multiple office Workset sharing

[crarchitect]

Hello Revit Community,

What solutions are people using for multiple office workset sharing? Are there successful WAN data management techniques built-in to REVIT that I am missing out on, or do we need to identify / create a new one to piggy back the database? Our present solution which includes one international team member has grown to be unbearably cumbersome with a 100 meg central file.

Here is the deal: we are finalizing our position as the main Architect for a very large project in the Caribbean. This exciting project will include residential towers, retail spaces, commercial, restaurants, a performance hall, and even an event center. The (eye popping) 3D master plan was done in REVIT, and our desire is to continue the project into DD's within REVIT. Then, the obvious choice to complete CD's in REVIT would provide for great design continuity.

How should we interface with the local project architects within REVIT?
How can we manage the REVIT CD production in another country?
Do any of you folks have experience with cached or duplicated data?

Sorry for the super-general question, but have not heard any international data management success stories yet. I hope there are a few out there!

Thanks in advance for any input,

[crarchitect]

Ah yes, the silence is deafening.

Let me ask the question another way:

Is anyone using international teams working with a single database?

Where and how is this data hosted?

Anyone? Anyone?

Thanks in advance,

[LarryG]

What is the nature of the data connection between the various locations that need to contribute to the project?


I assume that at a minimum you are going to break the overall development into separate files for the different buildings.

We are a multi office firm so I am facing a similar issue although not on the scale you are describing, not yet anyway.

Larry

[Steve_Stafford]

...Ah yes, the silence is deafening...Sorry to leave you without a response till now, glad that Larry replied to bring it back to light.

I am not aware of anyone happily working across the "internet" using worksets to share a single database file to do project work at the same time. That doesn't mean no one has been able to do such a thing, just that no one has claimed to do so successfully in this forum. Several threads have discussed how we might do so and how some have tried using various approaches.

As Larry said, I'd assume you would move from SD to DD by breaking up the various buildings into individual project files and then link them to a master site.

As you move forward to CD's will all your partners use Revit as well or will you have to collaborate with other software users? When you move to CD's will you be able to pass Revit projects to them or dwg/dgn files?

What are the partners roles regarding each building in question?

[Wes Macaulay]

Revit requires a thick pipe between the central and local files -- thicker than the internet can provide. Latency and bandwidth problems abound. Still, the developers have the idea on their minds.

But for now you can't have more than one team in more than one location working simultaneously on one central file. You could move the central file between offices and set things up so that the UNC path to the central file (\\Server\Projects\2005.01-MyProject (file:///ServerProjects2005.01-MyProject)) is the same in all offices, and then one team could work on it while the others are sleeping. Only one team could work on the file at one time, and then they'd pass it on to the next, and so it would go.

[LarryG]

OK. How about this.....

Break the project into multiple buildings as much as practical. You need to this anyway.

Determine the most logical location for the central files to reside - most likely the network location with the most users involved in the project.

Add computers to your network to serve as Revit stations for your remote users.

Link the remote offices to the central file office with the best internet connections you can afford.

Implement the best remote desktop sharing application available and have the remote users use their own machine to access their Revit machine in the central office. Windows Remote Desktop works well for me.

The Revit processes all stay on the central (gigabit) network. Software upgrades, licensing, support file management (families, libraries, etc.), and troubleshooting are all relatively easy to manage. Only keystrokes, mouse clicks, and display data are transferred across the Internet.

What do you think....?

[crarchitect]

Hey REVITeers,

Thanks for the responses. Yes, I appreciate the pipe line issues. We have experienced that problem head on, ouch. And as far as the duplicated data, gosh the flow chart that outlines how to run duplicate central files and then combine them again looks like a nightmare. Workable, no make that POSSIBLE, but not at all practical.

Maybe if I answer some of Larry's questions, it will help me, or you folks, uncover a solution. Thanks for brainstorming.

1. Yes, we certainly will need to divide this overall project into linked projects.
2. The connection would be our current turbo'd up DSL . We could go to a T1 if there were significant gains to be made with a larger pipe.
3. We do not plan on doing the CD's. The principle is interviewing nationally recognized firms to take on the CD's for a project this size. It would be great if they took on REVIT.
4. We will do all the work thru DD, at least. The local project architects would be expected to work with us on finalizing the DD as per local requirements using REVIT.
5. Hopefully a development of this size could generate enough intere$t in REVIT to steer our larger partner (once we find one) into using REVIT for CD's.
6. The principle here is committed to B.I.M. all the way. Personally, I think this whole enchilada is a great vehicle for showcasing REVIT- both in the Caribbean, and as a model for international team workset sharing. I understand the bandwidth problem, but I think there must be some savvy way to conquer the data management issues.

Back when I was using Pro/Engineer, the AE's where hot to trot on creating us a duplicated, locally cached, database with all the workset controls and permissions we are used to. This hydra would do all the updating in the background, at night. Sort of like the tiny little elves principle. It never took off, but that was because the tool ended up being too cumbersome for heavy B.I.M. They never even tried it. I THOUGHT they said folks like Caterpillar were using this method. Or was it John Deere. Tonka?
Sorry, Trucks ain't my specialty. That's probably why I don't use Pro\E anymore...

Thanks again folks. I appreciate your consideration and your thoughts. We will figure this out one way or another- no choice. Great opportunity though. FACTORY? any help?

[crarchitect]

OK. How about this.....

Break the project into multiple buildings as much as practical. You need to this anyway.

Determine the most logical location for the central files to reside - most likely the network location with the most users involved in the project.

Add computers to your network to serve as Revit stations for your remote users.

Link the remote offices to the central file office with the best internet connections you can afford.

Implement the best remote desktop sharing application available and have the remote users use their own machine to access their Revit machine in the central office. Windows Remote Desktop works well for me.

The Revit processes all stay on the central (gigabit) network. Software upgrades, licensing, support file management (families, libraries, etc.), and troubleshooting are all relatively easy to manage. Only keystrokes, mouse clicks, and display data are transferred across the Internet.

What do you think....?

Hey THANK YOU for a solid reply! We are doing all of that at this time. We have used a WEB-X type solution, I forget the product name. it was a after market remote desktop engine. But, with a 100 meg file the latency was crippling. Maybe if you are a master of the click and pick and you never make an errant edit, this could work for you. Practically, this was not workable. We also used the Windows Remote desktop, which worked well while it worked. We suspect we have a Windows Small Business Server bug. Several of us are now locked out of our desktops remotely.

So I guess if this is the state of the art, then we are doing okay. but wait, this is not okay! We need fluency.

Thank you for your res pone Larry. Question: how many users do you have connected in this way? how big is your central file?

Thanks again,

[dgraue]

Not to promote any one company, but you might want to look at"Steelhead IT Infrastructure Appliances" from Riverbed Technology, Inc. They claim that their appliances are scalable and allow your WAN to perform virtually like a LAN by reducing chatty protocols and the impact of associated latency. They have a number of large architectural firms as clients who state their throughput on CAD applications was improved up to 100 times.
I've attached a pdf of their datasheet if you are interested.

Good luck.
DG

[Archman]

Revit 8.1 might make sharing the data across a WAN a little easier. Since 8.1 only writes individiual objects that were modified instead of entire worksets during STC, the performance over WAN should be immensly improved. We've seen pretty impressive results already between our Salt Lake City and Dallas offices in testing.

[LarryG]

Chris,

We have 2 offices, about 120 miles apart that are connected by a dedicated T1 line. 4 of the T1 channels are dedicated to voice and the remaining 20 are for data. Although this is a decent connection, I can't imagine having people save to central on anything close to a 100 Mb project. We are starting to install 8.1 and I am hopeful that it will reduce STC times but it would have to be pretty significant to make STC over a T1 practical on large projects.

We have just recently introduced Revit in the smaller of the two offices so we have not used this scenario in a real word scenario. The tests using Windows Remote Desktop for now seem very promising, of course I have a fairly stable connection and no firewall issues, etc., since I am using a private network. In case you are wondering, this T1 costs us $1,100/mo. whereas my public T1 is only $400/mo.

The "Steelhead IT Infrastructure Appliances" mentioned by DG look very interesting. I'd be very interested in hearing some real world success stories using these systems.

Keep me posted and I'll do the same.

[phyllisr]

Steve (Valenta), can you give me a sense of what you consider pretty impressive using the WAN between Salt Lake and Dallas? How many people are working at a time on the project? How large? If you coordinate saving to central, how long does it take? How long does it take to open your individual file from the remote location? This is something our IT Director is evaluating and something I have asked our local reseller to research as well.

We recently opened a Madison office (we are in Milwaukee) and are connected through a WAN. We are using Revit 8.1 and have just completed our first test pilot through State Submittal, construction beginning soon. When I am in Madison, I have had significant problems with the worksets when the whole team is cranking against a deadline. The complexities of borrowing elements, checking out new sets, saving to Central and more have created serious performance/speed issues.

It was a but more of a challenge with our first project because of changes we were making on the fly to elevation marks, title block families, etc. That aside (I worked off hours in the central file), it was very time consuming (translation: 30-45 minutes) to save and update even when we coordinated the Save to Central so we were not all doing it at the same time. It was a small project and our central file was only 22 MG.

So far, this speed/performance issue is the only that may become a "make or break" in the evaluation process.

Thank you.
PBR