A360 Drive not syncing

[Anonymous]

In a project with multiple offices in a joint venture we thought about using the A360 Drive to share the Revit Keynotes file to all offices by uploading it to our A360 Drive and sharing it with other users.

However, in our tests we found some strange behaviours:

1) Once the file is shared and now showing on the users Windows Explorer A360 Drive folder, if one user deletes the file (maybe by mistake) it is still existing on the cloud and all other users local desktop (which's good) but will never show anymore to that user that deleted the file locally. The only way we found to make the A360 Drive to refresh and bring the file back to that user is to actually going deep into the users App Data folder and deleting an A360 Drive database (db) file.

2) Even though we share the file as "read only", if users right click on the file and remove the read only lock, they can now write to the file, which's going to get synced to all other users.

3) I had almost 500Mb in the drive. When I deleted the database locally to test if the file that was shared with me would come back next time I synced (which worked and actually brought the file back), I ended up losing all the other info that was in the drive. Only what was not mine, but shared with me remains.

Can you confir if that's just the way it is or if there's anything we are doing wrong?

Thank you.

Andre Carvalho

[Bud_Schroeder_ADESK]

Hello Andre,

It sounds like you are using A360 Drive Desktop sync component, can you share with us what version this is and what it was installed with? A360 Drive Sync desktop component is not directly supported with Revit files, so that is why I am curious how it was installed. It does come with AutoCAD, AutoCAD LT, AutoCAD based vertical apps and Inventor.

How are you sharing files as read only, are you using File Explorer? A360 is not going to know anything about File Explorer, you would need to share the file or folder from A360 Drive in the actual browser.

For #3, again how are these file shared to A360 Drive? Are you copying them to the A360 Drive sync folder? What happens if you upload the files through your browser rather than A360 Drive?

Thanks and let us know more details here.

[Anonymous]

Hi Bud,

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, we are using the A360 Drive desktop. The version we are running is 6.0.5.1100. We installed it from our Building Design Suite Package and thought of using it as an option to Dropbox. Since it creates a "folder" where files can be dropped and will be synced to the cloud and since the file can also be shared with other users that also have the A360 Desktop, we thought of pointing our Revit Keynote file to that location (it's available in Revit as soon as we include  the A360 drive path to the Libraries in Windows Explorer) so other users could add to it as needed, sharing the keynotes being added to the model.

But this was all theory. To test the theory we created some scenarios: One of them was to share the file to the users as read only (in the web version of the A360 Drive, we selected to not give full access). As they synced their A360 Drives, the files showed, were marked as read only. However, by just right clicking the file and deactivating "Read Only" they could open the file, add info to it, save and sync back to the cloud. Dangerous.

For your last question, yes, we are dragging the file to the A360 sync folder under Windows Explorer. We didn't try to upload as we thought that any file copied to the A360 sync folder gets uploaded regardless, right?

Andre

[Bud_Schroeder_ADESK]

Hi Andre,

How are you making the file read only?  The only supported way to do this in A360 is at the A360 Drive UI.   Also if you create subfolders, then the share is inherited.  So you can not have different rights nested in the folder.

The reason I suggested trying the WEB Upload is to see if there is a different behavior. 

Also it sounds like you are a Revit Shop, have you looked at Revit Collaborate?  It might be a better solution for the team, and it uses the new A360 for Projects.

Revit Collaborate Overview:

Also are you still having syncing errors?   When you look at A360 Drive in File Explorer are all the filec check green, or do you see errors?

Thanks and let us know.

[Anonymous]

Hi Bud,

Yes, we made file file read only by setting it as "Download Only" in the web interface, like you showed. However, once the file is synced and shows on other users A360 drive desktop location, they can go to the properties, remove the Read Only check box and start modifying the file, which's gonna save back to my main file, which they weren't allowed. Seems a glitch to me unless I'm getting it wrong.

We are using A360 team with a project hub as well as Collaboration for Revit. In fact that's the reason that triggered us exploring A360 Drive a little more. I'm sure you are aware that in Revit some files reside outside of the project, like Keynotes files or Shared Parameter files. We would like these files, usually TXT, to be loaded from one shared location. If we keep it in our internal network, users collaborating with us can't edit them to add more keynotes or parameters. I know A360 allows us to upload files and share with other users so they can download. But I don't think we can keep it synced to all users and in a location where they can navigate to in the Keynotes dialog box in Revit.

I'm not having sync errors and yes, all the check marks are green in the synced files. The other "glitch" I experienced is this:

Imagine I upload a file to the web A360 drive. Then I share that file with you, so now it shows synced on your A360 drive desktop location. So far so good. Then you delete the file from your A360 drive dektop location. Even though the file still exists in my cloud drive and is still shared with you, that file will never show on your desktop location anymore. I thought that you'd always have a mirror of what I'm sharing with you, all the time. And the only way we found to "wake" the sync again and bring the file back to you is by deleting  the file AdSync.db located under C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Autodesk\Autodesk Sync.

While I was typing all this I may have found another solution for the shared Keynote: External Resources! Seem pretty good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK0OdAe4fWM

Thanks,

Andre

[Anonymous]

Hello mate, 

I know this is an old post. I read your theory of using A360 as agains dropbox. I am facing the same scenario right now but I am having all sorts of issues with this A360 I am beginning to doubt if it's even worth it. Did you get all your problems fixed with A360? did it do all you wanted or you eventually resulted to dopbox/google drive?

[Anonymous]

Hello and welcome to the forums.   The A360 Drive component is being discontinued, you might want to look at Team and the Autodesk Desktop Connector as a replacement.   

Autodesk Team Products:

For the A360 Drive Component, heck out the following link so that you have the latest version installed. 

A360 Desktop Expiring Links FAQ:

Hope this helps and have a great day.  

[Anonymous]

Thanks, I am looking into this now. I have installed this and Sync seems to be fine.  I have a question. Is it possible to change the root folder for where connector stores the files on my desktop? i.e. link the root 'C' folder to another drive? 

Thanks

[Anonymous]

Hi Femi,

That's great news.  As far as the Desktop Connector, and A360 Desktop Sync Component, these can not be moved to different locations.   You can post this as an idea for the Idea board.  The Idea board is used by the teams to see what new or enhancements can be made to features.   Once posted, they are opened up to voting and comments from others.  That allows the team to see how popular this idea would be and if it's something that should be considered for the future.  

Autodesk Idea board:

Hope this helps and have a great day.   

[Anonymous]

One final confusion I need help with.. We have created a folder structure with the newly installed BIM360 but I think the model we created in A360 needs to be moved into BIM 360? We have a model that was already setup in A360 and we have about 3 members working on the project. They are just getting a hang of opening their files via A360. Want to be sure of the implications of this before I start inviting other discipline in