Design Assistant & OLE links

[DRoam]

I have a potential big issue with a large assembly I'm working on. The very top, parent assembly is linked to an external Excel spreadsheet from which it's pulling several parameters. My issue is that, when I open the assembly in Design Assistant under the Manage tab, it brings up this message box:

"The following (2) files(s) contain OLE links which will not be updated as part of the selected action."

One of the files it lists is my top assembly! So once I click OK, every single component of the assembly is greyed out and uneditable! After that dialog box it also brings up one about some files needing to be updated to the current Inventor release, but those are just 5 or 6 burried-deep little parts, so I don't think that's the issue.

I don't want to delete the link to the Excel table. I need to keep it. Is it not possible to use Design Assistant to rename and otherwise manage my files if my top assembly contains a linked spreadsheet? If so this is a huge issue and needs to be changed. The parameters from the Excel sheet are completely independent of all the rest of the files in the assembly, and even from the assembly itself, so I should be able to make any necessary changes from Design Assistant without having to break the link.

Does anyone know a workaround for this?

[japike · Accepted solution]

All of the files in your project need to be migrated before using Design Assistant. That is most likely why all of the entries are greyed out. You can use task manager to take care of that.

[DRoam]

Jeff,

Great, thanks! I migrated the files and now I can use the Design Assistant. I was sure I remembered using DA in the past even with a few files not being the current release. Oh well, it's working so I'm happy.

Quick question, I updated the parts one by one. You mentioned a "task manager". What is that? Can I use it to migrate multiple files at once?

[japike]

Actually, it's called task scheduler. It's in the AutoDesk folder on your start menu and you can use it to migrate all of your files using a variety of options.

[DRoam]

Oh ok cool, I didn't know about that tool. Great, thanks for your help!