications used over WANs, including web-based applications
(like Deltek Vision), Microsoft Exchange, MS-SQL based applications (like
Microsoft Project), LotusNotes, Microsoft SMS and DPM, Network Appliance's
SnapMirror, Symantec's NetBackup, and many many more (and of course Windows
file sharing).

Tacit's product has long been based on the concept of a file cache, which
only affects file system traffic, and provides little to no performance
benefit to the list of applications above.

[Anonymous]

Full Disclosure - it took over a month for a top (if not the top) reseller to get it working right here.
I spent so much time scouring my acad setup and other stuff trying to see if I was the cause.
It was the Riverbed software.
So Beware!

alsaldich <>
|>Full disclosure - I'm the VP of product marketing at Riverbed.
|>
|>I'd encourage you to talk to more of your peers, and to check out the just released 2006 NetworkComputing "Well Connected" award, which we have just been awarded a Network Infrastructure award for Best Remote Office Solution.
|>(See: http://www.networkcomputing.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=185303656 )
|>
|>Riverbed has over a hundred AEC customers, including most of the large architecture firms in the US, and many many small and medium firms; most of them are also Autodesk customers using ADT, Revit, Inventor, LandDesktop and a range of other Autodesk applications.
|>
|>The basic difference between Riverbed and Tacit is that Riverbed's products are general purpose WAN accelerators that provide powerful acceleration for most business applications used over WANs, including web-based applications (like Deltek Vision), Microsoft Exchange, MS-SQL based applications (like Microsoft Project), LotusNotes, Microsoft SMS and DPM, Network Appliance's SnapMirror, Symantec's NetBackup, and many many more (and of course Windows file sharing).
|>
|>Tacit's product has long been based on the concept of a file cache, which only affects file system traffic, and provides little to no performance benefit to the list of applications above.
James Maeding
Civil Engineer and Programmer
jmaeding - athunsaker - com

[Anonymous]

What was the issue? It looks like our IT department is going with Riverbed.
Any heads up I can get would be greatly appreciated.



"James Maeding" wrote in message
news:5156926@discussion.autodesk.com...
Full Disclosure - it took over a month for a top (if not the top) reseller
to get it working right here.
I spent so much time scouring my acad setup and other stuff trying to see if
I was the cause.
It was the Riverbed software.
So Beware!

alsaldich <>
|>Full disclosure - I'm the VP of product marketing at Riverbed.
|>
|>I'd encourage you to talk to more of your peers, and to check out the just
released 2006 NetworkComputing "Well Connected" award, which we have just
been awarded a Network Infrastructure award for Best Remote Office Solution.
|>(See:
http://www.networkcomputing.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=185303656 )
|>
|>Riverbed has over a hundred AEC customers, including most of the large
architecture firms in the US, and many many small and medium firms; most of
them are also Autodesk customers using ADT, Revit, Inventor, LandDesktop and
a range of other Autodesk applications.
|>
|>The basic difference between Riverbed and Tacit is that Riverbed's
products are general purpose WAN accelerators that provide powerful
acceleration for most business applications used over WANs, including
web-based applications (like Deltek Vision), Microsoft Exchange, MS-SQL
based applications (like Microsoft Project), LotusNotes, Microsoft SMS and
DPM, Network Appliance's SnapMirror, Symantec's NetBackup, and many many
more (and of course Windows file sharing).
|>
|>Tacit's product has long been based on the concept of a file cache, which
only affects file system traffic, and provides little to no performance
benefit to the list of applications above.
James Maeding
Civil Engineer and Programmer
jmaeding - athunsaker - com

[Anonymous]

I wish I knew the specifics.
It was explained to me as "a command" by the riverbed devices that was unknown to the people involved.
Look up Trace 3 and contact them about Hunsaker Irvine's problems.
They are really good at troubleshooting, glad we went with them.

CadDog
|>What was the issue? It looks like our IT department is going with Riverbed.
|>Any heads up I can get would be greatly appreciated.
|>
|>
|>
|>"James Maeding" wrote in message
|>news:5156926@discussion.autodesk.com...
|>Full Disclosure - it took over a month for a top (if not the top) reseller
|>to get it working right here.
|>I spent so much time scouring my acad setup and other stuff trying to see if
|>I was the cause.
|>It was the Riverbed software.
|>So Beware!
James Maeding
Civil Engineer and Programmer
jmaeding - athunsaker - com

[chris.bolden]

I’m an IT Manager for an engineering firm in the south - we have four offices using TACIT, been running it for about six months.

You are right, TACIT is historically a ‘file’ shop, only recently getting into WAN optimization market (the recent acquisition by Packateer will no doubt help with this), while Riverbed is historically a WAN optimization shop getting into distributed file management.

The right choice will depend on what you need – we were looking for a way to keep data consistent between offices and have local ‘real time’ caching at remote locations. TACIT’s history extends well beyond Riverbed’s in this. If you are looking to improve performance on the WAN, look to Riverbed, which is a fine company in its own right.

Probably the KEY POINT for most IT Departments, Riverbed (when I was looking at any rate) is not Windows based – some kind of Linux kernel – in any case, some of the additional features that Tacit carries (Exchange attachment distribution, print server, and I believe domain controller) are not available. Also, they’re a Microsoft partner so you can count on future releases being compatible, or at least as compatible as anything is under the Microsoft umbrella.

As for Land Desktop problems with TACIT, most have to do with the database file. Keep in mind, any system that operates on a lock and lease basis like BOTH products do, will NOT WORK with any kind of MDB file that multiple users access. This will go away with Civil 3d which I believe uses more XML tables I to store that data…but that’s another thread entirely.

There are also some other key things that your IT Department MUST DO to ensure smooth operation of the TACIT devices (I’m going to avoid the obvious ones like which ports to open on your firewalls, etc):

In Land Desktop:
-- Your LDT Databases must not be on the Tacit Remote Appliance (TRA). One person accessing it will lock out everything, or at the worst cause serious corruption issues. We setup a separate mapped drive on a local file server that backups to a directory on the TRA every evening (so we still have a centralized backup at the data center).
-- Your Support file paths should path locally: This a rule of thumb for CAD on any kind of server – don’t run your support paths to a server – you’re slowing yourself down. To ensure consistency and standards, use robocopy upon login or logoff to mirror the important customization files you have. Your dual-core dual processor monster with 4gigs RAM/256 MB video RAM gets you SQUAT if you’re querying the network every time you access a menu command (yes even with GigE). Granted the TACIT system amplifies any issues you would have had before by running standards from the network tenfold.
-- Under the Projects menu in User preferences, again, I’d recommend avoiding the TACIT device – generally these are templates and LDT specific reference material anyway and should be stored with the databases on a separate local device.

On Your Workstations (XP/2000)
-- Disable Offline Files.
-- Right click on any CAD shortcut or drawing, go to EnableDisable Digital Signatures. Take the check OUT.
-- Exclude any workstation scanning of viruses on your network drives. It all goes in real time back to the data center where you’re running virus protection so your fine

On your Tacit system:
Stay up to date on software, and only install security patches that are cleared through the support department..

What this system does is incredible but it will take some adjusting and most of all PLANNING to get it right. Don’t expect to turn it up and smile, especially if you already have branch offices. You’ll be grooming data for a while before you go live – this isn’t just for Tacit, it’s for any consolidated storage system. Remember, you can’t polish a turd – if you’re data’s disorganized in separate file servers, just wait until you copy it all to one location.


Just my two cents –
Cheers
Pete Nuffer
IT Manager

[chris.bolden]

FYI, I am not aware of any patch that TACIT will have out that will address this.

They're waiting for Civil 3d to fix the problem.

[Anonymous]

I'm starting to think that is their plan. They had promised a patch
last November that never showed up. Then they promised another one last
May that never happened either.

In looking at the other discussion (titled "Multiple Offices - One
Server") it looks like at least some of the other solutions seem to have
the same file locking issue with LDD database files.

Bummer.

At least it is more of an incentive to move to C3D more rapidly...

Charlie


PeteNuffer wrote:
> FYI, I am not aware of any patch that TACIT will have out that will address this.
>
> They're waiting for Civil 3d to fix the problem.

[Anonymous]

Where were you 18 months ago when we started using Tacit? 😉

Seriously, though, thank you for the informative post. We've been
figuring out these same issues slowly but surely now and apart from the
whole LDD file locking issue, we've got it working pretty well now. An
occasional reboot of the remote Tacit box when performance slows down
has been all that's required, maintenance wise. Getting Robocopy set up
to put the formerly server-located AutoCAD support files on the local
hard drives has really helped performance, even in the main office.

Charlie


PeteNuffer wrote:
> I’m an IT Manager for an engineering firm in the south - we have four offices using TACIT, been running it for about six months.
>