topic Re: Demo Mode & Write Protection in Licensing

Demo Mode & Write Protection

Lingwisyer — Thu, 23 Oct 2025 01:57:55 GMT

Why does opening a file in Demo mode put it in a write protected state? Does this happen on MacOS? I am guessing this is an OS based interaction?

Ling.

Operating system used: Windows

Re: Demo Mode & Write Protection

Laszlo Nagy — Sat, 25 Oct 2025 02:11:01 GMT

What do you mean by "write-protected"? That you cannot save it?

In demo mode, copy-pasting, saving, publishing, and collaboration features (Hotlinks, Teamwork) are not possible.

https://help.graphisoft.com/AC/28/INT/index.htm#t=_AC28_Help%2F022_Licensing%2F022_Licensing-2.htm&rhsearch=demo%20mode&rhhlterm=demo%20mode&rhsyns=%20

Re: Demo Mode & Write Protection

Lingwisyer — Sat, 25 Oct 2025 05:19:13 GMT

Someone opening a file in demo mode will make the file write protected, so if you want to open said file, you need to go track down who it was. AC disables saving separately, so I am guessing this is an OS interaction?

Re: Demo Mode & Write Protection

Lee Hankins — Sat, 25 Oct 2025 07:22:13 GMT

Do you mean if someone opens the file just to view it in Demo mode, someone else cannot open it to edit it in licensed mode until the version in Demo mode is closed down?

I know if we try to open the same file in two machines we get a warning saying [user] has [filename] open. Don’t want to open with exclusive access or read only and macOS creates an .lck file in the directory which is how it knows the file is open elsewhere.