topic Newbie with TeamWork Problems!! in Teamwork & BIMcloud

Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Anonymous — Tue, 09 May 2023 09:29:12 GMT

I apologize up front if this issue has been covered in the forum archives.

We are a small firm of three and have purchased AC 10 only three months ago.

We are having problems with Team Work. As we create a project to share (PLP) and each member saves and creates their respective (PLC) files, upon executing send/receive we receive messages that it cannot read the teamwork administration file. A second warning directs us to find (ADM) file manually, which doesn't work.

We are a new OSX firm with (2) 2.33 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Mac Book Pro and (2) Mac Books networked to a 500 GB LaCie network hard drive, where the files reside.

The other weird thing is that while all of our individual PLC files are accessible, the original PLN appears corrupt as we receive a warning that the "plan file cant be read"

Please HELP!! we are sinking fast!!

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Anonymous — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 06:25:38 GMT

My only guess is that there is some problem serving the files from the Lacie drive. I've never used NAS myself so I don't know any specifics. You could try sharing the file from one of the MacBooks. If that solves the problem you should consider getting a proper computer to act as file server. In your case an iMac or Mini would probably do in the short run (limited to 10 users on a peer to peer network).

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Anonymous — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 13:47:38 GMT

Thanks for the reply. I have tried sharing the file from one of our Macbooks and we continue to get messages that the PLP file can't be found or adm file can't be read.

I have created a brand new test file and have recieved the exact same messages!

This has become extremely fustrating!!

No software package should be this difficult!!

If there are any other sugguestions out there I would appreciate it. I am starting to think I bought the wrong BIM software package!

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Anonymous — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 14:18:14 GMT

I have never seen or heard of the problem you describe (in over 10 years of using teamwork) so I have to wonder if there is something you may be doing incorrectly - though the process is so simple this is hard to imagine.

I still think it may be a networking issue. The "file cannot be read" comes up for me when I disconnect from and then reconnect to a Windows network when running OSX on my MacBook Pro.

For a test try excluding the network altogether by sharing the file and then signing into it locally on a single, unconnected machine. If that works try two machines networked by Firewire. If that works then we know there must be some problem with the ethernet setup.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

TomWaltz — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 14:23:31 GMT

What are the user permissions on the file, and more importantly, what are the users' umask settings?

It's possible that everyone is saving files that no one else can read.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Aaron Bourgoin — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 14:24:17 GMT

The problem rests with file permissions. I don't know all the reasons why, but here's what you have to do.

Until it starts creating Backups, the project consists of 3 files:

project.PLP
Project.adm
Project.txt

Do a 'Get Info' on these files at the machine where you shared the project. Change all of the permissions - down at the bottom to 'Read & Write'

If you receive a message stating either that you 'can't back up the file' or 'write Teamwork notes', you'll have to do this to the 'Project Backups' folder.

Sorry I'm not at a Mac right now and so can't post a screen shot. Hope this is clear.

Am waiting for a visit from the network guru at the office where this problem has been ocurring to see if he can shed light on a the problem and help solve future ocurrences.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Anonymous — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 14:43:57 GMT

Gentlemen Thanks for the support!!!!

Question, Tom you referred to user permission on the file and user "mask" setting. Please clarify

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

TomWaltz — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 15:39:54 GMT

The umask is a users' default permissions settings for saving files.

By default, Mac saves files with a permission that allows themselves to read/write and others to see, but neither read nor write.

As Aaron said, if you check the user permissions on a file(with Get Info), look at the Ownership and Permissions. You want everything to say "Read & Write". Anything else will mess with Teamwork pretty badly.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Anonymous — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 17:41:54 GMT

Gentlemen THANKS!!!

THIS ROUND OF DRINKS ARE ON ME!!!!!

The issue was a permission problem on OSX. Once we addressed the permission issue on all machines the Teamwork function has been working as advertised!

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Thomas Holm — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 18:22:11 GMT

TomWaltz wrote:
The umask is a users' default permissions settings for saving files.

By default, Mac saves files with a permission that allows themselves to read/write and others to see, but neither read nor write.

Tom, if possible, how do you change the default umask setting? Or do you need to check and change permissons each time a user saves a new file to the server?

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

TomWaltz — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 18:53:25 GMT

open Terminal

check what it is now: type umask in the Terminal
(will return 022 by default)

enter the following:

defaults write -g NSUmask 0

Then logout/reboot
Then check it in Terminal again: type umask in the Terminal
(should return 000 now)

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Karl Ottenstein — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 21:24:25 GMT

In principal, it should be sufficient that each user is in the same group and that the group permissions are RW. Providing write access to all users is a bit of a security risk, unless you really want every user with access to your network to be able to write (and delete) the file.

Personally, I would never change the umask to full public access as Tom illustrated under any circumstances, but would only change permissions on a per file basis.

Aaron/Tom - have you had a problem with leaving 'other' protected and just making sure that the team members are members of a common group that has W permission?

Karl

PS The terms umask vs User Permissions along with others are just the Unix vs OS X 'friendly' terms for the same thing.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Aaron Bourgoin — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 22:35:50 GMT

In response to Karl's questiion about setting file permissions I have been too busy trying to make a really complex series of Temworked files communicate that I've been more firefighter than forensic crime scene investigator.

Will look into this some more as the permissions for some files I thought I had fixed are becoming read only again. The project is understaffed and so making the time to solve the ongoing issues is a challenge.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Thomas Holm — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 11:39:39 GMT

OK Thanks Tom,

I wasn't aware this means Terminal work - I'm too scared to change defaults that way when I really don't have any idea of what I'm doing. I guess Karl's advice is wise, and since this only is an issue whan you Save As new files, (permissions shouldn't change when you just save ongoing work) I think I'd better stick to only

change permissions on a per file basis

But i learn new things every day. That's why I'm here

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

TomWaltz — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 12:06:21 GMT

Karl wrote:
Aaron/Tom - have you had a problem with leaving 'other' protected and just making sure that the team members are members of a common group that has W permission?

With 50+ employees, we have people in different groups (admins, architects, graphics, etc), so the group does matter . For a smaller firm, it's probably not a big deal.

Thomas wrote:
I wasn't aware this means Terminal work - I'm too scared to change defaults that way when I really don't have any idea of what I'm doing. I guess Karl's advice is wise, and since this only is an issue whan you Save As new files, (permissions shouldn't change when you just save ongoing work) I think I'd better stick to only

It's one line in the Terminal. It won't hurt you. Besides, umask does affect files saved, not just new ones created.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Karl Ottenstein — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 14:52:24 GMT

TomWaltz wrote:
With 50+ employees, we have people in different groups (admins, architects, graphics, etc), so the group does matter.

Users can (should) belong to multiple groups to control access and avoid providing full public access.

Karl

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Thomas Holm — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 14:58:33 GMT

TomWaltz wrote:
Besides, umask does affect files saved, not just new ones created.

But then why doesn't this Teamwork issue turn up all the time?

Is there some other way to fix it, like setting permissions on the server so that all files saved in this or that folder always get these specified permissions, regardless of the "umask" of the user? To me that seems like a more logical solution.

And I seem to recall there's an "inherit permissions" folder setting (through GUI, that is select folder > Get Info), which I think has been broke in a number of OSX releases, but that may be fixed now, haven't checked it lately.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

TomWaltz — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 15:27:48 GMT

Karl wrote:
TomWaltz wrote:
With 50+ employees, we have people in different groups (admins, architects, graphics, etc), so the group does matter.
Users can (should) belong to multiple groups to control access and avoid providing full public access.

More importantly, why would we restrict access? Anyone signed into our network with access to the "Projects" volume is in the building and either has a valid login or a lot of unsupervised time to hack in.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

TomWaltz — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 15:33:33 GMT

Thomas wrote:
TomWaltz wrote:
Besides, umask does affect files saved, not just new ones created.
But then why doesn't this Teamwork issue turn up all the time?

Is there some other way to fix it, like setting permissions on the server so that all files saved in this or that folder always get these specified permissions, regardless of the "umask" of the user? To me that seems like a more logical solution.

And I seem to recall there's an "inherit permissions" folder setting (through GUI, that is select folder > Get Info), which I think has been broke in a number of OSX releases, but that may be fixed now, haven't checked it lately.

It does turn up every time here, if the Sys Admin creates a new user and forgets to set the umask.

Re: Newbie with TeamWork Problems!!

Karl Ottenstein — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 18:59:30 GMT

This article may be of interest to OS X users who were following the group access aspect of this thread and who have a peer-to-peer OS X network, rather than one using an OS X server:
http://www.peachpit.com/articles/article.asp?p=700592&seqNum=1&rl=1

Karl