One option that might work for you is to create an entirely new vault and
start clean. That doesn't mean you totally lose your history; you can leave
the old vault the way it is, and have access to it if you really need to go
get an old version of a file. This would be a chance to scrub your dataset,
making sure that all your libraries and other files are just the way you
want them for moving forward, and that all old and unwanted data is weeded
out.

The way to do this would be to copy one of your local (freshly updated)
workspaces to a new directory, taking that dataset out of vault altogether,
and manually taking the read-only tag off the files. Then go through the
files, migrating everything to Inventor R2010 and getting everything cleaned
up. Create a temporary, non-vault version of your project file to use while
you're working with the files. Then create a new vault and a new project
file and push that dataset up.

This method has a few advantages; first, it bypasses the issue of migrating
the vault itself altogether. All you have to worry about is file migration.
Second, it lets you start fresh with a clean, lean vault. If your current
vault is bloated with a bunch of old versions you're not likely to need,
trimming it down will give you some performance gains. The downside is that
if you do find yourself needing an older version of a file, you're going to
have to jump through a few hoops to go back into the old vault, get the old
version of the file, and then manually integrate it into your working
dataset. Whether this is a viable option for you depends on the number of
times you might have to do that...and whether you'd be getting a simple part
file (not too bad) or an elaborate assembly (potential for a lotta hassle).
One place I worked, we created a fresh Vault every year with each new
version of the software. We did this three years in a row, and only had to
go into the old vaults a couple of times for simple stuff.

One caveat...unless they did some real work to Vault's autoloader utility
(and I haven't heard that they did), it's a miserable, kludgy little
half-baked application that will crunch away at your data for hours, and
then tell you it can't finish the job for some reason (it won't tell you
why) so it's not going to do anything at all, and then simply exit, leaving
you to try to guess what might be wrong and then try again. I swear
Autodesk must have farmed that application out to Billy Bob's Bait, Tackle
and Code Shack. Do everything you can to insure that all your files can
find everything they need, that all your links are live and your paths are
clearly defined--and still be prepared for a session of frustration getting
everything pushed up to the new vault.

Cheers,
Walt




wrote in message news:6277871@discussion.autodesk.com...
I am going to be upgrading from Vault 5 and Inventor 11 to Vault 2010 and
Inventor 2010. Is it possible to migrate directly from Vault 5 to Vault
2010? I've heard from a local Inventor/Vault guru that I would have to
migrate to 2008 first. Is this true? If so, is there a way to go about
migrating to 2010 without having a version of 2008 to migrate the files
with?

Thanks!

Whether your dataset is associated with a vault or not has to do with your
project file. When you create that file you have the option of making a
vault project file or not. If it's a vault project, you will have a local
workspace with all your Inventor files, which is imaged in the vault itself.
At that point it really doesn't matter whether you're working on a
standalone machine (your 'server' is local) or on the network; everything
works pretty much the same way. In your workspace, the files will be tagged
read-only unless they are checked out. Vault constantly watchdogs the two
mirrored datasets (workspace and vault) to make certain that they're in
sync. For that reason, you don't want to try messing with your vault-aware
local workspace out of the context of the vault itself. If you do, the
vault server will surely pitch a fit and give you much grief next time you
log in.

Here's what I'd do...

-Check all your files into the vault, so everything in the vault is current.
-Do a 'get all' on the vault so your local workspace is also current.
-Archive your entire local workspace. Save it out to the server, burn it to
DVD, copy it off onto a portable hard drive, zip it up and email it to
yourself. Heck, it's your data you're talking about; do them all.
-backup the vault itself. Twice. Put *those* backups in a safe place.
Yes, I'm paranoid about losing data.
-Delete your local workspace--everything under the mapped workspace
directory.. Don't worry; you made multiple backups. This is just to get
rid of the stragglers and orphans that tend to build up in a workspace over
time; stuff that never made it into the vault, and is therefore
'illegitimate'. If any of those files turn out to be valuable, you can go
get them later from the backups.
-Go to the vault server and do a 'get all'. This downloads a fresh local
workspace that's perfectly synched with the vault itself, and so represents
all your valid data, in it's best possible condition.

Now you're ready to start.

-Copy your entire local workspace to a new place on your computer.
-Remove the read-only tag from everything in the new directory structure.
-Create a new, non-vault project file which is similar to your old one in
structure, except that it points to the new fileset instead of your old,
vaulted set. Make sure there's nothing in the new project file that 'sees'
anything in the old vaulted dataset.

Now you've created a clean dataset, completely independent of the vault that
you can further scrub. You can also migrate the files without worrying
about vault. Get everything tuned and humming. Is anything in your old
directory structure or file arrangement unsatisfactory? Now's a good time
to fix it. Are any of your assemblies or drawings giving you error messages
when you open them? They won't vault cleanly until they're fixed. The idea
here is to separate your dataset from the vault so you don't have the added
complication of trying to deal with them both together (sometimes it can be
difficult to know where a problem is originating). Now is also a good time
to plan on moving the new vault to a network server if your'e going to do
that. Once your Inventor files are just the way you want them, what you
basically have is a nice clean local workspace...without the vault. At that
point, the steps are:

-Create a new, empty vault, either on your local or the network server.
-Create a new project file that is identical to the non-vault version you've
been working in, but make it a vault project file. Activate that project
file.
-Log into the new vault, and map that vault's working folder to the folder
with your new dataset in it.
-(cross your fingers) use autoloader to push your dataset up to the new
vault. It makes my skin crawl suggesting that anyone try to actually use
that dog, but it's the only reasonable way unless your dataset is small
enough to vault manually. Not many are.

One thing to keep in mind. You have a stand-alone vault client application
(Vault Explorer), and you also have the vault interface within Inventor
itself. The logins for those two can be separate, meaning that when you
have more than one vault hanging around, it's possible to be logged into one
with Inventor, and another with Vault Explorer. That can be really
confusing, and dangerous. Be certain that when you start to work with the
new vault, you don't have any auto-logins to the old one hanging around.

At this point you're ready to go back to work. I'd leave the old vault
around for a while. If you do need something, you can go get it with a bit
of work.

Whew!

I'll look this over in the morning to make sure it all still makes sense to
me

Cheers,
Walt


wrote in message news:6278382@discussion.autodesk.com...
Thank you much for the tips. I like you're approach and I think we'll try to
do it this way.

Bear with me because I've only recently (2 months) learned Inventor and
Vault, but I am a 15 year user of Autocad. I'm trying to understand how to
work with the files locally before creating or adding them to the new Vault.
Right now I have Inventor 2010 installed on my machine and have installed it
as a stand alone copy. Will I be able to configure and migrate all the old
files with inventor installed this way or will I need to create the new
Vault on my server first and install Inventor 2010 tied to this new vault?

I'm confident that with a little guidance, we'll be able to complete this
migration without having to contract the work out.

Thanks again for all your help.

Brian

If I understand you correctly, this won't work : You can't run two different
versions of the vault server on the same machine. The 2010 server installer
will see the existing version and ask you to uninstall the Vault 5 server
first.

Dave Mink
Autodesk / Data Management