7 Myths About CONNECT Edition

Transcription

1 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition Get the facts. Don t let rumors keep you from productivity gains. By Dan Raker, ConnectPress Back in the Fall of 2014 when Bentley Systems CONNECT Edition was first announced there was a swirl of misinformation. Perhaps a better way to describe this was a lack of information. Now with CONNECT Edition in its seventh release, some of the rumors persist. Why? Perhaps users misconceptions reinforce an underlying fear of change not wanting to upgrade away from tools and workflows they are comfortable with. Or perhaps some just latched onto early misinformation or lack of information and have never taken the time to get the facts. Let s fix that right now. Myth #7: If you use one CONNECT Edition product, you need to use the CONNECT Edition of all your Bentley products. Since introducing their robust DGN format in the mid-1980 s, Bentley has continued to show a commitment to forward, reverse compatibility and interoperability as one of the company s leading strengths. You can run MicroStation CONNECT Edition while still running pre-connect Editions or the very latest releases of ProjectWise, AssetWise, GEOPAK or any other Bentley application interchangeably. Here s an example that will drive home this point. In the illustration below you see a reality mesh visible in MicroStation CONNECT Edition. What is fascinating about this screenshot isthe sheer number of different versions of Bentley tools appearing in one integrated view. You are seeing a current workspace view from CONNECT Edition. Inside the working area you see an older, not CONNECT Edition, resolution mesh view on 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition pg. 1

2 the left plus a newer, higher resolution, upgraded mesh view on the right. The former mesh view is pre-connect, the latter comes from the latest release. MicroStation doesn t care! And the message is that you shouldn t care either go ahead and mix and match pre- and post-connect Edition applications and data. All viewed from inside CONNECT Edition: a reality mesh on the left from V8i and on the right a higher resolution 3SM scalable mesh from the CONNECT Edition. Myth #6: DGN and other file formats change in CONNECT Edition The underlying DGN file format is the same in V8i, CONNECT and pretty much all Bentley releases since the mid 1980 s (See Myth #7 above). Says Samir Haque, Bentley s Power Platform Manager, We believe that things like file formats are the responsibility of computer scientists, not users. Perhaps in a dig at Autodesk and other competitors where recent upgrades have necessitated changes to underlying formats, the ongoing Bentley commitment remains the same no file format changes. This is true even for the formats of files like DGNLIBs, RSCs, etc. To further buffer CONNECT Edition users from file format problems on import (and export) to other brands, Bentley continues to aggressively support things like Real DWG R and others. Myth #5: The new CONNECT Edition Ribbon UX (user interface) removes my old 2-key input 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition pg. 2

3 For years I remember proud announcements at Bentley conferences like what last year needed 14 clicks can now be done in eight. Yes, long-term users are fiercely proud of and defensive of 2-key input. First, the ribbon user interface opens the door to so many more productivity tools that many users will soon move on from 2-key input. The space bar pop up hub and search tools, for example, radically improve speed and ease-of-use. But for the diehards, 2-key input is still present and only a ribbon-click away for a 2-key pop-up: 2-key input in CONNECT Edition. Notice the enhanced, suggestive pop-up example di= gives all the di options available. 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition pg. 3

4 Myth #4: You cannot use CONNECT Edition if you are stuck using, say, an older version of OpenRoads Designer Forward and backward compatibility as well as co-existence works just fine across all Bentley applications. Many users are contractually limited to certain releases by project. This may be due to deliverables to a DOT or other owner. But this limitation is not a CONNECT Edition-imposed problem. You can convert to MicroStationCONNECT Edition right now and still produce compatible deliverables in things like older editions of OpenRoads. There s no reason to miss out on advanced productivity tools in the CONNECT Edition while waiting for contract or project obligations to shift. In fact, early adopters are finding ways to earn better margins on fixed fee projects by accelerating work internally with CONNECT Edition productivity yet still meeting contract deliverable obligations. CONNECT Edition introduces a whole array of database within a design file tools where new data types and properties vastly improve design productivity. Even this data is backwards compatible and are visible when opened in V8i applications. Myth #3: Big brother is always watching you must cloud enable everything First, you can control how everything you work on is or is not shared with the cloud. Now a disclaimer on this one: once you understand how to use the cloudenabled tools built into CONNECT Edition you will likely understand that CONNECT turns all your colleagues into good big brothers the kind who teach you stuff and support you at every step. Most CONNECT Edition users agree that sharing in the cloud is not a burden. Here are a few examples of cloud-enabled tools and controls you can use in CONNECT Edition: 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition pg. 4

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6 Access to cloud-enabled tools can be enabled and limited through user, project and enterprise settings. Turning on cloud services is easy and instantaneous. Myth #2: Migrating to CONNECT Edition requires substantial training and conversion First, moving to CONNECT Edition requires almost no conversions: not for file types, project files or more. Pretty much the only thing that needs upfront conversion are V8i Workspaces to CONNECT Edition Configuration. CONNECT Edition even comes with a wizard to help you make Workstation-to- Configuration changes that eliminates most of the work. To be fair, these do require human intervention, but most users who have migrated report they invested less than an afternoon of work to go from V8i to CONNECT Edition. 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition pg. 6

7 Above: Most of the differences between V8i and CONNECT Edition are in name identification only. You do need to convert V8i Workspaces to CONNECT Edition Configurations. Below: There is a wizard to help with this conversion. As you use enhanced CONNECT Edition features like data type properties, you are going to want to take some time to organize and setup smart data that will then become available across users, project and enterprises, but this activity will likely grow as projects evolve. Of course, you can invest in enterprise-wide libraries early on for even more productivity. Second, let s talk about training. One of the huge benefits of CONNECT Edition is contextual training built right into the CONNECT Edition UX (user interface). This means that CONNECT Edition can and does suggest work-context access to the Bentley LEARN server, YouTube channel, your enterprise tools (once you set them up) through the built-in CONNECT Advisor. 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition pg. 7

8 The ribbon UX is largely intuitive for most new users. And V8i and older users will likely adapt quickly or with a little help from the contextual learning tools. CONNECT Advisor will become your new best friend it is the? in a circle at the top right of the ribbon. Myth #1: Either Or! You must use either V8i or CONNECT Edition on a single workstation you cannot have both Plain and simple: you can keep your V8i configuration the way it is and start using CONNECT Edition on your workstation and local configuration at the same time. What are you waiting for? Dan Raker has been writing about CAD and MicroStation software for over 35 years. This article originally appeared in MicroStationConnections.com and is copyright 2017 by ConnectPress, Ltd. Some of the material in this article originated in the live webinar Why you should start using MicroStation CONNECT Edition on October 25, You can watch the view on demand version of this webinar at ConnectPress MicroStationConnections.com also runs a resource page for CONNECT Edition learning and migration at 7 Myths About CONNECT Edition pg. 8