- [Instructor] In this video
I want to talk about the Desktop Connector.
Desktop Connector is a piece of software that is used
to allow us to link to files other than Revit files.
So, it works a lot like a Dropbox, or a OneDrive,
where it creates a shortcut in your Windows Explorer
that you can add files to, and then it will synchronize
those files with your BIM 360 accounts and projects.
Furthermore, when we set up DWG links,
or links to other supported file formats,
it will maintain the path to the location on BIM 360
rather than the synchronized version on your hard drive.
So, this allows everybody in the team to update
these non-Revit formats in a BIM 360 environment
without having to manually configure the paths,
or having any of the issues that would go along with that.
So, if you haven't already installed the Desktop Connector,
I encourage you to do that before we begin here
and we looked at that in a previous video.
All right, so I'm logged in here as Howie,
and he is responsible for this canopy
that we want to place out in front of the restaurant,
here, on the patio.
So, he wants to start by bringing in that preliminary design
and let's say that this has been devised in AutoCAD.
So, it's an AutoCAD DWG file.
So, I'm going to minimize Revit
and I've already got a Windows Explorer window open,
here in the background, and you can see, right here,
the BIM 360 virtual drive that was created.
So, I'm going to double click to open that up
and you should see at least one, but possibly several,
accounts that you have access to.
So you want to browse to the account
that you want to work in and then, within there,
you'll see one or more projects
that you have access to within that account.
I will go into Nadia's Garden.
Now, naturally, if you're following along with me
you'll have different accounts and different projects
to choose from, feel free to browse into whichever one
that you wish to work in for this example.
Now, Howie has access to both the architecture
and the structure folders in this account,
but it's really important that you understand
that the user permissions will play a role here.
So, what you will see in Desktop Connector
is totally based on what access rights you have
to the BIM 360 project.
Now, I'm going to place this canopy design
in the shared folder so when I double click in there
you're going to see sub-folders for all of the disciplines
that are part of the project, and then I will double click
into the structure folder, next, which is currently empty.
So, this is where I want to put my canopy design.
What I'm going to do is double click my exercise files folder,
here, and open up a second Windows Explorer window.
I'll just, sort of, move it out of the way, here,
and this is my preliminary canopy design right here.
And I will start to drag this DWG file
over to this location, but notice that I'm getting
the little symbol that indicates that I can't do it,
so if I let go nothing happens.
So, what this is telling me is that even though I can see
the shared structure folder,
I don't have the correct permissions
to be able to write to that folder.
So, this is where Howie would get up
and go walk over and talk to the BIM Manager
and ask to be granted permissions to write to this folder.
So, I'm here in the Document Management module
and I'm logged in as the BIM Manager Zachary's account
and he has admin level access to this project.
So, from Zachary's point of view,
he is seeing all of the discipline folders,
including the shared folder, and when he expands
the shared folder he's seeing all of the sub-disciplines
in there as well.
Now, there's actually a few different ways that Zachary
could approach this request from Howie.
He certainly could just go into the structure folder, here,
and grant Howie the requested access rights to that folder.
That's actually what I'm going to show you how to do
but, alternatively, he could change the access rights
of Howie's firm instead.
So, if not only Howie, but other members of his company
needed the same level of access, it might make more sense
to elevate the access rights of the entire company.
We could change the access rights of the shared folder
but that may not be advisable, or Zachary could choose
to create an entirely new folder
for this file to be uploaded to,
and it really just depends on your office standards
which of these many approaches you would take.
And then, of course, Zachary could just say,
"Why don't you give me the file and I'll upload it for you."
So all of those would be valid, but in this example
I want to show you how to change the permissions
if you choose to do that.
So, what I'm going to do is select the structure sub-folder,
right here, there's a small menu icon
that appears next to it,
I'll click that and choose Permissions.
So, you can see the various users, and companies,
and roles that have already been assigned to this folder
and what their access rights are.
So, as I mentioned, we could go to Howie's firm,
Foundation Structural Engineering,
and change the level of access, right here,
or we could use this Add button, at the top,
and add Howie in individually and give him, only,
an elevated level of access
and that's what I'm going to do here.
So I'm going to start typing Howie's name,
and there he is right there,
and I will click to add him to the list
and then just click away from it to dismiss that menu.
And then, here you can see all of the various permission
levels that we can add, from View Only, at the top,
down to full Folder Control at the bottom.
Now, the two options that would work here, for Howie,
would be either View + Download + Upload,
so this means that he would be able to upload a file,
to that location, or we could do
View + Download + Upload + Edit.
So, assuming that we want Howie to be able to edit the file,
after he uploads it, I think this is the better choice.
So, I'm going to choose View + Download + Upload + Edit
and click Add.
And you will see him added right here.
Now, all of the other users and permissions
were inherited from the parent folder,
but notice that Howie has this Remove option, right here,
so we could choose to remove
those permissions later, if necessary.
So, that's all that Zachary needs to do, so he'll inform
Howie and then we'll walk back over to Howie's desk.
So, here we are back at Howie's desk
and it might take a few minutes for the change to take place
so sometimes you have to wait a little while,
but I'm going to go ahead and re-open the folder containing
the model that I want to upload, I'll select it
and drag it over here, and you can now see that we have
the plus sign and the Copy option,
so I will let go and in the lower right hand corner
you'll see it transferring to BIM 360.
So, as you can see, it's just a simple drag and drop
process to upload that file to BIM 360.
So, now let's return to Revit
and then here in Revit we will link in the CAD file.
So, I'll go to Insert, link CAD,
and the difference here is that you will browse to this file
through the Desktop Connector.
So, I'll click the desktop link, This PC,
there's my BIM 360 shortcut,
and then I, simply, browse to this the same way
that we did a moment ago
and locate the file.
So, for this one I'm going to place it manually
so I'll choose Manual + Origin, and then I will click Open.
Now, it's coming in at the bottom of footing level
so I'm going to start off by placing it
over here, off to the side.
And, if we spin the view around to the front
you can see that it's, kind of,
buried down here in the ground.
So, I'm going to select it and go to Move
and move this file up to the correct height
and then I will go to the top view
and let's just, sort of, move it
into a more appropriate position, right there,
and then I will switch back to an axonometric view.
Okay, so let's say we're done working for the day
and we're going to close out of this file.
We will synchronize our changes with the central model,
optionally add a comment and click OK.
Now, one of the neatest things about doing a DWG link
with Desktop Connector is if you decide to later re-open
the file, so let's say that Howie wants to continue
working on the project, so I'm going to click the link
here to open that file back up.
The Desktop Connector will automatically re-load
the latest changes so you can see it
transferring the file there,
and notice that the file loads showing the latest version
of the linked DWG which, naturally,
has changed pretty considerably
since that preliminary version that we linked in.
So, the Desktop Connector allows us to use DWG files,
and other supported file formats as a full participant
in our BIM 360 project work flows.