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5 person firm to 5 office firm & cloud servers & data shortcuts

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Message 1 of 15
annw2
969 Views, 14 Replies

5 person firm to 5 office firm & cloud servers & data shortcuts

Help needed for an old fogey.

 

I just moved from a 5 person firm to 5 office firm.  The 5 person firm used data shortcuts and one server to share and manage data, especially on the 12 mile gas main project with sheets of nothing but profile views.

 

The multi office firm uses the 55 gallon barrel CAD file system, keeping everything in one base file so you can get a cup of coffee between regens.

 

We had a minor SD being worked on between offices.  I was asked to e-mail a copy of the CAD file down to the second office while we worked on the file in our office.  We then had to piece things back together.

 

I asked if anyone had used this drawing file in the cloud thing that our reseller always 'bragged' about at the yearly univeristy as a wonderful feature available with subscription.  The CAD 'gurus' said it had been briefly discussed, but the individual users freaked out at someone else having 'control' of THEIR files.  The CAD gurus seem to think this might be a good thing, but seemed unsure how to go about setting it up.  I did click the cloud icon on Windows explorer and got nothing.

 

Does anyone know of a 'white paper' or 'idiot's guide' out there?  Call reseller to get it set up?

 

Once the basic cloud is set up, will we be able to use data shortcuts through this cloud thing?

Ann Wingert, P.E.
14 REPLIES 14
Message 2 of 15
annw2
in reply to: annw2

I just googled Autodesk and cloud and came up with this link:

 

http://www.autodesk.com/products/a360/overview.

 

I hit the button to watch the sales video.  I e-mailed the link to my daughter studying computer animation and told her if she ever animated something like this, I would fly out to SD and slap her.  I couldn't stand to watch if for 5 seconds.  I cant' think of anything that would scare me away from looking into it more than this.

 

It is overlapping chatter saying how wonderful the cloud is with no information on what it actually is or does. INCREDIBLY IRRITATING AND INCOMPREHENSIBLE.

 

I then found the CADalyst video by Lyn Allen which had some useful iformation which assumed you knew how to get this cloud thing set up and what it is.  She was talking about the cloud as backup.

 

What I want to know is if it can function as a real time 'server' and imitation 'Windows explorer' to work as real time storage between offices?  Or what is the lag time?

 

I DO NOT WANT TO HEAR ANYTHING ABOUT FANCY RENDERINGS.  I have had to deal with too many clients who object to paying for a half hour with a highlighters or markers for a meeting presentation,  let alone days for fancy videos.  Go work for Disney.

Ann Wingert, P.E.
Message 3 of 15
Neilw_05
in reply to: annw2

I don't know the product any more than you do but it seems apparent from the product pages that it is primarily a file sharing portal somewhat like an FTP site. You can put files up for viewing or downloading but I can find nothing about it serving as a cloud based "drive" such that you can work on and reference the files that are stored there. Under the support page there is a search tool. When I searched for XREF or file path I get nothing relevant.

 

You might need to consider a document management system such as vault or Bentley's Projectwise.

Neil Wilson (a.k.a. neilw)
AEC Collection/C3D 2024, LDT 2004, Power Civil v8i SS1
WIN 10 64 PRO

http://www.sec-landmgt.com
Message 4 of 15
annw2
in reply to: Neilw_05

I am hoping for a reply from someone who would know both, pros and cons, and how in the world to get started with either.

I will need something concrete to explain to management what the heck I am talking about so I could get the time or reseller authorized.
Ann Wingert, P.E.
Message 5 of 15
sboon
in reply to: annw2

We're in a similar situation.  We have about 15 offices, and our projects are becoming large enough that we need to share them among people in various locations.  Up until now we've been able to use data shortcuts successfully, with careful drawing management but we have started looking at Vault again as a possible solution. 

 

Supposedly the integration with Civil3d is good enough now that companies can use Vault successfully - we'll just have to wait and see.

 

Steve
Please use the Accept as Solution or Kudo buttons when appropriate

Steve
Expert Elite Alumnus
Message 6 of 15
dgorsman
in reply to: annw2

I'd start with the AutoDesk 360 boards here: http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/a360-products/ct-p/200

 

From what I've seen any kind of live, cloud-based server replacement system is still a couple of generations off (there was mention of some BETA testing in the boards, although that may have been limited to Revit which already supports a distributed server system).  The current system is still in the teething stages, with more users testing than fully adopting (there is no substitute for software being out in the wild, after all).

 

I'd also recommend a slighlty less confrontational approach.  While it won't guarantee the results you are looking for, it will put off posters who may otherwise be willing to help.  While you may not want to hear about "fancy renderings", as it isn't your desired use, the rendering system is one the key benefits of cloud processing.

----------------------------------
If you are going to fly by the seat of your pants, expect friction burns.
"I don't know" is the beginning of knowledge, not the end.


Message 7 of 15
annw2
in reply to: dgorsman

The biggest use or the biggest profit for the resellers?

All the reseller trade shows I have been to use a high pressure fancy rendering sales pitch as the main 'benefit' of the cloud. The sales pitch is one of the biggest reasons I DIDN'T check out the cloud more before.

In 30 years of engineering, I have seen MINIMAL requests for fancy rendering. I think it has been twice.

Sorry for the tone, but I tend to get annoyed at sales pitches that try to force features I have no use for while blowing off the requests for data I do need. The last thing I wanted to hear about was the joys of fancy rendering.

>From the one other response on this board when I searched for "cloud", it appears that very few users are doing anything with it.
Ann Wingert, P.E.
Message 8 of 15
doni49
in reply to: annw2

I don't know but I think I'd be VERY leary of depending on a cloud server for my live/active files.  What happens when the internet connection is down?  Everyone stops working until it's fixed?

 

At my previous company, we had 6 offices:  one main office in northern NJ and then 5 branch offices -- the closest distance between any two of them was about 50 miles.

 

We had a VPN tunnel that connected each office to the main office.  And there was a software package (I don't remember the name now) that copied a mirror image of each branch office's server to the main office.  It also put a mirror image of the main office server in each branch office -- it did this all on a nightly basis.

 

This allowed for an off-site backup of the data from each office -- which IMHO is never a bad thing.  

 

If someone in the main office needed to reference data from a branch office's data, they could do so.  Likewise if someone in a branch office needed to reference something from the main office's data, they could do so.  When doing that, we had to keep in mind that we were referencing "last night's data".  If we needed the "latest and greatest" of one (or a few) particular file(s) we could always request a manual sync of that data.

 

I suppose that if the need had ever come up, we could've created a VPN tunnel directly between two branch offices but it was never needed.



Don Ireland
Engineering Design Technician




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Message 9 of 15
annw2
in reply to: doni49

We mostly work local with limited file sharing between offices.

I was thinking of the occasions when we DO have two offices working on the same project. "Just e-mail the CAD file to us" That had both offices working in the same CAD file at the same time with us piecing it back together when they finished. Recipe for disaster.

With all the TV hype about this Cloud thing, I was wondering if it was a better way, especially since every time you open Civil 3d it has that icon "Open file from the Cloud"

I have never gotten a good description of what that does or how to use it and when NOT to use it.

Internet connections being down occur about as often as a server crash.

Can this cloud thing be set to back up to hard drives or save to servers periodically?
Ann Wingert, P.E.
Message 10 of 15
dgorsman
in reply to: annw2

"The cloud" (generic) is somewhat different than "The cloud" as implemented in AutoDesk products, and its best to be specific when talking about them.  Even more so when dealing with point clouds, which are a whole other topic.  General implementation is basic file storage, sharing, and backup ie. DropBox.  For AutoDesk products it allows for users to upload and directly share AutoCAD files, as well as some of the AutoCAD workspace/profile settings.  There are additional cloud products for other programs like Infraworks, ReCap, Fusion, etc. which provide a number of additional services as well as temporary storage associated with those services.  It does NOT allow for multiple users to access the same file simulataneously.

 

Keep in mind we're "one percenters" here.  When the TV or other mass media is referring to the cloud they mean movies, maybe some text documents, but overall very limited in scope and data compared to what we deal with here.  Best to just ignore that for now.

----------------------------------
If you are going to fly by the seat of your pants, expect friction burns.
"I don't know" is the beginning of knowledge, not the end.


Message 11 of 15
Joe-Bouza
in reply to: annw2

I think this is what "Buzz saw is for

 

http://www.autodesk.com/products/buzzsaw/overview

Thank you

Joseph D. Bouza, P.E. (one of 'THOSE' People)

HP Z210 Workstation
Intel Xeon CPU E31240 @ 3.30 Hz
12 GB Ram


Note: Its all Resistentialism, so keep calm and carry on

64 Bit Win10 OS
Message 12 of 15
annw2
in reply to: Joe-Bouza

I used that on one project with another firm. I have a proposal with another firm using.Drop Box. Our firm has a third option.

Has anyone at Autodesk or anywhere else ever done a 'Consumer Reports' analysis of these various options?
Ann Wingert, P.E.
Message 13 of 15
idmadcadder
in reply to: annw2

We had this same issue...we started out as one company, then grew into three office locations.  We would only add whichever project folder from the other office to our drive and have it sync over the VPN...sure you had to let the IT know specific projects...but it really cut down on bandwidth to only do the ones you needed to work on.  Ours were set up to sync anytime a change was made...so things stayed up to date.  It's a good system between offices...just have to stay organized while doing it, keep the communication lines open.

Civil 3D 2016 SP1
Windows 10 x64
Core i7 3.40 GHz 8gb RAM
Message 14 of 15
Neilw_05
in reply to: idmadcadder

We have 2 offices and all of our data is shared between them via NAS appliances (replicators). Essentially we each have our own servers but they are synchronized via the NAS appliances so we are working on the same files, file paths, drives, etc. Since the servers are local there are no delays when accessing files. It only takes about 30 seconds for the servers to synchronize when files change. I think this is a good solution for operations that only require a couple of offices within a domain to be intergrated. It is not a good solution for cases where different companies and domains need to share data or when the number of offices makes the cost of the appliances prohibitive. 

Neil Wilson (a.k.a. neilw)
AEC Collection/C3D 2024, LDT 2004, Power Civil v8i SS1
WIN 10 64 PRO

http://www.sec-landmgt.com
Message 15 of 15
CADmgrMike
in reply to: annw2

Have you looked at a product called Panzura?

Our multi-office firm is looking into it and it looks promising.

Mike Porter
https://provostandpritchard.com/

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