Add "Reload from Disk" or "Discard In-Memory Changes" Command for Assembly Components

[ryan_murphyKSEE3]

Product and Version

• Autodesk Inventor Professional 2025.3
• Autodesk Vault Professional 2025.4
• (Issue observed in multiple prior versions as well)

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Summary

When a user makes temporary, experimental edits to a part or subassembly within the context of a parent assembly—without checking out and without saving—there is no way to discard those in-memory changes and reload the component from disk without closing all parent assemblies that reference it.

This significantly impacts productivity for users performing "what-if" analysis or exploratory design changes.

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Detailed Description Use Case

Engineers frequently need to test design ideas before committing to them. A common workflow is:

1. Open an assembly from Vault (all files in Released state)
2. Edit a component to test an idea, declining checkout prompts since this is temporary
3. Evaluate the change in the assembly context
4. Decide to discard the experimental change and revert to the released version

Current Behavior

• The experimental changes exist only in RAM (not saved to disk)
• The following Vault commands do not discard in-memory changes:
  • Refresh File — compares local disk timestamp to Vault; since nothing was saved, disk file is already "current"
  • Get Revision — same issue; local copy already matches Vault
  • Revert to Latest — designed for disk-level discrepancies, not in-memory state
• Closing the part window does not release it from memory because the parent assembly still holds a reference
• The only current solution is to close the entire assembly (and all of its parents), losing any valid work in progress at the assembly level

Technical Root Cause

Inventor's document management keeps referenced documents in memory as long as any parent document references them. The Vault add-in's refresh commands compare disk timestamps, not in-memory state. Since unsaved experimental changes never touch the disk, these commands see nothing to refresh.

From Autodesk's own API documentation:

"If a document is closed, the document is not really closed unless that was the final view and the document is not referenced by any other open documents."

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Business Impact

Impact Area Description

Lost productivity	Users must close and reopen large assemblies (potentially 100,000+ components) just to discard a small experimental change in one part
Risk of data loss	If the assembly has valid unsaved changes, users face a difficult choice: lose their real work or keep the unwanted experimental changes
Workflow friction	Discourages exploratory design and "what-if" analysis, which are critical for innovation and optimization
Training burden	New users expect "Refresh" or "Revert" to work intuitively; current behavior is confusing

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Proposed Solution

Add a new command accessible from:

• Right-click context menu on components in the Model Browser
• Right-click context menu in the Vault Browser
• Vault ribbon

Command Name (suggested)

"Reload from Disk" or "Discard Changes and Reload"

Expected Behavior

1. Prompt user to confirm: "Discard all unsaved changes to [filename] and reload from disk?"
2. Internally close the document (with SkipSave)
3. Re-resolve and reload the document from the local workspace file
4. Update all occurrences in referencing assemblies
5. Trigger an assembly update to reflect the reloaded geometry

Integration with Vault

When Vault integration is active, an additional option could be offered:

• "Discard Changes and Get Latest from Vault" — combines discarding in-memory changes with fetching the latest version from Vault in one step

Scope

• Should work on parts and subassemblies
• Should work regardless of Vault lifecycle state
• Should preserve assembly constraints (geometry should be identical if reloading the same version)

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Workarounds Attempted (All Unsuccessful)

Workaround Result

Refresh File (Vault)	No effect — disk timestamp unchanged
Get Revision (Vault)	No effect — local already matches Vault
Revert to Latest (Vault)	No effect — same reason
Close part window	Part remains in memory due to assembly reference
File → Manage → Refresh (Inventor)	Compares to disk timestamp; no reload occurs
Replace Component with itself	Does not force document reload

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Related Autodesk Ideas Submission

This request aligns with existing community feedback: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/inventor-ideas/reload-model-in-assembly/idi-p/12476534

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Additional Notes

• This limitation has been observed and reported by multiple users across Autodesk forums dating back to at least Inventor 2020
• The issue affects both Vault and non-Vault users, though it is particularly painful in Vault environments where files are often read-only and exploratory edits are common
• A similar "Reload" function exists in other CAD systems (e.g., SOLIDWORKS, Creo) and is a commonly expected feature

[ihayesjr]

@ryan_murphyKSEE3 

Thank you for posting the idea. However, this would have to be controlled by the CAD application itself, not by Vault. 

Please post on the Inventor Ideas board.