Old Data Shortcuts not Working in 2013 or 2015

[Anonymous]

Okay, I give up on Data shortcuts in the new versions of civil 3d, I Have no clue what is going on, if there is a simple step that I am missing or if something is really screwed up with the software. We went from 2008 to 2013 at the first of the year and ever since then we have had nothing but problems with data shortcuts, old and new. We have been using data shortcuts since 2006 and have never had any of the problems we are now. First off, with older projects, we would create folders directly in the related project folder for each job on the server, we would then export the data shortcuts into that folder and referance them from then on. Okay, never, not one problem with the shortcut losing it's data, from 2006 til late 2013! Now, in 2013, 2014 and 2015, all existing surface data is blank, in every last one of our many jobs that used data shortcuts.... all surface spot elevation labels show nothing but ??????, all surface profiles that were referancing a surfac via data shortcuts... gone, nothing. I know they changed how data shortcuts are setup in 2013 and on, what the heck do we need to do in order to have our old shortcuts work. Are they really completey useless now in the later versions of c3d? I really hope there is a simple step to solve this!

Now on to the new issue, I have already posted this one, the data shortcuts are losing their path or data somehow? I set them up just as c3d says to do in the help file, we have one folder on our network named Data Shortcuts, within that folder we have projects, 13001, 13002, etc... When in c3d, we set the working folder and then we either create a new project or associate a drawing to a project, create the shortcuts, referance them into other drawings, save those drawings and the next time you open that drawing.... wow, what a shocker... the data is no good! This has only been happening to the best I can tell, to surfaces (both issues, new and old data shortcuts) which leads me to beleive they are realted.

If anyone knows what we are doing wrong, please share the magic, I really truley hope that this is just a simple operator error issue. If this is software related, Autodesk, YOU NEED TO FIX IT!

[AlmasSuljevic · Accepted solution]

There were some changes in how program deals with data shortcuts and how drawing is being associated with projects since 2008 version. For instance now, program saves project association within the drawing and you should be able to associate it or remove the association. http://beingcivil.typepad.com/my_weblog/2010/04/preview-2011-new-commands-in-civil-3d-data-shortcuts...

Also, in order to improve loading time, especially when the drawing contains many data shortcuts objects, we optimized the code to reduce the sync operation when open the drawing, which may results in some unexpected behavior when the object reference relationship is complicated. Seeing “???” may indicate that the links between references are broken and not found.

You may need to manually synchronize it by going to Manage ribbon and clicking on Synchronize references button. The SYNCHRONIZEREFERENCES command may help on issue, which will invoke the synchronize operation for all the data reference in the drawing. The REFRESHSHORTCUTNODE is another command that you may find useful. http://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/autocad-civil-3d/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticle...

And in Civil 3D 2014, there is a semi-promote for data reference objects in the drawing. In other words, the drawing will contain the cache object from its source drawing.  If the objects in the source drawing don’t change, the consumer drawing will not sync geometry in the source drawing, and will use the geometry in the local cache. This is all documented in help and I would recommend to get familiar with it as some things are behaving differently as we have seen it.

I hope this helps.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for the reply Almas, manually synchronizing the referances seemd to fix the issue. What about contours and profiles not showing up in drawings? For instance, I have a topo drawing with an exising surface that has the contours in it, I xref this drawing into my drawing for printing and the contours do not show up? It is not a layer issue, I have doubled and tripled checked that, sometimes I can unload my reference and reload it and the contours will show up, regen all does nothing for it? The same happens with existing grade profiles, I have a drawing with my profiles in it and I xref that into my drawing for printing and some or all of the existing profile grade lines do not show up? I am assuming it is a civil 3d thing since it only happens to civil 3d objects. I was really hoping it had something to do with synchronizing the data but it seemed it did not.

[AlmasSuljevic · Accepted solution]

I would check Level of detail settings. I have seen similar behavior if Level of Details feature is set not to display all contours. Use the command LEVELOFDETAILOFF to control the Level of Detail feature. This will display the surface as intended. 

(View ribbon, Views>Level Of Detail)

[Anonymous]

Thanks alot, that seemed to do the trick, thank you again.

[Anonymous]

Hi,

We have had a few project cases where Data References are automatically promoting, without the user doing anything.  Our workflow is as follows:

• Civil 3D design file - all design work, alignments, profiles, etc. are done here, and data shortcuts are created from these objects.
• Master File x-references - In this file we create our data references to the Civil 3D data in the above file, and also create all of our 2D objects associated with the project. 
  • This file is then x-referenced into a seaprate "deliverable" plan sheet. 
  • This is the file that I get reports of promoting of data references from the user, without the user physically promoting the objects.
• We do not have different versions, we are strictly using 2013 for these projects.

Please help, I would like to know if there is a bug in the program.  These promoted objects are wreaking havoc on our work flow.

Thanks!

Frustrated PM

[tpettis]

AlmasSuljevic,

My data shortcuts were created using civil 3d 2015 service pack 3 and originally created when it was on projectwise. I have since had to move it to our local network drive due to the shortcuts getting corrupt on Projectwise. I can get them to work fine for a bit but then I started having issues with files getting so big I couldn't open them. We wblock all info out and saved as same file name and re did the data shortcuts but I still seem to have issues with them updating and eventually I couldn't even open files unless I removed the data shortcut location out of prospector and moved the files to my local desktop location. I installed the performance resolution fix thinking this would help http://forums.autodesk.com/autodesk/attachments/autodesk/66/310541/1/autodesk_autocad_civil_3d_perfo... and they still seem to get hung up on synchronizing references. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.