Lab install and frequency of published updates

[airRPT2H]

We area a secondary school in Kent, England and have a LAB install of the Fusion 360 product and about 100 - 150 users or so.

Our issue seems to be that the 'published updates' our IT department receive and then roll out are out of date/synch with the frequency of updates our students receive on their own (home PCs) Fusion 360 install.  This is causing us many issues, as when a student creates or edits a Fusion design at home, they are then unable to open and edit it when at school on the school Fusion install.

Questions

Why are the published updates our IT Department are using out of synch with other updates?

Is there a better, more frequent, update  option than our IT department are using (waiting for published update files)?  

We are unable to prevent students from updating their own home PCs, a process we believe is largely automatic,   therefore, how do we keep the school system as up to date to prevent the above issues?

Your helps and advice would be most appreciated.

Regards,

Ant

Design & Technology Dept.

Hayes School

[TrippyLighting]

@James.Youmatz I believe you are able to answer this.

If there's a blog post that explains his, please point it out.

@airRPT2H This has come up not frequently but regularly. I've made a post on the Fusion 360 Expert Elite slack channel and asked if there's anything in the works that provides better update-syncing between accounts.  

[gaby.waldman-fried · Accepted solution]

Hi @airRPT2H , I certainly understand your frustration that updates to lab installs do not happen in the background the way they do for individual downloads. Fortunately, we now have a solution based on the feedback of many educators like yourself who ran into this issue.

To ensure your lab version is consistent with the latest version available on students’ personal devices you now have the option to set up Auto-Downloads. Auto-Downloads for Fusion 360 automate the recurring 4-8 week update process. To learn more about the benefits of Auto-Downloads and the set-up instructions, check out this PDF (see section 6/page 14 for auto-download info).
https://damassets.autodesk.net/content/dam/autodesk/docs/pdfs/Advanced_Fusion360_Lab_Installation_In...

[airRPT2H]

Many thanks to everyone for their support.

I have forwarded the information sent by Gaby to our IT Dept. in the hope this information helps us to resolve the issue.  I will report back on the success/failure ASAP.

Regards  Ant

ps Merry Christmas to all

[airRPT2H]

Hi Gaby,

Our IT Support Dept. have responded in the positive.  They came back to me yesterday, having implemented the soltion you kindly provided. 

I can confirm that all is well and working! 

🙂

Many thanks for your help and to all others that posted responses to our plea for assistance.

Have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy (well, happier than 2020) New Year.

Cheers,

Ant