topic Re: Converting commercial into educational version in Licensing

Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Thu, 25 May 2023 16:09:05 GMT

A few years ago i had a educational license and i played with archicad quite a bit, designing houses nd whatever came into my mind. Now i am working and i have a commercial license for archicad 12.
In my spare time i continue to play with archicad.
The problem is that i would like to use some of the stuff i designed in the educational version in my more recent projects.
Considering that the projects that i am playing with have no commercial purpose, i am not rejecting the option to convert a project started in commercial to educational in order to be able to copy/paste certain objects, like a pond, a gazebo, some interior furniture and things like that.
Since i don't have a educational license any more to just open the file and automatically convert it, is there another way to get around this problem?
Or is there a way to extract certain objects from the educational pln so that i can use them in a commercial version?
I know i can start over and design again all the objects but that would be tedious.

Thank you very much

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Eduardo Rolon — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 01:24:41 GMT

As long as the EDU files were not made using the .pne format (up to AC09 I believe) you will be able to open them in AC12.

If you do AC12 will switch to Educational mode until you quit. You will not be able to copy paste between Commercial and Edu versions.

If the files are in .pne format AFAIK you can only open them in the original Edu Version.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 01:30:08 GMT

No, no. That's not the problem.
As i told, i have some projects made in archicad edu.
Now i am still playing with archicad but i have the commercial version.
I also have some projects made for fun, but in archicad commercial. It is in those projects, made in commercial archicad that i want to incorporate pieces made in archicad edu. That's why i would like it if there was a method to convert my commercial plans to edu plans to be able to copy from the older projects.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Eduardo Rolon — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 01:33:37 GMT

Ok, going the other way is easy open the Edu file first and either merge the Commercial file into it or have 2 sessions of AC running one with the Edu file and the other with the commercial and you should be able to copy/paste between them.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 01:37:49 GMT

I cannot copy neither from the commercial to the edu or the other way. I will try to merge them and see what happens.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Eduardo Rolon — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 01:41:45 GMT

I think copy/paste was disabled when the format was .pne but I am not sure.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 12:15:54 GMT

You cannot copy/paste between edu and commercial.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Laszlo Nagy — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 16:30:46 GMT

If you open the commercial file in the EDU version and save it, it will be saved in EDU format.
Then you will be able to copy-paste stuff from that file into your other EDU project.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 17:31:54 GMT

I don't mean to be rude, but i think that i am not able to get the message out right.
I'll try again:

I have some older projects in edu format and some new projects in commercial format.
I want to merge parts of the old edu projects into the new commercial ones.
Since the new commercial ones have been made for pure enjoyment, i don't mind converting them to edu because i can still work with them even after the conversion.
I do not have a edu version of archicad in wich to open the files in order to convert them.

Is there a way to convert at least part of the older edu files into commercial or to convert the commercial file into edu without a edu licenced archicad?

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 18:30:19 GMT

Looney wrote:
...or to convert the commercial file into edu without a edu licenced archicad?

Why would you need to convert to edu if you don't have an edu license?

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Laszlo Nagy — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 18:53:56 GMT

Looney wrote:
I don't mean to be rude, but i think that i am not able to get the message out right.
I'll try again:

I have some older projects in edu format and some new projects in commercial format.
I want to merge parts of the old edu projects into the new commercial ones.
Since the new commercial ones have been made for pure enjoyment, i don't mind converting them to edu because i can still work with them even after the conversion.
I do not have a edu version of archicad in wich to open the files in order to convert them.

Is there a way to convert at least part of the older edu files into commercial or to convert the commercial file into edu without a edu licenced archicad?

One thing is for sure: You will not be able to get any data from an EDU file into a commercial file. Also, it is not possible to convert EDU to commercial.
Plus, only the EDU version can convert a commercial file into an EDU file. A commercial version cannot do it.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 21:23:17 GMT

So i can use things i designed when i had the edu license.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Laszlo Nagy — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 09:31:57 GMT

That is correct.
But you will not be able to get that data into any commercial project later.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Sat, 15 Jan 2011 21:37:52 GMT

I shall try again. It seems that either i am not able to explain in reasonable terms the actual problem, or the people reading are not able to understand.

Just to be sure you understand my point:
- I am aware that i cannot copy between edu and commercial
- I am aware that i cannot change edu to commercial
- I am aware that i need a edu licence to convert a commercial project into a edu project
- I do not have a edu licence
- I have a commercial licence

I use a commercial licence sometimes for fun, designing things for my own pleasure. I want to incorporate certain elements that i designed for fun and pleasure in other plans that i am designing now. Since i do not have a edu licence now, how can i do that.

If anybody can answer my simple question or help me in any way the help would be much appreciated.

Thank you very much.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Laszlo Nagy — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 00:02:02 GMT

So if you are aware of the points you listed and you actually believe that they are true then you already know the answers:

It is not possible.
It is not possible to create a a commercial version from an EDU version. That we already know.
So you would need an EDU version to create EDU version from a commercial version. This way all your files would be in EDU version and you could copy-paste between them and use your EDU objects in all of them.
But if you are not in university anymore then you are not even supposed to use the EDU version anymore. Not even for converting commercial version files to EDU for fun.

Look, I don't know if you think there really is a way but we just don't want to tell it to you, but there is no other way.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 06:22:21 GMT

There is actually a way. I just have to find someone that has a edu version. I'll send them the plans and he-ll convert them for me and send them back. This solution, i knew from the beginning, but thought that there might be another way around the problem.
Furthermore, it might be illegal for me to use a edu version now, but i anyway can't use one, since i don't have a registration key for one and since i already have a commercial version, wich is superior to the first.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

fnderimo — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 12:08:33 GMT

Looney you are just contradicting yourself (check Matthew comment). But reading between the lines, what you want is to convert edu version to commercial version

This is simply not possible. Even though you have good intensions that possibility can be abused for commercial purpose...Sorry

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 12:37:46 GMT

Some people on this forum are plain dumb. Not all of them, but some really lack plain logic skills.
There is no "between the lines".
I shall explain one last time.
When i was in college I had an educational licence (i used to work then with autocad for fun, like some people like to watch sports).
I designed some houses, and some furniture to go along with those houses.
They are in educational version. I still have them.
Now i work for a company that gave me a commercial license.
I still have the idiotic hobby of designing houses in my spare time (even though i am a civil engineer).
I still design houses, but now i use the commercial licence (even an idiot would guess that, since i am not a student and do not have an edu license).

I would like to use some of the furniture i designed years ago in these houses.

I know the versions are not compatible, but since i am not interested in the commercial value of my designs, i am willing to downgrade irreversibly to edu the projects in order to be able to use past objects.

In light of fall this, fnderimo you are one of the ones of wich i spoke earlier.
The only possible solution still remains to find someone with a edu licence who can convert my commercial houses into edu and give them back to me.

Is there such a gentleman here?

Thank you very much and sorry for the rough language, but i am at the end of my patience.

P.S. If you can't help, or have no clue about any possible solution, please refrain from writing.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 15:14:26 GMT

What seems dumb to me is to take eight posts to explain something simple and still not be clear. It seems you understand all the issues here but continue to act as if no one is answering your questions.

One last try...

You don't have an EDU license and are not eligible for one. Therefore converting COM files to EDU is useless to you.

You do have a full COM license which you can use for your own amusement (I assume you are aware there is no legal obstacles to using a COM license for fun 😉 )

You have some old furniture parts you made in EDU which you wish to use now.

Your choices seem obvious:

If the furniture parts are written in GDL you could get access to an EDU version to open the furniture parts and copy/paste the scripts into a text editor to be later pasted into COM version parts. You will also want to take screen shots of the parameters lists if they are complex or extensive. You may also be able to get the scripts you need by just forcing the parts open in a text editor but you won't (as I recall) get the parameters list this way.

It may be possible to export the parts as XML from the EDU in which case you could import them into the COM version.

If the parts are modeled and not scripted you may be able to export them as DWG or 3DS. I am not familiar enough with the EDU version to know if this is possible.

If none of this works the simplest thing would be to just remake them from scratch in the COM version. Since you are doing this for your own entertainment you could just decide to have some fun redesigning your old stuff.

All of this foolishness could have been avoided if you had been clear in the first place. Something like...

Looney wrote:
I have some furniture I made in the EDU version which I would like to use for some non-commercial projects now for my own amusement. Is it possible to get an EDU license for this even though I now have a full commercial one? If not is there any way I can get these parts to work with my COM license?

No one on this forum is dumb, though anyone can occasionally act that way.

Re: Converting commercial into educational version

Anonymous — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 04:53:32 GMT

Hey, Who's on first?