Cad deployment in the age of Covid

[jcapriotti]

Since most companies for the past year have had their employees working from home, how have you deployed CAD/PDM software to the end users. VPN is usually too slow to have large numbers of users installing gigabytes of files.

This past year we pushed the administrative image to the Azure cloud and have the users download it and extract it to a local folder while off the VPN. Then they reconnect to VPN and run our installation scripts.

[matt]

My wife is an architect, and with her large firm, they send home company laptops.

[Frederick_Law]

VPN is just a secure login, connection.
Pulling all those data across the network is. wrong.
If user need to pull 100MBs constantly to do their work, it is wrong even on LAN.

Either put all data on user's "home" "remote" computer or setup something like Remote Desktop.

When you Google search, you get search result. Not the whole Google database.
So PDM at home sending all the CAD file up and down will not work.

I don't need to share anything with other users and everything I need fit in a portable drive.

[jcapriotti]

VPN is just a secure login, connection.
Pulling all those data across the network is. wrong.
If user need to pull 100MBs constantly to do their work, it is wrong even on LAN.

Either put all data on user's "home" "remote" computer or setup something like Remote Desktop.

When you Google search, you get search result. Not the whole Google database.
So PDM at home sending all the CAD file up and down will not work.

I don't need to share anything with other users and everything I need fit in a portable drive.

We have over a hundred users that need to access the same data sets. It's all in PDM. Everyone at home has their work laptops/desktops and they connect via VPN. In PDM, all users have our library of hardware cached to their local PDM folder already. For other work when they open files in PDM it downloads over the VPN, while slower than in the office, once cached locally its fairly fast. When they check in it uploads the changed files only, which is a bigger bottleneck as most user's home internet upload is slow (mine is around 1.5mb)

Remote desktop doesn't work well, graphics performance is not good for one and it can be sluggish overall.

[jcapriotti]

My wife is an architect, and with her large firm, they send home company laptops.

We have our company laptops at home with us. I suppose an option to upgrade SolidWorks/PDM on them is to bring them to the office but our building is locked out without prior permission to get in.

[matt]

We have our company laptops at home with us. I suppose an option to upgrade SolidWorks/PDM on them is to bring them to the office but our building is locked out without prior permission to get in.

My wife can go in by appointment for express network connection or suffer the vagaries of VPN.

[Frederick_Law]

Remote desktop doesn't work well, graphics performance is not good for one and it can be sluggish overall.

RDT or similar connection reduce bandwidth because it only "live stream" the screen.
Instead of all the files.

So user don't need powerful computer. Done properly they can use a tablet.
Also it is more secure because user never get the files on their computer.

[Glenn Schroeder]

I've been working on a VPN connection, with our files on network drives since last March (no PDM). There have been a few issues, like files getting corrupted, but that's why I have backups. I think the corrupted files were caused by my internet connection going down in the middle of saving. I'm not sure about that, but I don't think it's happened since I got better internet, so it's a reasonable conclusion.

I'm well aware that this wouldn't work with numerous users.

[jcapriotti]

RDT or similar connection reduce bandwidth because it only "live stream" the screen.
Instead of all the files.

So user don't need powerful computer. Done properly they can use a tablet.
Also it is more secure because user never get the files on their computer.

RDP is great for some things but CAD usage isn't one IMO. There is usually no graphics acceleration so sketching and model manipulation is sluggish. And many of our users have slower internet connections so even most movements just dragging windows around can be sluggish.

I use it for working on servers or for users to test new functions and workflows. Works good for that.

[Frederick_Law]

RDP is great for some things but CAD usage isn't one IMO. There is usually no graphics acceleration so sketching and model manipulation is sluggish. And many of our users have slower internet connections so even most movements just dragging windows around can be sluggish.

I use it for working on servers or for users to test new functions and workflows. Works good for that.

A remote control don't need graphic acceleration.
User only getting screenshot of the connected computer.
All processing is on the other computer.
User only see and get the result.
It is like a good old terminal.

Now user input (mouse and keyboard) delay is latency issue. Not bandwidth.

My work IT setup "Windows Ink Workspace". I didn't try using SW.

[Craig Makarowski]

I prefer Remote desktop over VPN that way all the company assets stay at work, besides the pdm standard vault library is now around 6gigabytes now not including Projects and Products folders. The only real pain is that the vpn doesn't support the 3D connexion devices in Remote desktop so i have to buy a third party tool for that which is way overpriced!! so My work flow at home is a little slower. I do have lock up of the screen at home (Using 4K)
I just restart the remote desktop and continue on.

[jcapriotti]

A remote control don't need graphic acceleration.
User only getting screenshot of the connected computer.
All processing is on the other computer.
User only see and get the result.
It is like a good old terminal.

Now user input (mouse and keyboard) delay is latency issue. Not bandwidth.

My work IT setup "Windows Ink Workspace". I didn't try using SW.

Yeah but I find that while some applications are smooth, CAD apps like AutoCAD and SolidWorks have poor graphical performance no matter what the connection. The issue doesn't seem to be the local machine but rather some issue with the RDP.

Here's some threads from the SolidWorks forum on it (found via google, nice knowing ya)
https://forum.solidworks.com/thread/239739
https://forum.solidworks.com/thread/57316

Appears the software OpenGL option is being turned on resulting in reduced performance.

[Frederick_Law]

Oh, RDP got between SW and graphic driver.
I believe some had it setup successfully.
It's in one of the thread.

[Ry-guy]

@jcapriotti That's pretty close to what we did as well. We built an entire install package and had the users VPN into the system and do the install. The users were warned that they should come into the office to do the install..but some..well spent 4 hrs waiting for the download.
We got hit with an issue where the installer was using an admin account that was only accessible in one domain- this caused the install to request an admin account for the other domain users. We had to temporary build an admin account that was avaialble to both domains (not a good practice) to solve the issue. Once that was done the admin account was nuked.

But in short we did a full SW 2020 SP5 and PDM Pro upgrade via VPN. I still feel for those users that attempted to do the download via VPN at home. People don't realize how big these installs are! 24GB!! Try that during the day using your wireless connection and the rest of the family on Zoom meetings or school! Yikes.

I was the smart one. Drove into the office and did the install...about 45 minutes.

[Jaylin Hochstetler]

If I have to do any work from home (which isn't very often) I use RDP. In fact, I even use it here at work with my laptop. If I have to resolve an issue out on the floor I'll take my laptop out there and remote into my CAD computer. Much easier, don't have to have SW on my laptop and I can utilize the processing power of my CAD computer. I use the wifi here at work (which is really fast) for my laptop so there are no internet issues.

[jcapriotti]

I was the smart one. Drove into the office and did the install...about 45 minutes.

Unfortunately that wasn't an option for most, our badges have been deactivated and we aren't allowed on the premises without prior approval. Also some have brought home their desktop workstations so lugging that around is well, not fun.

[Ry-guy]

I was the smart one. Drove into the office and did the install...about 45 minutes.

Unfortunately that wasn't an option for most, our badges have been deactivated and we aren't allowed on the premises without prior approval. Also some have brought home their desktop workstations so lugging that around is well, not fun.

Yeah, that's a bit extreme...we are exempt from most of the regulations...we are med device and PPE producer. Our dental division does A LOT of PPE for the world...I was told the government told us back in January, 2020 to start producing at full capacity and to reactive a machine that we being recommissioned. Not sure if that is true but it wouldn't surprise me. We are one of very few companies that make n95 FDA certified surgical face masks..then a crap load of the regular face masks..if you go to the dentist in the US..I'm confident the dentist or assistant is using one or many of our different branded products.