Why is Fusion 360 scanning my OneDrive account?

[ltomuta]

If I lock the PC with Fusion open and it goes to sleep, when I unlock it Fusion starts complaining about network issues (network is fine for every other app) and then it freezes apparently busy with something.

Then Windows's OneDrive shows me a notification that Fusion is accessing (i.e. downloading) files which are stored on my OneDrive account (local path c:\Users\lucian\OneDrive\FusionBackup\F\)  but are available only online.

[Phil.E]

Can you post an image of that, along with your diagnostic log files please?

[ltomuta]

I just tried to reproduce the issue. I got Fusion to unresponsive "offline" mode after waking up PC from sleep but the OneDrive download part did not happen this time.

[ltomuta]

I remembered collecting log files when this first happened but I can't find them anymore. I just found a screenshot with Windows notifying me about Fusion accessing the files. 

[Phil.E]

What is your current Fusion 360 build number? (Help > About)

[ltomuta]

I have 2.0.12392, probably the same at work where I mostly ran into this issue.

Now, I just tried this at home. Here, on Win11 vs Win10 at work, it seems that OneDrive does not show a notification anymore when apps access online only files. Instead accessed files are scrolled in the main window when there is activity.

So here are my steps:
- start fusion, open a random design
- put the PC to sleep

- wait few seconds and then wake it up

- after login, Fusion complains about not having network (other apps are fine)
- Fusion becomes unresponsive (black in Browser and around notification )
- As I did not see the expected notification form OneDrive I went to check the files on OneDrive. I right clicked the folder with Fusion files and I chose "Free space" basically asking OneDrive to delete local copies of the files.
- Once the change applied, I opened the OneDrive app from the status bar and there I could see lots of activity with Files reportedly being downloaded by Fusion into the F folder. I then checked the folder again and I could see that indeed, some files were again available offline, having been downloaded by Fusion.

- I put OneDrive sync on pause
- As Fusion was unresponsive, I could not collect logs. I did however collect a dump file, which I will make available to you.
- Now Fusion is restated and I did collect logs which I will also make available to you. 

HTH.

[Phil.E]

Can you tell me about this folder, and if you open Fusion designs from here?

(local path c:\Users\lucian\OneDrive\FusionBackup\F\)

[ltomuta]

Hmm, seems that replying via email to the forum is broken.  I replied to this some 16h ago 🙂

In brief: the ...\F folder on my OneDrive is a copy of %AppData%\Local\Autodesk\Autodesk Fusion 360\<USERID>\W.login\F folder taken after a refresh of Fusion's cache on one of the team hubs I no longer actively use. Basically it has all the latest versions of my projects from that hub.

I have a script abandoned at some 80% done stage that one day may take those files and upload them to my current hub, recreating the original folder structure as well. But until that happens those files are meant to stay on the cloud, not on my local drive. I don't need them now and I don't access them.

Fusion should not be aware of those files, should not be accessing them (as that triggers a dld. which consumes bandwidth, disc space and CPU) and should not freeze if/when doing so.

[lance.carocci]

Just to confirm - the folder on OneDrive is just a copy/paste, not a symbolic link or anything like that? It is truly puzzling how Fusion would be aware of that copy, as you said.

[ltomuta]

Indeed, just a copy.

I just tried it at work again. Folder "emptied" to cloud, wake-up PC from sleep and promptly Fusion started downloading my files back to the drive.

I can only guess that when detecting the offline mode Fusion does a greedy search for "where in this system are my cached files?" and the API call returns this location as a possible candidate.

[ltomuta]

The folder contains a backup of Fusion's local cache of files but from a
different hub than the one I am actively using now. I don't remember now
the exact path these files used to live under, but it starts with %appdata%
and ends with /F/. It is that F folder entirely that I have copied over to
my onedrive.

I don't currently use any of these files. They are "cloud only" precisely
for that reason. I have a 80% done script that will eventually use them,
but that side project is on hold now.

The thing is that Fusion sees them where it should not look and while
downloading them is wasting my bandwidth, disk space and also my CPU
cycles, becoming unresponsive when I need it to work.