Restore AC6.5 project

[Anonymous]

We have a old (ok, very old) project that was teamworked in AC6.5. When I try to sign in with AC7, it indicates that teammembers are still signed in and to sign in as Teamleader with exclusive access and then save to update the file. I am unable to sign in as AC6.5 as I don't have a machine that will still run that program. I do not get the option to open as a solo file. Is there anyway to reset the file and open with at least AC7 so that I can upgrade the file?

[Eduardo Rolon]

As a possible alternative, since you are running Mac

download VirtualBox (http://www.virtualbox.org/)
create a Win 2000 virtual machine (if you have the disk)
install AC6.5 in Win 2000

[Anonymous]

As Bill Cosby would say....


RIGHT!

[Eduardo Rolon]

Is that an exclamation that it worked?

As a side note I think VirtualBox runs in Vista therefore it might help with the same situation in a Microsoft environement.

[Anonymous]

It could be an alternative to try with AC7, it is very close to AC6.5 and I'd bet it is abble to open your file. I can still open an AC7 on my Macintel, it runs perfectly on my MacbookPro and with my AC12 dongle.

If I remember well only the very last upgrade of AC7 was abble to run on both MacOS9 and MacOSX.

[Anonymous]

No the exclamation is not because it worked; we don't have a copy of windows. Tried AC7, but you cannot sign in or open a old teamwork project if someone is still signed in. I was able to pull the old plotmaker layouts from the archive and print these out. At least we have those copies. I could probably also save out the old plotmaker files as a DWG line drawing to trace over. This reinforces my new practice of leaving a old teamleader PLC on the server that is archived with the old files. These I know can be opened and saved as a solo project.

[Anonymous]

.....and this is the very problem I've complained about for years..
How do you maintain continuity for a building model years down the track??
It's all very well to say that the model lives in the "moment" but what do you do in this case?

[Karl Ottenstein]

RLC wrote:
.....and this is the very problem I've complained about for years..
How do you maintain continuity for a building model years down the track??
It's all very well to say that the model lives in the "moment" but what do you do in this case?

Not really a new problem. What do you do about your old files that are on punch cards, paper tape, 9 track tape, 8" floppies, 5 1/2" or 4" floppies, various tape (Mountain, Travan, etc) backups or Iomega disks? Even if media isn't the problem (but it easily can be)...How about your company books from QuickBooks 3 for when the IRS audits you for 7 years ago? Or some CAD system that hasn't been manufactured in years. It is always an issue of either keeping old hardware and/or old software around ...or tediously taking the time to convert things before they are too old...

Karl

[Anonymous]

Karl,
Yes but all those things you mention are "2D".. word documents printed out would suffice, balance sheets as hard copy, even autocad drawings printed out could be copied...but 3D BIM's...can only be printed out in 2D.
So what do you do when you need to access your original model years down the track? I've personally worked on a nice heritage project that has spanned, on and off, 12 years, sometimes a couple of years between commissions. It was done in Autocad so no problems accessing the dwgs, but had I used a BIM program then...and thankfully it would have been Archicad!, what would happen ?

I only bring this up because one of the great reasons to model a building and all its associated coordinated drawings from consultants etc was the ideological virtual building model that goes beyond just producing a set of nice construction drawings.

I've never figured out the answer either...but I sure as hell wouldn't like to tell my client my drawings are too old to work on.