Practices of CAD "Smart Saving"

Practices of CAD "Smart Saving"

Posted on fredag, januar 23, 2009 @ 15:44:10 by bobjr

"Smart Saving" is a process of backing up in progress CAD drawings to ensure reliability and reduce vulnerability

Why practice "Smart Saving"

        We have all run into a disaster with a CAD drawing at one point in time. These range anywhere from a lost file to a corrupted solid and are the most stressful time for design engineers. There is a sure fire way protect the integrity of your drawing no matter what happens this process is called "Smart Saving". Smart Saving starts with recognizing that CAD drawings are complex, time consuming, and are vital to the survival of many businesses. For these reasons saving a drawing like it is a high school research paper just does not cut it. So how does smart saving work?

How to "Smart Save"

        It follows the basic priciple of save often but also includes having multiple saves in differnt locations. Here is a breakdown of the saving steps which are usually easy to access options in any CAD system, I use Keycreator so I will use that as an example. If you reference the image I have posted with this entry you will see the Keycreator save options tab. There are two differnt option on how to "Smart save" your files, choosing the correct one is just a matter of which one fits your style.

• Time Save - This option the CAD system will automatically saves a copy of the drawing in the interval of time that you specify. This is a good option if you tend to forget to save often, because the program will do it automatically for you.
• Automatic Creation of Backup Files - This is the better option if you manually save often. Everytime you use the save or save all command the program will automatically create a backup file.
• Generations - Generations are just a complex way of saying back up files and they are created when the drawing is saved. The number of generations is up to you and depends of the size and complexity of the part. If it is a large and complex part you may want to have multiple generations in case you need to go back a few saves and work from there.      
• Back Up your back ups - So now you are almost to "smart save" status you are designing a part saving often and have back up files for previous saves. The last step in "smart saving" is at the end of the day move your saved files to the network or to an external hard drive because you want to be prepared if your computer crashes.