Sheet Set manager, expected layout, found layout, import layout as sheet

[Anonymous]

I've scoured the web and weeded through the patronizing answers people get when questioning the gods of autodesk and have attempted to find my own solutions to no avail. Maybe one last shout to oblivion will return a useful echo. 

I have a project, and I have created sheets for this project, about 130 sheets.  I imported these sheets into the sheet set manager, numbered them, ordered them, and used the numbering as fields throughout the sheets in references (sheet totals, page numbers, sheet list references, etc). 

From what I can tell, you should be able to use the sheet set manager to print. However, every single time I print, it fails because the sheet set manager cannot find any number of layouts. Fine, so I go to the sheet that failed, right click go to the properties, go to the expected layout, re-import the layout and reprint. Success! Or so one would think. Until you look at your pdf and find out that even it prints a sheet "successfully" it could be printing a different layout for the expected sheet. For instance, it could decide to plot the layout for sheet 20 as sheet 2. And there's no way to tell without going through each sheet, inspecting them, identifying the ones that the sheet set manager plotted incorrectly, then either doing the whole process of importing the layout as sheet and re printing those sheets, or just opening the sheets by themselves and printing. By the time I get through all this, a 130 sheet file takes 2 hours to get right, I find myself asking, why didn't I just open each sheet and plot each layout individually? But sure enough, the next submittal comes around and I find myself going through the entire process again, because, "surely it will work this time". 

so with the back story come the questions, gods of autocad:

1. In what universe does it make sense that I told the sheet set to import a specific layout as a sheet, but the next time I go to print, autocad thinks it knows better, and implements it's own ideas of what I actually wanted print. Why would that even be a feature? If I tell it to look for a specific layout, it should look for that layout and only that layout, forever and ever.  If it cannot find a layout (even if I have the file open and am looking right at it) it should not import a random layout because, "close enough!" So please, I need justification and one scenario where anyone in the universe would think that was useful. It seems more like this was a problem and rather than fixing it, the onus was put on the drafter to fix the printing issues. 

2. I've read that printing was kind of an after thought to autodesk and that sure seems to be the case. It seems the idea was to make the sheet set at the very end of the project, ignoring the fact of 30%, 60%, 90%, final submitalls and internal reviews. If that were the case, doesn't the whole idea of fields go out the window? Those fields (referring to sheet numbers) are linked directly to the sheet set. Even if you remove and re-add the same sheet from the sheet set, the fields will be broken. So once a sheet set is created, and inevitably fails, you are resigned to the process of re-associating the layouts when they cannot be found or face the risk of going into every sheet and hoping you find every time a field for that sheet was used. 

3. And before anyone gets cheeky and starts up the whole batch plot vs. printing from sheet set manager argument, I've tried that as well! Autocad will also print random sheets in the batch plot if you give it enough sheets to think about. 

4. The problem seems to be more common in files with multiple layouts in a file. If this is an issue and the sheet set manager simply cannot cope, it would seem Autodesk has never heard of cross sections. Surely they don't want a single file and layout for each individual cross section sheet? I've had hundreds of cross section sheets on projects before. Individual files just so the sheet set manager works is insanity.

5. The problem isn't isolated to files with multiple layouts. I've had single files, with single layouts, and the problem occurs there too.

6. It is completely random. If you correct a sheet layout, the next session of CAD will have different, or the same, or both, sheets having the same issue.

7. Is there any way to override the location where the sheet set will look for the expected layout? Even if I have to create a special folder and dump all my files there and tell it to only look in that one location, that would be better than what is happening now.

I fear the solution is what I've found by reading the internet, there isn't one. The user must simply resign to the fact that printing is not, nor will it ever be easy with autocad. Printing is a day long, company wide event that requires all resources available. Either you open each file individually to print, or you play whack-a-mole fighting the sheet set manager to get it to print the sheets and layouts you actually want.

And in this universe, I ask, where is my paper and pencil?

[jggerth]

Interesting,,,, I _CAN_ state with certainty that in many years of using Sheetsets both to manage a project's drawings, and publishing from SSM both to hardcopy and pdf/dwf, I have NEVER encountered any scenario remotely resembling what you describe, nor have I even hear of anyone else doing so.  The worst problem I've run into with a corrupt Sheetset / publish fubar was with 2011 C3D, where calling for multiple copies worked, but only one sheet at a time regardless of how many were selected to publish.  The only times SSM has failed to correctly load the proper layout, or lost track of which layout was which has been when a project was moved form one location/server/path to a different one (e.g. V: drive in Office A to W: drive in Office C)

Given that, and presuming you are running relatively current versions of the software, it would seem to be something unique, or relatively unique, to your particular setup of workstation, network, printer, server etc.  

So question 1, is what is your Network Operating System?  Novell? *Nix? MacOS? Windows Server (& version)???  If the latter, is DFS implemented anywhere?  Any NAS devices involved?

[Anonymous]

I'm using 2016, but we've had this going back through 2012. It is not isolated to my computer, it is company wide. I have seen others discuss this issue in other forums, but never a solution outside of re-pathing the layout or deleting the sheet set and recreating. 

[jggerth]

>>So question 1, is what is your Network Operating System?  Novell? *Nix? MacOS? Windows Server (& version)???  If the latter, is DFS implemented anywhere?  Any NAS devices involved?

If you just want to vent, that's fine.  If you want to maybe figure out what's happening differently in your operation than most of the rest of the planet, then we need more information about your infrastructure and setup.  Fer example, since it's evidently happening across your company -- how many people are involved, and are they all using identical drive mapping?

[Anonymous]

the files are actually being stored on Projectwise, with local copies on individual hard drives. as for my operating system,

windows 7

16 GB RAM

Intel Xeon 3.6 GHz processor

[jggerth]

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@Anonymous wrote:

the files are actually being stored on Projectwise, with local copies on individual hard drives. as for my operating system,

windows 7

16 GB RAM

Intel Xeon 3.6 GHz processor

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And that is most probably the source of your problem.  I haven't dealt with PW for over a decade -- since shortly after Bentley acquired that product and started pushing it,  but IIRC the actual files are stored in a 'vault' format, not directly accessible  through the file system at least not under the filename that SSM would be looking for.

If you have to live with PW, then SSM is probably not going to do you much good -- since much of what SSM can do can also be handled differently through Projectwise.  As far as I'm aware, no-one in either Autodesk or Bentley has done _anything_ to integrate or coordinate SSM and PW.

Bottom line?  IMO pick one or the other, and rock on.    btw -- what you desktop OS si really doesn't answer the question of what your _network_ OS is...

(Alternate which may or may not work -- consider investigating Synergis Adept as a PW replacement)

[Anonymous]

ahh the Bentley beastie strikes again.  Projectwise has never played well with AutoCAD, be it reference files or sheet sets or OLE or any number of other AutoCAD core functions. Files/data/information external to the drawing itself frequently get lost in the shuffle without a strict control of the Projectwise setup and adherence to that setup.  Checking out a drawing doesn't always check out the appropriate support files leaving older files in the local "inbox" directories to muck with the drawing.  This is a Projectwise issue, seen em before.