Every 4th release historically has been a file format release and 2013 is no different.  For AutoCAD users, this is no big deal. One can always open previous version and in plain vanilla AutoCAD they can save down to almost any previous version DWG.

When AutoCAD Architecture, or ACA users save their files in 2013 and then save back to an earlier version to share with consultants or clients, those using a previous version of ACA can no longer edit the AEC objects as intelligent objects. The intelligent Doors walls and windows, for example, cannot be saved down to previous version and maintain their intelligence. Upon opening the older DWG in AutoCAD Architecture they will get the following error.

Don’t save . . . or else

This means that the smart objects will be upgraded and not intelligent if downgraded to older DWG formats. Downgrading will make these objects dumb and not editable.

Users will not be able to change a simple door width for example. Also we have seen users getting a ton of errors when opening a DWG that has been saved in a version of AutoCAD Architecture that writes a newer version DWG. for instance; “ARX error — e not of that class”

Please comment or give me a call if I can be of assistance or if there are any other questions or concerns.

Roger

First and foremost, as the MEP guy here at Microsol Resources, I was focusing on MEP-related content and found this MEP Connectors and Revit Architecture post by Doug Bowers last November.  I started reading it, but before I could finish the first paragraph, something caught my eye…”A previous blog post lists each of the family templates installed with the various Revit packages,” so I clicked through and am so glad I did!  The post from October 2011 is entitled Templates Provided with Revit 2012 and contains a link to a PDF that I feel is a very valuable reference for any Revit 2012 user.

As the MEP guy, I was shocked to learn that Revit MEP 2012 does not include many MEP-specific family templates that a MEP user might expect to find in his/her product.  You can review the PDF for a complete comparison matrix, but the following is worth mentioning: Electrical Equipment, Electrical Fixture, Lighting Fixture, Linear Lighting Fixture, Mechanical Equipment, Plumbing Fixture, Specialty Equipment, and Spot Lighting Fixture.

Once I reviewed Doug’s list, I decided to compare the content of all Revit 2011, 2012, and 2013 products.  What I found, and what makes this even more interesting, is that the family templates listed above were included with 2011!  So, what happened in 2012?  I can’t answer that question, but the good news is the templates are back in 2013.  See below for a list of total family templates in each product, at least by my count.  Note that this list does not include Annotation, Conceptual Mass, Titleblock, or Project templates:

• Revit Architecture 2011 – 64
• Revit Architecture 2012 – 62
• Revit Architecture 2013 – 65

• Revit MEP 2011 – 78
• Revit MEP 2012 – 43
• Revit MEP 2013 – 76

• Revit Structure 2011 – 34
• Revit Structure 2012 – 35
• Revit Structure 2013 – 68

If you are a 2012 user and still have 2011 loaded, you can basically copy the 2011 family RFT files from the C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\RME 2011\Imperial Templates folder and paste them into the C:\ProgramData\Autodesk\RME 2012\Family Templates\English_I folder for your 2012 product.  Granted the 2011 templates will need to be upgraded in 2012 when you elect to use them, but that’s no biggie and something that can be done as needed!

I just want to pass along some advice having to do with file folder names and lengths, as this seemed to cause Paul several hours if not days of wasted time.  Paul downloaded and unzipped the Ultimate Suite which created a folded called Autodesk_Building_Design_Suite_Ultimate_2013_English_Win_32-64bit. Apparently after all of the other subfolders get created under this, some of them actually are TOO LONG for the Windows OS to use, and the entire install process fails.

The truly fun part Paul had was when he Canceled the install. Not only does it stop the install process at that point, it also UNINSTALLS EVERYTHING that had successfully installed. Seriously? Yah, that is what he wrote. Bang. Head. Here.

Ok, so hopefully Paul’s sacrifice is your gain. Here is his advice:

• Download the archives.
• Run the installer and accept the default location (you can change drives if you like)
• When the actual installer appears, cancel it.
• Browse to the location of the installed folder and rename it to something shorter (like BDS).
• Double-click the Setup.exe file in the now shortened folder.
• Sit back and wait for it to finish.

Ok? Thanks Paul! We owe you one. Next time you’re in Philly, the drinks are on my boss, er make that me.

Disclaimer: I have not attempted the Suite install myself, but seriously, doing what Paul suggested is like chicken soup. It couldn’t hurt, right, and it might actually help!

Stairs are super fun. That 30 minutes I spend teaching stairs has now expanded to more like 90 minutes. There are a huge number of amazingly wonderful new tools. Then it was time to play with the new Background Graphic Display Options feature. The one thing I like to brag about with my Macbook is that “it just works”, er, except when it doesn’t, which is what happened here.

So, from the Properties palette I set up a “fluffy cloud” image background. We have been missing fluffy clouds ever since Accurender vanished from the products. I found a great image and set it up from here:

And then…..I held my breath and waited for the screen to refresh…and….NOTHING! Just a white background. So, I changed to Sky and yep, same results. Strangely, Gradient did work. So, I checked with my fellow techs here who all have much less cool Lenovos, and WHAT??? It worked on their laptops. It even works on our Dell training stations. So, my sleek, sexy, extra cool Macbook was NOT going to do this? Bummer!

The issue is with virtual machines and graphic card emulation. While the Macbook has this hot little Nvidia card, the virtual machine creates some rinky dink vga driver and no you can’t change that. After exhausting the web, it was time to turn to the experts at Autodesk.  So to keep the 60′s music analogies going here, the Mighty Quinn in tech support there found this bit of info:

“Hardware acceleration is not available in the Parallels 7 environment, and Revit will revert to a DirectX 9 based software graphics mode, which will not render materials, sky, artificial lights, and other features when the Realistic visual style is in effect.

Workaround 1: When you first start Revit and see the Graphics Options – Cannot Use Hardware Acceleration dialog, select the Save Hardware Acceleration Setting option, and then close and restart Revit. Upon restart, DirectX 11 software mode will be used and features will display correctly in Realistic visual style.

Workaround 2: Manually add the following to the [Graphics] section of the Revit.ini file before startup: UseGraphicsHardware=0″

Workaround 1 did not present itself to me, but workaround 2 was pretty easy to achieve:

[Graphics]
TempDimFontSizeInPoints=12
InvertBackground=0
Antialiasing=0
SemiTransparent=1
UseGraphicsHardware=0

I added the last line above to the 2013 Revit.ini file, restarted RAC 2013, and….

As they say these days: “SWEET!!”

Now if this purple haze will just lift……

Here are the steps in case you feel like reading and not watching my awesome video:

1. Load the latest FlexLM on the media of 2013 software. You should be using 11.10.xxxx. Should look similar to:
   
2. On the Autocad install DVD (or any other installation DVD)  or the extracted EXE file, the path for FlexLM is named NLM.msi, under folder: C:\Autodesk\AutoCAD_2013_English_Win_64bit\x64\en-US\Tools\NLM\
3. Note down the existing settings onto notepad and copy the files (especially the license file) off to a backup directory.  You do not want to mess up and delete your license file!!!!
4. Remove the old version via “Programs and Features” in Control Panel.  You can also stop the service manually and do an “in place” installation.
5. Click on the MSI file and follow the installation wizard. It’s as simple as clicking next a bunch of times.
6. Once it’s installed, make sure the initial check box, “LMTOOLS ignores license file path environment variables” is checked. To configure as service, go to the CONFIG SERVICES tab and point/browse to those locations for LMGRD, LICENSE FILE, DEBUG FILE (you have to get the license file from Autodesk and create a debug.log file manually). Make sure the two check boxes are checked and click on SAVE SERVICE.
7. Go to the Start/Stop/Reread tab and click on the Start Server button.
8. Once the status shows Server Start Successful, go to the Server Status tab and click on the Perform Status Enquiry button.
9. VOILA! You’ll see all the licenses available to you in the status window!

The Autodesk Cloud, now called “Autodesk 360”, provides great value by enabling you to extend your desktop with secure and ubiquitous cloud computing capacity and capabilities, helping you rapidly design, visualize, simulate, optimize, and share your ideas. 

This idea of extending your desktop is not an easy concept for everyone to grasp, however having someone else do your work sounds pretty simple to me. If you could delegate a task that normally would take time away from other tasks wouldn’t that be great? Not only does Autodesk 360 have tools that enable advanced processes to be done somewhere else it is a place to store share and collaborate with others.

Do you have an Autodesk subscription? If yes, then you have the cloud already.

CLOUD CAPACITY: All Subscribers have access to: Storage, Sharing, and Viewing, DWG Editing and Mobile Viewing. Your available tools include; Autodesk® Cloud Documents, AutoCAD® WS, and the Autodesk® Design Review Mobile App.

CLOUD CAPABILITIES: If you subscribe to select products or suites, you have an even greater advantage. You can harness the power of Autodesk 360 to perform more compute-intensive tasks, such as rendering, energy analysis, optimization, and collaboration. These offers are; Autodesk 360 Cloud rendering, Autodesk Inventor optimization, Autodesk Revit Conceptual Energy Analysis, Autodesk Green Building Studio, and Autodesk Buzzsaw

Let’s explore and elaborate on this from a few different perspectives.

“I’m not sure if the cloud is for me” or “I have a dedicated machine for rendering or specialists in-house, so I don’t need these cloud services.” Your in-house specialists may find these services useful at times to augment their current process. There may be times when a fast iteration or the ability to run multiple simulations and analysis is useful. Your in-house specialists may choose to use a combination of their current tools and Autodesk Cloud services.

“I don’t know if the service will provide accurate results.” The Inventor optimization service is validated against benchmarks published by respected industry organizations such as NAFEMS (National Agency for Finite Element Methods and Standards).

“I’m not sure that my data will be safe from unauthorized access and available when I want it.” Users of Autodesk Cloud documents have the security controls to define who is authorized to access, view and update the files they have uploaded. These controls allow users to store design documents in the cloud so they can access them anytime, anywhere (when connected to the internet) and securely share them with designated colleagues, clients, and other users. The subscription contract administrator can define who in their organization have access to the cloud services. Autodesk 360 uploads and downloads are securely encrypted using SSL certificates. To ensure the security and availability of Autodesk 360 services, Autodesk strategically chooses stable and reliable hosting providers and locations with the following key concerns in mind; Availability, Replication, Connectivity, Environment Security, Power/HVAC, Hardware redundancy. Please contact us for more detail if necessary.

If any of this sounds interesting or confusing please give us a call or email Support@MicrosolResources.com and we will be happy to explain further or answer any question you may have. Welcome to the cloud.

ROGER LIUCCI | AEC BIM / 3DP SPECIALIST 

One of the common questions I get is about those pretty blue dongles. We’re all used to setting up FlexLM to manage licenses, but all Chaos Groups’ V-Ray licenses are managed by a USB dongle. So how does it work, how will my network be affected, how will our firms’ licenses be managed? Well, here’s a quick little video that demonstrates how to install the license server and then making sure the dongle is [properly] read by the workstation (I’m using a Windows 7, 64bit machine for our licenses). It’s not as easy as just sticking the USB in so before you jump in, it’ll be good to check the video out. 

The Shared Mode is where things get a little more interesting, and for larger firms, this is the preferred method since standardization across all workstations is vital for productivity. I mean, you don’t want teams in the same firm using completely different Templates and Layer Standards. Some points to consider:

• If you specify the same location for subsequent installations (not deployment), you will be prompted to overwrite the existing shared content files.
• If you create a deployment with shared content, the content files are written to the shared locations when the deployment is created. This “one time deal” installs content for all Content Packs to the shared location so make sure it’s large enough.

Thankfully uninstalling the software from one workstation does not remove the content from the shared location. Imagine the headaches that would’ve happened if that was the case! Craziness!