Donate your corrupted design files to science.
How Axiom researches emerging types of V8 file corruption
CLEARWATER, FLORIDA, USA — Regardless
of the cause of design file damage — a power fluctuation,
a network glitch, an unreliable hard drive, an amateur software
developer, an act of God or an act of Bill Gates —
customer reports to Axiom Technical Support confirm week after
week that design file corruption does impact MicroStation projects,
and no version of MicroStation is immune.
Some forms of design file corruption are immediately obvious and
fatal (such the "Unable to open design file" dialog).
Some categories of design file corruption are annoying time wasters
(such as unselectable elements). There is also a class of design
file corruption that lurks unnoticed in your project design files,
not impacting production until the most inconvenient time for
you, possibly long after the damage was done.
To solve these problems for the MicroStation community, Axiom
continuously watches for long-term trends of design file misbehavior
to identify new features that should be added to FileFixer.
Axiom is particularly meticulous in its analysis of any file
which is so badly mangled it cannot be opened by MicroStation
— the files which stop projects dead in their tracks.
When MicroStation cannot open a file, that design asset is lost.
Axiom takes this very seriously.
To assist the broadest possible number of MicroStation users,
FileFixer enhancements provide solutions for recurring,
long-term file corruption trends which have been identified by
Axiom's analysis of customer files over a long period of time
- the most common problems CAD shops, like yours, have encountered
or inevitably will.
V8-specific corruption
One of the most common problems that are found in customer V8
design files is a corrupted level table. When a V8 design file's
level table is damaged or missing, graphical elements become "stranded"
on levels that aren't defined. This problem is new to V8 and does
not occur in V7 design files. FileFixer for V8 offers a quick
remedy for damaged or missing level tables.
Other V8-specific problems discovered in many customer files involve
elements that have at least one coordinate beyond the edge of
the design plane. This type of error makes these elements hard
to select, move or delete and cause MicroStation users a great
deal of annoyance (and wasted time). FileFixer repairs
these elements so that they can be manipulated as needed.
Running out of design file corruption
to fix?
What about FileFixer's future? The fizzing test tubes and
bubbling beakers in Axiom's design file laboratory are currently
filled with specimens of "structured storage" corruption.
Structured storage is the file structure used by Microsoft Word
and Microsoft Excel. Bentley also selected this file structure
for MicroStation V8 design files.
A structured storage file contains multiple sub-folders and sub-files.
Analysis of multiple customer V8 design files has identified repeated
instances where the internal pointers to sub-folders or sub-files
are damaged — causing the standard structured storage
file reading and writing operations to fail. When such damage
occurs, MicroStation cannot open the V8 file. Sound familiar?
You may have been told nothing can be done to recover from this.
Fortunately for you, Axiom didn't give up. Analysis of customer
files revealed that in many cases of structured storage damage,
the original design data is still intact, but is trapped within
the mangled wreckage. If you need to free your V8 data from the
surrounding structured storage wreckage, or if you've run into
any project-stopping or annoying design file anomaly —
V7 or V8 — contact Axiom. Your troublesome file could
contribute to a new search or repair option that benefits the
entire MicroStation community.
Call now!
For more information on FileFixer
contact an Axiom MicroStation Consultant today! Call 727-442-7774
extension 9474 or e-mail 9474@AxiomInt.com.
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