Breaking Through the Cloud – A 30,000 ft View of ACC and Design Software Workflows

KEVIN ROBINSON: Hello, everybody. Thank you for joining me. I know your time is special. And you guys could have chosen any other presentation to watch. But you chose this one. So I appreciate that. This is Above the Clouds. This is a very, very high-level view at ACC and how it works with some design software, specifically Civil 3D Revit and Plant 3D. So, we're going to go over some of the workflows that we do here at Hazen to accommodate ACC Docs and how it works with those softwares.

My name is Kevin Robinson, senior principal design technology specialist here at Hazen and Sawyer. I've had 25 years of working in the AEC industry. And in the past year, I've worked in the design technologies portion of our company-- enjoyed it thoroughly. Hazen and Sawyer is where I've been working for the past six years. We are a water wastewater, exclusively water wastewater firm. So we do all things water and only things water. So we don't venture too far outside of that workspace.

So I say that-- I just said that Hazen and Sawyer is a water, wastewater firm. So all of these workflows and what we think we know about ACC and how it works with those design softwares are based on our experience internally and how we've dealt with it here at Hazen. So they are Hazen specific work cases with Hazen specific workflows, but they do apply outside of us. So that's why we figured we would share our findings.

Some of the slides that you're going to see are architecture slides, how we believe that ACC is built in the background. We have not verified those diagrams with Autodesk. We don't believe that they would even probably confirm those with us anyways. But they are important on how we approach our workflows between the design softwares and the cloud. But we just want to let you know we did not get ACC-- or I'm sorry-- Autodesk. approval or verification that these are accurate.

OK, so the problem statement for us was I guess it's been about three or four years ago, Hazen chose to switch over to the cloud. And we chose ACC Docs as our host for that cloud. It means that we were pretty much exclusively an Autodesk shop anyway. So it just made sense for us to go to ACC Docs.

At Hazen, our primary design software is Civil 3D, Plant 3D, and Revit. And when we were getting into these things, obviously, as they brought ACC Docs online with the different softwares, we were testing them, doing some things. And we were noticing that there were differences in how ACC interacted with those softwares in different ways depending on what software you were in.

So we had to start figuring that out in the background so that it informed us on how we were going to deal, how we were going to change our workflows. I'm a button pusher. I believe that if there's a button in the software, I should be able to push it. And that just isn't the case or at least historically hasn't been the case with how these things operate with ACC Docs and the Desktop Connector.

So when we started digging in, these are some of the parts and pieces we believe exist in the background. We'll start down here on the ground level here. At the user base, we've got the user's computer. We've got the design software. We've got the Desktop Connector, which interacts with the design software in one form or another.

Civil 3D has no way of communicating to the cloud except for this Desktop Connector. So it does not have its own cache folder. It exclusively uses the Desktop Connector for its storage locations. Plant and the Plant Project has its own ACC cache folder, the Collaboration Cache folder. So it is able to communicate directly with the cloud via its cache folder. And Revit has its own cache folder, and that allows it to communicate directly to the Revit server.

Once we get above the cloud here, the servers that we believe exist-- obviously, there's probably more than just the ones we list here. And we're not sure if they're actually separate hardware, but we do know there are partitions of some sort between these servers. But you've got the ACC File Server, the ACC Publish Server, the Plant 3D File Server, and the Revit File Server.

And then, we believe that the portal exists on its own file server. But it could be just a partition between the ACC File Server and what's viewable on the web. All of this exists on Amazon Web Services. That's what Autodesk chose to host its web environment, not really a lot there, just a note. Amazon Web Service does host the ACC environment.

OK, so we're going to start off with Civil 3D. It has probably the simplest, what we believe to be the simplest diagram and working environment of the three softwares just because it uses the Desktop Connector to be the brokerage software between the design drawing or the design software and the ACC file servers.

So we'll start with how to open up a drawing. So when you go into your design software, you would go to the Start tab in the design software. That Start tab is effectively a view into the Desktop Connector software. So when you open up a drawing through that Start menu, the Start tab, it opens up the Desktop Connector.

And that becomes the first point of contact and the first point of any kind of command to go up to the file servers, the ACC File Servers in the cloud. And then, it caches that file or that drawing down to your local cache in File Explorer. And then it opens it up in the design software from the local cache.

So Civil 3D, you should be able to go through the normal file, open the software-- I will say, the Desktop Connector is designed to do that, to go to File, Open, and then open the file through the software that way. But what we noticed is that when we went through the normal file open command, that it seemed to be pulling the drawing from the local cache.

And then, the Desktop Connector would have to play catch up and notice the change or the open, then go up to the file servers, lock it, check for the current one, cache it back down. And we noticed that it was having locking and unlocking issues. It seemed to fail a lot more going with that direction rather than going through the Start menu and letting that initial command come from the Desktop Connector to do the brokering. So that's one way that we changed our workflows.

When we go to xref or reference files-- normally, it's your flat files, your Excel files, PDFs, other drawings, images-- those files, we don't have any other choice within the software but to go to the File Explorer, through the normal xref palette, and then open the File Explorer, and browse to our drawings via the Desktop Connector.

They don't really get locked at that point. So we didn't have any real issues with that workflow. Not only that, we don't have any other options. So that is Hazen's preferred method of referencing files through the Desktop Connector but through the File Explorer area. And that's pretty much the only changes to our workflow for Civil 3D.

What we did notice up here in the cloud was that you would save all-- the Desktop Connector would be doing its job. It'd come up here. It'd file, save, lock. All the things would happen as expected in the ACC File Servers. And then, it would fail to publish to a viewable portion in the website. So that's why we believe that there is some kind of a disconnect between what you're viewing in the website and the file servers.

So when you go up on the website and you're monitoring or you want to view something, a drawing in the project website, you'll notice that there's a warning triangle or something. That is letting you know that the publish from the ACC File Servers failed to make it to the project website. Not much we can do there to correct that.

We've noticed that over time, the more you work on the file, it will eventually make the journey from the file servers to the published project website browser. But that's just be aware of that when you notice that because you're able to continue to work in the file from the file server through the Desktop Connector even though that warning is up here on the website. So just be aware of that.

Most recently, I guess in the past month or two, they brought on the Sheet Set Manager for Web. We believe that that web app-- we're not sure if it lives on the Publish Server. It might exist somewhere between the software and the Publish Server. We're not real sure. That's why we put it out here. I personally believe it actually exists on the Publish Server, but it doesn't really matter.

Sheet Set Manager for Web is, we believe, a direct access to the files that live on the file server. We know that because you can view all of the files and all of the projects that you have been assigned to, but they're not necessarily checked and added to your Desktop Connector.

So it does not use the Desktop Connector to access the file servers in the cloud. It is using another method or direct access to the file servers. And then, it uses the Publish Server to eventually publish those files, the plotting of those files back to the file servers and then to a viewable format on the project website.

So that's the architecture. So what does that mean as far as workflows? So when opening the a, again, this is what we do here at Hazen, not-- this should work, but we just-- it seems to fail more often by going this route. So we tell our users don't use File Open for opening drawings.

Do use the Start tab, browse to the Autodesk Projects tab or area, and then browse to your project. And again, you will only see what projects have been added to your Desktop Connector. So you got to add them projects to the Desktop Connector. And then, you can browse and open up the drawing from there, that simple. Still not perfect, we still have file locking issues.

The Desktop Connector seems to be the weakest link in the whole cloud environment situation. We don't have-- we have more issues with this than we do with the Revit and Plant 3D because they don't necessarily use the Desktop Connector. So it's not perfect. We still have some file locking and unlocking issues. But it is the preferred method. And it seems to be-- it seems to work the best.

Again, referencing, we're going to go to our normal xref palette. We're going to go to the xref button, hit Reference, whether it be a PDF, a drawing, however you want. You're going to browse to the Autodesk Docs shortcut area to your project. And again, the only thing that's showing up here is projects selected in your Desktop Connector. And then, we're going to choose it that away.

One note that we have noticed is that any file that you reference into a project that lives on ACC, all files that are being referenced into that drawing need to live on ACC. We've noticed some corruption, and obviously, some failure to find the path. Some broken paths happen if it's not on the ACC. So we always tell our users, all reference drawings must live in the project on ACC so that you don't have any broken path issues and any corruption issues.

The Sheet Set Manager for Web, not much to this. There's a lot-- Autodesk has some good how-tos out there on their website. We chose to go with creating a project in our hub. That is our standards. And then, we dumped all of our standards into it. And then, Sheet Set Manager for Web will recognize-- once you pick that support file location, it will recognize all of the support documents and the support files that you need for Sheet Set Manager to work.

Where we had an issue and what we recently found out, and I didn't really find a whole lot of information out there from Autodesk on how this works, but there is an Autodesk web portion of this that when you make changes to your support files, it doesn't automatically register with Sheet Set Manager for Web. You can change it on ACC Docs here, and it doesn't make that journey up to whatever server that the Sheet Set Manager for Web is looking for. Again, that's why I believe that that Publish Server exists. It's got to make that journey over there.

So that is a manual step. The copy to the server happens automatically, but the changes are not registered until you open Autodesk for Web, add the storage source, and then go to Manage Support Files, and then hit that Refresh button. And it will go back to your project, your standards project, and pull in that new information. So that's just a little something that we figured out that hopefully it's helpful to you. That's it for Civil 3D. Now, we're going to move on to plant 3D and ACC.

So Plant 3D works a little bit different. Again, it has a direct access to the Plant 3D server. That Plant 3D server seems to be separate from the ACC File Server. So if I'm going to open up a drawing, I'm not opening up that drawing from the Start menu, from the Start tab. I'm opening it up from the Plant 3D Project Browser.

Plant 3D is a database-based system, so there's a SQLite server that sits out here somewhere. It's not pertinent to what we're talking about, but it does sit out there somewhere. So it wants to live in its own project in its own little lane here. It doesn't like really to communicate outside through the Desktop Connector for any kind of files.

So when you go to File, Open, you go to that Plant Project Dialog, it goes up to the Plant 3D Server. It caches down to the P3D Collaboration Cache and then opens it up in the software. When you're done, it also locks it up here in that process. When you're done, you save.

It goes back up, saves it to the cache, and then re-uploads that to the Plant 3D Server, unlocks it. It then-- we believe it then automatically publishes that over to the ACC File Servers. So that publish from Plant 3D server to ACC File Server appears to be an automatic thing.

The problem comes into where if you do have the Desktop Connector installed when you have a Plant 3D project, and you do have that project selected in your Desktop Connector, it will allow you to view these published files that live here on the file server, the ACC File Server.

And one thing we noticed was when we're working on files here in the project, it's going to the P3D Server and living in the P3D Collaboration Cache. It never comes over here and locks these files. You don't even know that someone's in them. Now, when you get done and save it, it does process the publish, and it does update the version. But it never locks these files over here on the ACC File Server.

So if you're opening Plant 3D and you're going through the Desktop Connector to access these files, it is a published version, and it is not connected to the files that live natively here on the P3D server. So these could be-- you could make all these changes-- one thing, you can make all these changes, save, do whatever you want, and it will store here on the ACC File Server.

But then, when the next user comes in and opens it up appropriately through the project and then saves it, it automatically publishes, and you lose all your work that happens here on the ACC File Server. Now, we've got versioning and things. We could go back and download and get the lost information, but unless you know that, you don't even know to look for the issue.

So we tell our users, basically, don't connect to the Desktop Connector. We try to keep our Plant 3D users out of the Desktop Connector except for to reference in some flat files, which, again, our workflow tends to say copy those to your Plant 3D collaboration project and let it live in the project storage location. Stay away from it.

Another thing is if you open these files off the ACC File Server, they are pretty much dead files. You can't change or manipulate the Smart Plant Plant servers, Plant objects. So just be aware of that. That's the biggest thing that Plant will get you in trouble by going through the Desktop Connector.

We typically will collaborate the title block by downloading it straight from the website to a hard drive and then uploading it to our Plant project that way. And then, that title block lives in the plant project. It's a little bit disconnected from the rest of the project group, but it seems to work out the best. And again, we know Plant 3D is a much more powerful program than what we use it for. We only use it for P&ID drawings. So we don't really use Plant 3D to its full extent. So we're able to keep these simplified workflows for Plant 3D.

All right, so that is the diagram for Plant 3D. What did we learn? All right, do not use the Start tab. I know in Civil 3D, we say only use the Start tab. Here, we're saying don't use the Start tab because that'll take you to the Desktop Connector and those published files. Always use Plant 3D Project Manager to open up your files. You browse to the collaboration project until you go to Open Collaboration Project, browse to your drawing to the P&ID drawings, and then hit Open that away. That opens them from the P3D File Server. So that is what we instruct our users to do.

The Collaboration tab, so you can manually check in and check out drawings from this Collaboration tab. It will automatically check in and check out when you're doing the open and stuff through the project dialog box. But if you have an issue where you need to manually do that, you come to the Collaboration tab, check them in, check them out. All that happens on the Plant 3D File Servers.

Again, we don't recommend using the xref palette. We say go to the Collaboration tab, use the Attach button here. That opens up the Attach External Reference dialog box. This will isolate you to your project and the files that live in the project. Then, you can check the drawings that you want to xref and then hit Attach. So that guarantees that you stay within the Plant 3D project and you don't veer outside to the Desktop Connector and potentially open up those published files.

So that's it for Plant 3D, pretty simple. Now we get to Revit and ACC. This has got the most complex workflows to go along with it. Same-- the diagram looks a lot more similar to Plant 3D. It does have some nuances here. So we'll go over those. But again, we start with File Open or Model Open.

So that model, if you go to Open, will go up to the Revit ACC Cache Folder and then go up to the Revit File Server, lock it, cache it down to the file server-- or excuse me-- the cache folder, and then open it up within the software. So the software has a direct link to the file server, the Revit File Server in the cloud.

All right, you save. You work in it. You close. It goes back to the Cache Folder, goes up to the File Server, releases them-- and actually-- so let me just say this, too. Let me back up and say this. Hazen works exclusively with Workshare Cloud Models within Revit. So we know that you can use flat files over here on the file servers, and you can go that route. But they are not collaborative. So we choose to go with a collaborative model. We've got users all across the country in different offices working on the same model. So we are pretty much isolated to Workshare Cloud Models within Revit. So let me go back up.

Open the file, goes to the cache folder, locks it on the Revit file-- or doesn't lock it on the Revit file server, but whatever model, whatever family you're working on, it will lock on the Revit File Server. Once you're done, it file saves, caches, goes back up to the Revit File Server, releases whatever content that it's got locked out, and then it just stops. So this is good. All the users that are working within Revit that are opening models the way they should be, this environment is pretty tight, right? It's a good, tight working environment.

The problem comes when you need to share these models outside of Revit. So we've got engineers that want to review the models. We've got clients that want to see the models. Plant 3D, we believe that published from the file server, the Plant 3D File Servers to the ACC File Servers happens automatically.

Revit is not that way. Revit, the publishing has to happen manually. So you have the live central models that live here. We need to publish those models to the file servers and to the project website so that others can view those models. That is a manual process, and we'll get into how to do that in a later slide.

So that manual publish happens. It goes to the Publish Server. And then, it gets pushed to the ACC File Servers and to the ACC Web Browser. That is not a bidirectional workflow. That can only go one way. So there's no way to get these models back to the Revit File Server other than resyncing the central and putting them back up in the cloud that way. So that's just a comment.

Revit, we do allow for the use of Desktop Connector. So we have to add the project to the Desktop Connector. That's where all of our families, that's where we would reference, where we would link in the drawing files, where we would link in PDFs and images. We would not link in other Revit models using the Desktop Connector.

Again, those are published, could be potentially out-of-date models. The versioning could be different, likely is different. So the versioning here on the ACC File Servers that you see through the web browser might be version 2 where you're actually physically working on version 22 in the Revit File Server. So again, anything out here that you can view through the Desktop Connector and the web portal is a published model and should not be used for anything but viewing and referencing and analyzing, not working on.

But we, again, we do go back to our families. Our families live on ACC through the Desktop Connector. And we would load through that, through the normal family load and unload. Flat files, you would import and link those also through the Desktop Connector and through the File Explorer.

Models get linked through the Link Revit Models area. And we want to make sure that those are pulling from the Revit File Servers. And we'll walk through how to make sure that that happens. But it is in a different spot than every other link that you do. All right, so that's the diagram for Revit.

What did we learn? All right, to open a file, we want to go to the Revit home screen. We want to go to the ACC Docs. And in Revit, 24 and 25, there's a toggle to go to the Revit New Home. That switches from ACC Docs to or Autodesk Projects. So it works the same, just looks a little different. So we come down here to the ACC Docs Project or Project and then browse to your appropriate project and then open the model from the Revit home screen. That guarantees that you're opening that model from the Revit file server.

All right, if we go to Open, Models, that's going to take you to the Desktop Connector. And that's going to be published models. So we do not open with Model Open. We only go through the Autodesk Docs area. So in the Revit home screen, do not use Model Open. You would use the new command, the Model New to create new models as long as you use the appropriate templates and things. So that's OK. Then, you would upload them as cloud models once you get all your settings correct, right?

Family access, you want to go to Families and Open or Families and New. All that is normal workflows, no issues there. We don't recommend using Recent Files. It does take you to the appropriate file server if you're paying attention. But if you accidentally open that from the Desktop Connector previously and you don't pay attention, you will open again from the Desktop Connector instead of from the Revit File Server. So we just tell our users, steer clear of it. Don't do it just for ease of workflows. And again, model access, Autodesk Docs/Projects depending on if you've got the new home open. That is the preferred method.

Linking models, so we're going to go to the normal Manage link. We prepopulate our new models with links to other models that we've already got. And we just have to go in here and reload to the projects models. So we basically just repath to the actual project model, just makes it a little easier for our users. We come down here to reload from or if you need to add a new one, add, same box pops up, Add Link.

And if you slow down for just a second, you're already set to the appropriate project that's going to the Revit File Servers. And you just browse within that project. We've had users that want to immediately go to this pull down. They accidentally browse to the Desktop Connector and link to a published model rather than the actual live models. And then, that's obviously no wonder why their models are out of date and aren't updating.

So once-- the way to get back to the appropriate area is to come over here and click this external reference button that has the cloud and the little chain on it. That gets you back to your project area. Browse to the appropriate folder. You're back in business. So the way that we know that it's a good link is that you've got Autodesk Docs and then straight to the project number. In this case, we were testing with a delete project. That was the name of the project. And then it goes into the project folder structure.

The wrong way, to know if it's the wrong way to link, you'll have-- up here, you'll see Autodesk Docs. Then you'll see your hub name-- so for us, it's Hazen and Sawyer-- and then the project number. That is wrong. You should not see the hub name in the link. So if you do notice that, you need to go back up here, reload from, and then hit the external reference button and then browse back to your project on the Revit File Servers. So again, do not navigate to the Desktop Connector via the pull down in the Add Link dialog box. That will link published models. I don't know-- I can't say that enough. So just don't do that.

Publishing, we talked about publishing, and that's a manual step. So there's a couple of different options to publish. You can do it individually on the user level within Revit. You just go to the Revit home screen, browse to your model, select it. The Publish box will pull up. And then, you can hit Publish.

And you can publish multiple models that live in the same folder. It's a little bit longer process because then you have to go to each folder and hit Publish. And one thing we noticed is you can't exit. You need to stay right here and let this publish. Otherwise, the publish fails. It doesn't finish that publish. So it's a little bit longer process, a little bit more manual process to do it this way.

On the admin side of things, at least right now, our company keeps this as an admin option. We don't give it to too many users. But on the admin side, from within the ACC Docs Hub, you can go in and say Publish Latest. You'll use the Design Collaboration Module and then go to Publish Latest.

And then, that will publish the entire project or all models that live in our own design, which that's where we keep all of our project models. So it will publish the entire model collection in one publish. And then, it happens in the background on the ACC servers. You don't have to sit there and wait for it. It's a much more streamlined approach.

And then schedule, we can do a monthly-- a weekly, bi-weekly publish on a schedule. That way, they're always up to date. And no matter who's viewing it on the web, it's always up to date. So yeah, so that also, we keep as an admin thing. Set it up. It's pretty consistent. So far, it's been a good tool for us. So that's Revit.

So now let's talk real quickly about the Desktop Connector. All the software, use it in one way or another. Again, we don't recommend it with Plant 3D, but I'm not going to-- I'm going to touch quickly on these. I'm not going to get too in depth with it. But this is Hazen's experience. This is our adaptation to it.

What we do as a company is we don't just let users go and upgrade the Desktop Connector. Our experience has been that every Desktop Connector has its issues, some worse than others. And so we always have a long, vigorous testing before we release it to the masses. So we would also suggest doing the same.

I don't know if this is intended, but we noticed that 15.3 and 15.8 were the better versions of the 15. And 16.3 and 16.8 seem to be the better versions of 16. We are currently testing 16.9 and 16.10. We've had a few little issues with 9, so we will probably skip over that one to 10. But we do know that with the 16.9, we're able to adjust the storage location that prevents a lot of the user pathing issues that we've seen with the xrefs and different things like that through the Desktop Connector.

So that's the Desktop Connector. That's my presentation on workflows. Thank you, again, for coming and listening to this presentation. Have a good day.