Can't open NWF

[tstorzuk]

A little help please...

Trying to open an NWF file in Vault using Navisworks Manage. Every single file that is appended into the NWF comes up as "Can't resolve external reference:". Doesn't matter if the file is a DWG, NWD, or any other type of file appended into the NWF.

When it finishes loading, there is NOTHING in the view window.

What's wrong with Vault?

Why won't it allow anyone to open and view the NWF?

How do I overcome this shortfall?

[hmunsell]

I'm not as familiar with Vault as i should be... i assume the NWF was made, with all its links, outside of vault then copied into vault. The links could be being associated with a drive path that the NWF no longer has access to. 

does it have to be a NWF? can you create a NWD of the NWF and upload the NWD instead? the NWD should not rely on the links as much and should open better for users that don't have access to the original link locations.

another option is to copy all the files associated with the NWF into the same folder with the NWF. i have not personally tried this, but other Autodesk programs will sometimes default to the local folder first and then look at drive paths.

[tstorzuk]

I don't know why the moderators moved this to the Navisworks forum, as it's a problem with Vault.

No, the NWF was not made outside of Vault. The links are associated with Vault's file paths. For some reason Vault isn't pulling out the associated/appended DWG's, DWF's or any other file type when opening the NWF file.

[hmunsell]

Interesting. that does sound like a Vault issue to me too.  

As a test, if you have time... Try putting all, or some, of the linked files in the same folder as the NWF in Vault and see if that matters at all. Its a stretch, but it might get you thru until Vault gets it fixed.

[tstorzuk · Accepted solution]

To get it to work, I had to manually "Get" all of the appended files for the NWF and put them in my working folders on my C:\. So technically, it's still not reading the latest dwg file information.

This is definitely an issue with Vault. Navisworks has absolutely no problem opening the NWF. It's Vault that can't figure out what files to pull from the vault to make Navisworks function properly.