My template has old resources in it

[Marcus bLD]

Hi VW friends,

I've discovered a self inflicted anomaly that I'm trying to remedy.

I saved a template with my preferred layers, sheets etc all setup after having completed multiple drawings and getting everything fine tuned to how I like.

What I've discovered (as I start to understand VW better) is the template has all the resources from previous drawings sitting in the file as shown in Resource Manager when I search Selected File, All Resources. There are about 1300 items from previous drawings. 

I'm wondering if there is a way to resave my template but without these items, or if I have to start again, save a new template and manually recreate what I already have setup? I assume these items being in the current file are either going to be taking up space, or potentially slowing things down.. or at minimum just messy!

Thanks

 

 

 

 

 

[markdd]

The Purge Command will do what you need. But be careful. Save the file first and then Purge category by category and make sure that you preview the results before you click OK.

 

 

[Marcus bLD]

Thanks Mark, when you say be careful, what is the risk?

[Pat Stanford]

Start a new file using the template. Purge or delete the objects you don't want in the template. Save as Template to create a new template file or overwrite the original template.

[markdd]

7 minutes ago, Marcus bLD said:

what is the risk?

You don't want to delete objects that you want to remain in your Template.

[Marcus bLD]

I have followed Pat's instructions (thanks Pat). There are still 732 items in the file. The second image shows all the ticked boxes that I purged. I have also then refreshed the library.

 

[Tom W.]

Tick 'Special Symbols' too

[Marcus bLD]

Thanks Tom, have ticked the 2 special boxes. That's taken care of most of it. There's still some random textures, backgrounds and images hanging in there. Any thoughts?

[Peter Neufeld.]

Hi Marcus,

I'm a purist and would suggest it's better to rebuild the template again from scratch. It sounds like you have reused that file and saved as a template many times over, even years and it has had a lot of history going on inside. Even though as everyone has suggested doing a Purge is correct, as I said I would rebuild it.

It's very easy and fast:

 

To Rebuild Design Layers

• Create a new blank document (this means that it is a current version file and not an old resaved template).
• Right click in the Design Layer tab of the Navigation Palette and select new.
• Select the second radio button Import Design Layers.
• Click Choose and locate the original file that needs to be re-built from your computer or server, ie open your template draw a line and save as a normal VWX file.
• Select the Design Layers you wish to recreate in your new file from the list. 
• Click the option to Import Layer Objects if there are any objects you might want and select OK.

 If you have design layer viewports, these will not be recreated during this process and for each one an alert dialogue will appear saying the Layer Links are not supported.

 

Classes can be imported the same way as above.

 

To Rebuild Sheet Layers

• Right click in the Sheet Layer tab of the Navigation Palette and select new.
• Select the second radio button Import Sheet Layer.
• Click Choose and again locate the original file that needs to be re-built from your computer or server.
• Select the Sheet Layers you wish to recreate in your new file from the list.
• Click OK.

To Rebuild Viewport/s

In your original file, navigate to one of the Sheet Layers you would like to rebuild. Simply copy and then paste into the new file.

 

Cheers,

Peter

 

 

[Marcus bLD]

Hi Peter, you are right and I think that makes sense. This revelation came to me after talking to Ben last week about another issue.. he kept saying oh wow there's so much in your file, so thought it was time do some housekeeping. I'll work through the above, seems fairly straightfroward.

Cheers

[Marcus bLD]

OK, I have followed the instructions, started fresh and done the rebuild.

For some reason I still have these hangover items? 

 

[Peter Neufeld.]

1 minute ago, Marcus bLD said:

OK, I have followed the instructions, started fresh and done the rebuild.

For some reason I still have these hangover items? 

 

 

 

I'd do it again but this time don't click the 'Import Layer Objects" for the design layers.

 

Cheers,

Peter

[Marcus bLD]

Just redone, and now the number has increased to 101 items.

 

[Marcus bLD]

They are coming in when I rebuild the Classes. I instead tried bringing in the Classes from the ANZ Garden Design template and for some reason it still brings in a random group of hatches, textures and lines. Much better than it was though.

[Peter Neufeld.]

Well done for finding the cause. I didn't twig to that but it makes sense that if a class has some graphics set to 'Use at Creation' then it has to bring those graphics into the file, in order for those graphics to be able to be used.

 

Cheers,

Peter

[Gadzooks]

7 hours ago, Marcus bLD said:

Much better than it was though

 

We've all followed your 'journey' - That was a mission, well done!!

 

However, what have you left that could reasonably be helpful in saving as a (new) Template? We all have different ways of starting projects to fit our individual work flow, but you seem to have cleaned out to almost a blank start page without any favourite (for eg) dashes/pen sizes, layers, classes, text styles etc, etc. The real power and simplicity of starting with a (or sum, if you have a few methods for alternative projects types) Templates - is so you don't then have to find all the various/essential parts that will make your working day easier. 

 

I see you have introduced some layers and a few other essentials back in following Peter's advice so that is that all you need (?)

 

Just interested...🙂

 

 

[Peter Neufeld.]

Hello,

I swear this is true! Only yesterday I had an architect in tech support that was having problems with some operations in the file. It turns out the file was ancient and I told them how to rebuild using the instructions above. Unexpected and unrepeatable weird things can happen in old reused files. They then admitted, and get this, that they had been using the same file since 2009! That's a record for such an admission! Not even as a template .sta rather just a 'save as' and emptying it out!

 

Cheers,

Peter

 

 

[Marcus bLD]

16 hours ago, Gadzooks said:

 

We've all followed your 'journey' - That was a mission, well done!!

 

However, what have you left that could reasonably be helpful in saving as a (new) Template? We all have different ways of starting projects to fit our individual work flow, but you seem to have cleaned out to almost a blank start page without any favourite (for eg) dashes/pen sizes, layers, classes, text styles etc, etc. The real power and simplicity of starting with a (or sum, if you have a few methods for alternative projects types) Templates - is so you don't then have to find all the various/essential parts that will make your working day easier. 

 

I see you have introduced some layers and a few other essentials back in following Peter's advice so that is that all you need (?)

 

Just interested...🙂

 

 

It has all my layers, and sheet layers with title blocks already in place and everything set to my preferred page setup. My plants, rocks, random pavers etc are all saved as favourites (I custom draw them all), as are my labels, plant tags, text etc (and also title blocks, plant schedule and plant legend). Lineweights/types I just change as I need when I draw. 

 

Happy for any advice if there is a better way to do this, I am very much learning as I go, but I think the constant save as might have been causing some headaches with the sheer amount of resources sitting in my documents, and actually I just checked.. the latest file is nearly 5 times smaller than the version prior to the clean out, so that's a pretty good advertisement for doing it! 

[Marcus bLD]

6 hours ago, Peter Neufeld. said:

Hello,

I swear this is true! Only yesterday I had an architect in tech support that was having problems with some operations in the file. It turns out the file was ancient and I told them how to rebuild using the instructions above. Unexpected and unrepeatable weird things can happen in old reused files. They then admitted, and get this, that they had been using the same file since 2009! That's a record for such an admission! Not even as a template .sta rather just a 'save as' and emptying it out!

 

Cheers,

Peter

 

 

Thanks again Peter