ACA 2015 Bugs

[KathyMoffa]

SP1 & SP2 are installed.  After working in a drawing for some period of time, the AutoCAD line commands hang and I am unable to draw lines (pline, xline, etc.).  It doesn't go into a spinning disk hang--the cursor just won't snap to a point to start drawing (hangs, stutters, jumps, etc.).  Audit, Recover, Purge all including Regapps does not fix the problem. Opening a new drawing and inserting the bad drawing works, but I haven't figured out a way to "trick" all the smart tags in my View drawings from recognizing the new drawing, so they all disappear.   Switching to ACA2014 also fixes the problem, so that's the better solution if I've already created any view drawings.  Another 2015 bug is inserted images.  They work fine for a while, but then turn solid black.  Again, if I open 2014, images appear correctly.

[Victoria.Studley]

Hi Kathy,

From what you've described, it sounds like there is some corrupted content in your View files that needs to be removed. It does seem odd that the tags are losing their association within the project if you insert the View drawing into a blank template to clean it up and then replace the original with the clean version. Could you please test this process and let me know if you see the same results?

• Create a backup of your project, in case this doesn't work for you.
• Close the project via Project Navigator.
• Create a new drawing using a default template.
• Use the INSERT command to insert the View into the new drawing file.
• Save over the original View file directly.
• Reopen the project in Project Navigator. Are the tags all linked up properly?

If you use this workflow and the tag links break, there may be some underlying issue with the project. I'd be happy to look into it further offline, via your subscription center case. Just let me know how you'd like to proceed.

[KathyMoffa]

Hi Victoria--thank you for your response

The View drawing isn’t the corrupted drawing.  The corrupted drawing is a construct drawing created with ACA 2015.  After using ACA2015 for some period of time (hours to days), all of a sudden I will be unable to draw lines (L, PL or XL).  However, I can open that same drawing in ACA2014 and it will be fine.  This problem has repeated itself several times in ACA2015 with totally different drawings, so I am no longer using  ACA2015. 

The second part of my problem, how to insert a corrupted construct drawing into a new one (a blank template), and then have the already existing  View drawing(s) not lose their tags is a "how to" question.  I have never figured out how to do it in any version of ACA.  After inserting the corrupt drawing into a new template, the new drawing is fine, but the View drawing with the tags has the original bad drawing referenced into it.  If I modify the View properties, removing the bad drawing and adding the new one, the tags obviously disappear.   I’ve tried multiple renaming schemes without any success.   Is there a procedure to link tags in an existing  View drawing to a different construct drawing than the original one?

The bug in ACA2015, and corrupted drawings in general,  wouldn’t be such a problem, if I didn’t subsequently also lose all my tags in existing View drawings that reference the corrupt one.  

[Victoria.Studley]

Ah, thank you for clarifying, Kathy.

Could you try the same procedure from above on the corrupted Construct and let me know what happens? (Saving over the corrupted file with the clean inserted version, instead of trying to save a clean copy under a different name and replacing the file in the project.)

Make sure you back up a copy of your project before testing.

[KathyMoffa]

Victoria--I can't do that at the moment, as I no longer have the  View drawing associated with the corrupt Construct drawing.  I will definitely try your suggestion at next opportunity, but am not clear  exactly what you mean by saving over the original drawing directly?  Do you mean a simple "Save as" or something totally different?

[Victoria.Studley]

Hi Kathy,

That's all right. Next time it happens:

• Close all open drawings and close the project in Project Navigator.
• Create a new drawing using a default template.
• Use the INSERT command to insert the corrupt Construct into the new drawing. (This would be a good time to run -PURGE and AUDIT processes on the file as well.)
• Instead of saving this new file under a new name, "Save As..." over the original corrupt Construct drawing file. (This is why you should back up the project beforehand.)

Saving over the original file, instead of saving it as a different name and then trying to swap the new file in, may prevent the tag links from breaking.

[David_W_Koch]

Based on a few experiments I just ran on a simple test project in ACA 2015 (with, to my knowledge, no corrupt files), I was not able to successfully save over a Construct file (with the project closed) and then, after reopening the project, open a View file and have any of the Schedule Tags (for Spaces, Walls and Doors, in my test file) survive (except for the leaders on the Wall tags, which are not much use without the tag).

I ran three scenarios, all failed:

1.  INSERTed the original Construct file in a new file, exploded the INSERT and purged the block definition.  (This is what I assumed Ms. Studley's instructions meant.)

2.  Used the Clipboard to copy the contents of the original content file and then used PASTEORIG in a new file.

3.  INSERTed the original Construct file in a new file, but left the INSERT as a block reference, unexploded.

So far as I know, when tagging through an external reference, that tag is capturing some identifying information that points to that specific wall (the Wall's Handle, perhaps, or some sort of unexposed GUID property).  I checked the Handle of the "same" Wall in all three cases above, and none matched the Handle of the equivalent Wall in the original file.

Tagging through external references is somewhat fragile (worse outside the Drawing Management environment).  Unfortunately, the tags themselves often vanish when the link to the object in the other file breaks, so there is no opportunity to re-link the tag to the replacement object.  Not sure if you could manually release the tag anchor first, and then manually re-anchor them, but that might be as tedious as re-tagging, if not more so.

[KathyMoffa]

David,  Thank you very much for that cogent reply.  Is the solution then to tag in the Construct drawing and is that what most people actually do in practice? 

Kathy Moffa

[David_W_Koch]

We do not use the Drawing Management feature (Project Browser/Project Navigator), and tagging through external references outside of that feature requires manually managing property data overrides, so we do our tagging directly in our "model" files (Constructs, in Project Navigator parlance).  I have tagged partitions through external references on a few projects, as our partition tag uses style-based properties, and those do not create property data overrides in the host file.

I cannot say what most firms do.  I would expect most would do tagging in the View files, but also would not expect to have the issues you are experiencing with your Construct files.

[Victoria.Studley]

Hi Kathy,

I discussed this with another specialist here to clarify what is happening. When you insert the Construct into a clean template (regardless of whether you save over the original or save it as a copy and repath the file), the Object IDs are different than the original objects that the tags were associated with (the program sees them as new/different objects). So, they either need to be retagged, or the tags need to be reassociated individually.

You could avoid this particular issue by tagging in the Construct instead of the View, although the recommended workflow is to place annotation objects in the View. If you find you're encountering corrupted Constructs on a regular basis, tagging in the Construct may save you some time in your specific workflow.

[KathyMoffa]

Victoria--thank you for following up on this problem.  After David's response, I decided that for all new projects, I am going to do all my tagging in Construct drawings.    So much for doing things the "correct" way!