Wednesday, May 27, 2020

Recent Autodesk Desktop Connector Developments

Yesterday I learned some new things about Autodesk's Desktop Connector, which is a tool that works in conjunction with BIM 360 Design projects (Revit and AutoCAD Civil 3D). This includes info about update notifications and a tool to purge local files! This constitutes today's post.


Keep reading to learn more...
In what may be your current version of Desktop Connector, you could right-click on the icon in your system try and select Check for Updates. Not anymore. I heard something like this is supposed to give firms more control over when updates are released/pushed out. I guess this also means the notifications are gone as well. 



Yesterday, my installed version ended in "999". After a quick web search to this page, I downloaded and installed the version listed in the image below.



This update has some new functionality as well...

Free Up Space
This tool removes the local copies of any BIM 360 files (see first image above). It does not affect any files in the cloud. We have had to do this manually many times when someone cannot open a BIM 360 project (while others can). Purge the local files usually resolves the issue. But, this tool can also free up a ton of local storage space.

Refresh Drives
If you are switching between accounts/logins, use this tool to force your folders/files listed to update (see second image from top).



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