Inventor 2013 Autodesk appearance/material library not found

[Anonymous]

Dear experts,

After having used several earlier versions of Invenor, I have just started using the 2013 version. I have installed it and got to work with it but I stumbled upon a problem concerning the autodesk appearance and material libraries.

As you can see in the printscreen my PC says it can't find the necessary '.adsklib' files. I think it somehow got skipped during installation or downloading, although there was never a warning or fault message during the proces. I have already tried repairing and reinstalling but this did not help.

I have not installed Vault, Fusion, etc. Because I don't think I need these extras. It would not make sense to me, but maybe the libraries are included in one of these programs? 

Can anyone help me to get these libraries active? Is it perhaps possible to seperate download these libraries?

Thanks a lot in advance.

Yours sincerely,

Eric

[dan_inv09]

First let's see if Inventor is looking in the right place.

Tools tab>Options>Application Options>File tab>Design Data (Styles, etc.)

Mine says:

%PUBLICDOCUMENTS%\Autodesk\Inventor 2014\Design Data\

[Anonymous]

Dear Dan,

Thanks for your reply. I've checked the settings and my Inventor version looks for these libraries in the same folder that you've mentioned (only the version 2013/2014 is different).

I've found the folder and inside it, there is only the 'Inventor Material Library' (which is working) and not the 'Autodesk Appearance Library' and the 'Autodesk Material Library'. The folder and path are displayed in the attached screendump.

[Anonymous]

Is there anything else that I can try in order to get the libraries to work?

Thanks in advance,

Eric

[dan_inv09]

Sorry, at work they sometimes want me to, you know, work.

If the files are not where they are supposed to be (and you didn't move them somewhere else that you can find) I think you'll have to try reinstalling - and redownloading to reinstall if that doesn't work. (It might seem like that's going to be a lot of work but compared to tracking down the necessary files and copying them, it's probably a lot quicker - plus it usually works out that if one thing was missing there'll be something else that it doesn't even look for until after that, and so on.)

Maybe it's a change from 2013 to 2014 but I don't even seem to be able to find the 'Autodesk Appearance Library' and the 'Autodesk Material Library' on my machine.

(Also, you might want to attach the images rather than inserting them if there's text - it's way to small to read.)

[ChrisMitchell01]

Eric,

Check the configuration of your current project file. The settings in application options simply define the default locations. Your project may have a different design data folder defined. Note that in the project there are specific settings for both Material & Appearance library locations as well as for Design Data.

Thanks

Chris

[Anonymous]

Chris and Dan, thanks for the replies.

I have checked the project settings, the project is set to default. But also in the project settings inventor shows that it is missing the libraries.

I guess I have to redownload and reinstall to get it. But this is an option I would not like to do because I have a very slow internet connection. However if I choose to reinstall, are there specific options that I need to switch on or off? Or any packages that I have to install to get these libraries?

Eric

[ChrisMitchell01]

Eric,

If yopu hover over the material/appearance library from the project editor it will give you the full path to the referenced .adsklib file:

Can you check that you have the files on disk ? By Default the Inventor specific libraries will be in the Materials folder under your Design Data folder. the Autodesk library files will be under C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Autodesk Shared\Materials.

If you look at Control Panel, you should see sometihgn like this for the installed components:

No, if you do a reinstall then you don't need to select anything -they are installed by default.

Thanks

Chris

[Anonymous]

Dear Chris,

This is what the project editor looks like on my pc:

If I hover over the inventor specific libraries, it gives the path shown above. I can find the libraries in that path and they are working fine in inventor. If I hover over the autodesk libraries it says this:

When I look for the autodesk libraries in the path that you mentioned (C:\Program Files\Common Files\Autodesk Shared), I can't find a folder named 'Materials':

And they do not show up at the control panel as well:

Is it possible to copy the libraries from another user and place them manually in the common files folder?

Thanks again for the help!

Eric

[ChrisMitchell01]

Eric,

These components must have been uninstalled for some reason if they do not show up there in control panel; I've never tried just copying the missing folders/files back in place. I believe it should work if you have another PC there that is working ok.

Alternatively you could go to the same program location in control panel & right click inventor & use the Repair option, but you'll need to have your original install media available.

Hope this helps
Chris

[Anonymous]

Dear Chris,

Excuse me for my late reply, I was out for the weekend.

I dont't have another pc here which has Inventor working but I was hoping that maybe you could send me the libraries?

I have already tried the repair option and also the reinstall option via the control panel. The only thing I could do else is delete everything, download the package again and reinstall with the newly downloaded package. But it took a lot of time the last time I downloaded it because of my internet connection, so this is not a solution that I would prefer.

Thanks again,

Eric

[ChrisMitchell01]

Hi Eric,

Actually it's not as simple as I had hoped. There are numerous other files & configuration files etc that you will need. If you previously downloaded the installation files though, then you "might" still have them on disk. by default they get extracted to C:\Autodesk\.... do you have them there? If so then an uninstall/reinstall may not be quite so painful.

Thanks

Chris