Sharing blocks and toolbars

[danielgreedy]

I operate a small, yet growing Cad company doing drawings for commercial casework and architectural millwork manufactures.  As the company grows, we have been using more and more "remote" drafters.  The trouble comes in that they do not often hold to the same standards as we do in house.  Basically we use a wide variety and ever growing set of blocks, symbols, templates, etc and the remote drafters do not always have the most updated versions causing some extra work.  All the items are created and then used locally via a group of toolbars (1 for each customer and then a shared "common" toolbar).

What is the best way to share these items - and make sure they stay updated - with the remote drafters?   

Currently using AutoCAD LT 2018.  I apologize in advance if this is a newbie question.  Remote drafters are relatively new for us and I did not see anything specific in the forums when I searched.

Thank you

Dan Reedy

www.manufacturingoptions.com

[pendean]

Send them your updated block library and your "standards" template files to use for your projects not an option?

You'll likely not be able to control contract workers beyond that, it's the nature of their business, they have many masters to serve, not just you, so their needs come ahead f yours most of the time.

[danielgreedy]

Is it as simple as emailing the template file to them as they start a new project for us?  I would assume that at that point, they would need to determine if they wanted to create a new toolbar for the blocks and symbols in that template file?

Thank you

Dan

[john.vellek · Accepted solution]

Hi @danielgreedy,

I see that you are visiting as a new member to the AutoCAD LT forum. Welcome to the Autodesk Community!

You might consider posting your block libraries to a Cloud/Website.  Many cloud services allow users to subscribe to a page and receive notifications of when files are changed. In this manner, you could change a block library  client standard (I put mine in ZIP files for each client) and your remote workers would receive an email indicating that their is a newer version available.

This of course will not update drawings with previous versions of the blocks bu t you can also add comments for blocks to indicate if they should substitute/replace the old blocks.

Please select the Accept as Solution button if my post solves your issue or answers your question.