Christiaan

Yeah I noticed that too. Abysmal information.

My presumption is that this is probably a longer term project, over two or three releases, involving many different aspects. Whereas we'd like a fix to this WGR bottleneck as soon as possible. So—absolutely agree with you—but if there's a stepping stone on the way that alleviates this bottleneck in the short term then this could be it.

Despite the advent of Project Sharing we still find ourselves (reluctantly) splitting files up in order to minimise memory usage when working in the main model file (and, to a lesser extent, save and commit time). If we weren't slowed down by large numbers of Sheet Layers and Viewports we'd almost certainly keep everything in one file. So in order to split files up we have to use Workgroup Referencing. But Workgroup Referencing is a drag, because the process of editing the model file, then doing a save and commit, then waiting for Dropbox to sync, then updating the workgroup reference is a long one. But the main culprit is the last step, updating the workgroup reference. Because it fetches the entire file every time you do it. So until Vectorworks can handle a large number of Sheet Layers and Viewports without getting bogged down, it would be great if we had a new form of referencing that worked more like Project Sharing: It would support delta updates rather than having to fetch the entire file It would have a refresh button like Working Files do But it would behave differently to a Working File in the that you could create Sheet Layers that aren't pushed back to the Project File Any thoughts?

We use Avaza for time-keeping. Despite it being a whole task management and billing suite we only use the time-keeping aspect of it. Mainly because it's cheaper than other offerings and because we use Asana for task management. We tried using Avaza for task management but it was too clunky compared to Asana. We haven't integrated billing with time-keeping. Partly because of technophobic office management but also because we don't bill by the hour. We bill by project milestone/progress. We've tried Harvest, Toggl, amongst others. Generally they charge far too much for what they're offering, usually a per user per month fee. Ultimately what I'd like to do is integrate our billing and time keeping so that we can assess profitably of projects at a glance. We could probably do that now with Avaza but I need to need to discuss it further with my director.

Not how it's designed to work. Would be a nice option though. But also dangerous in the wrong hands.

Why make us open a dialogue window when we could edit the fields in the OIP? In the case of a Door object, for instance, it's quicker for me to select the door object and edit my ID Labels directly in the OIP than it is to open up the Tag:

I'm creating this thread to make a list of Notes Database behaviours that I don't think work well. Feel free to add. 1. Active database The first one is what Vectorworks chooses as the active database. This morning I've opened a file and double-clicked on a callout, only to find that the active database is from a project I was working on yesterday, instead of the database associated with this file. Is this the default behaviour of the Notes Database or is this a bug? If it's not a bug, why this behaviour? Because this kind of behaviour has can lead to some pretty horrendous messes if somebody using this tool is not aware of this kind of thing (particularly when they copy paste).

I've noticed that Web View will keep spitting out the same URL even if I change the storage location and even if I change some export options. What change will tricker a new URL to be created? Layer/class visibility? VGX file name?

What conditions need to be met for the logo set under cloud.vectorworks.net/portal/account/ to show? Because ours doesn't show on our web views. We still get the Vectorworks logo. Does it only work if you save to Vectorworks Cloud Storage as opposed to Dropbox?

That's interesting, thanks Wes. Any specifics?

It's a glitch. Longstanding issue that seems to come and go. I reported it in version v2018 SP2 and it got fixed in v2018 SP4 (VB-146969). Which service pack are you using?

Last year we moved away from an internal file server and upgraded to Dropbox Business for the advantages that file syncing services provide. But the reason we chose Dropbox was mainly because it was familiar to us (we were already using a free account) and because some of the businesses we work with, including building contractors, were starting to use Dropbox. Now that I have a very busy year behind me I'm having a closer look at the options and in particular I've noticed a significant difference between how Dropbox and Box.com work with regard to collaborating with third parties: When sharing folders from Dropbox the data in the shared folder counts against the third party's storage space. This means if you want a third party to be able to alter or edit files in the shared folder they will need to upgrade to a paid account if they're to avoid hitting the storage limits of a free account (2 GB). When sharing folders from Box.com, however, the data in the shared folder does not count against the third party's storage space (although I believe some accounts limit the number of third parties you can share with). This is significant because it means you can work with people without forcing them to upgrade to a paid account. So I'm curious, what file syncing service are you using and why?

In the past year 2018 did become drastically more stable. v2018 started off pretty well as it was but v2018 SP4, SP5 and SP6 are some of the most stable versions of VW I've used. So we're watching this space because if there was one feature that allowed us to hit one of the biggest deadlines our practice has ever had (before Christmas), it's stability.

I would hate to work with both Windows and Mac (well with Windows in particular), but that's a personal thing. I like been a master of macOS and not having to learn or bother with Windows OS. Plus I love Apple hardware and their vertical integration with software. That said, Vectorworks won't push you either way. Works equally well on both systems.

@Jim Wilson what's the difference in save speed between an SSD and Fusion drive in practice? I was dealing with 1-2 GB files before Christmas so any difference can add up over time with that kind of file size.