Upgrading libraries

[dwyckoff]

Greetings,
Why is it so difficult to migrate to new libraries? Just upgraded to 14 and decided to pare down the number of libraries I was using, and now I have a boatload of missing parts. Is there a better method in doing this? The last time I had to change libraries in the middle of a project was V8 to V9. It did not seem to be this difficult back then. Why can I not rescue the settings from all the old parts and dropper them into the new part and go on?javascript:emoticon(':?')

[Erika Epstein]

you can always use the older libraries loaded in the new version of AC.

Your wishes seem contradictory; you want to pare down the number of libraries but now you complain about the missing parts.

Have you loaded the subset libraries with the new version?

[Anonymous]

One way to migrate and pare down the libraries at the same time is to first save the project as an archive (PLA). Then use this as the project library and load the new ArchiCAD library.

This may lead to a duplicate parts warning if you have used parts that are included in the new library. How to deal with this depends on the circumstances. If you want to avoid this you can load the previous "migration library" in place of the standard one before saving the PLA. This will avoid including the duplicate parts.

There may also be some cool tricks using embedded parts (since AC13) but I haven't tried this yet.

[dwyckoff]

The problem stems from the fact that our office does not use proper controls on library parts and standardization. We have parts from job A that are not in the corporate library and in a pinch I copy and past from job A into job B rather than take the time to find the originals. So now I have parts from custom library associated with A in B and all I need that library for is one or two parts. So now that has happened two or three times I have a bunch of libraries loaded and tons of duplicates. I just want to have three libraries: The standard AC library, our office library and a project specific library. So when I unload a library, how can I just take the one or two objects and point to pieces in another library that have the same name but different paths?

[Erika Epstein]

Select one of the library parts you want to reroute (you can do all instances in one go)

open its settings box ctrl/cmd +T and navigate to the correct library and within it the right path. This will redefine the path.

As you are in 14, you might consider keeping all your libraries in the folder designated for your BIM server libraries whether or not you are using TW2, there will only be one set of libraries in the office to maintain.

[Karl Ottenstein]

So when I unload a library, how can I just take the one or two objects and point to pieces in another library that have the same name but different paths?

Aha. Your situation is pretty classic, which is why GS introduced some new library management features in 14.

Check out the ArchiCAD 14 Reference Guide PDF (from your Help menu, or in the Documentation folder), page 59: "Keep the Objects You Need, Eliminate Obsolete Libraries"... which takes you to page 210 concerning automatic embedding of parts from a particular library, which would embed the one or two parts you have from each of those old libs and then stop loading the rest of the lib.

Cheers,
Karl

[Frank Beister]

The right way is to use the library of your actual AC-version plus the migration libraries down to the version you started the project from.

If you add a complete GS-library AC asks you for cleaning up library duplicates and links the migration libraries.

In library manager you should have a look to the "information" button, which shows you, if the library is needed at all.

The textures is a special point, which you have to embedd via attribute manager (overwrite by index).

This works fine down to AC10. Earlier version make more problems and you have to do more manual.

[Karl Ottenstein]

I agree, Frank, but the last question (I think) related (in part) with what to do about various office libraries from which only one or two parts were used, not the use of multiple standard AC libraries.

Cheers,
Karl