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How can I archive a local copy of a model?
Bob_2
Member Posts: 3 ✭
If I want to archive a local copy of one of my CAD models for safe keeping, how do I do that? It doesn't look like there is a native file format to export for Onshape and the formats that are supported seem like they can lose information from the model.
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Answers
I think this would give better sleep at night for those who think their harddrive is safer place than Ons cloud.
I personally sleep better when I know my stuff is safe in cloud and not just local hdd. But I would still like this feature for critical documents in case of serious human error or stolen credentials.
I guess I'm not really sure what a "local copy" does for a user. To me, it looks like the data is only relevant if it is being viewed through our product. Having the data on a local harddrive isn't readable, so I am not sure how much use it is if it needs to be re-imported to our servers.
The second problem is that many customers will have contractual requirements that they be in control of their data. That means local backups. Again, we can argue that these are not useful, but I don't know that it is an effective argument in these cases. I have certainly personally experienced cases where having a local backup of Cloud data was useful because something happened in the Cloud that caused a loss of data. Being able to reload and re-access using the Cloud app was a great comfort.
All the major Cloud vendors allow export of data for such purposes, even though that have far less local-disk friendly data than CAD software. For example, Enterprise Software that is largely database records. It's part of what companies know to ask for when they start looking at Cloud solutions.
I see this similar to having a backup copy of your webstore database, it is not accessible or easily readable or up-to-date file when stored in your harddrive - but for some reason it is recommended to have those backups. It is more likely that the disk for backups will die before it is needed but if you can backup your critical files with only a cost of harddrives, you feel very stupid not doing so if it was ever needed.
Onshape people, trust me, just do simple one button entire document backup/restore function. It will save you a lot of time prooving people of cloud being safer solution than local copy. You can always end the discussion with: "Of course you can always backup your data locally and restore into Onshape anytime".
Some people asking for backup capability don't understand version control. They will always be pushing for 'backups' and we will always be gently educating them that we have made progress since the days of floppy disks.
A 'local' copy of onshape data is useless without their cloud platform. And I really don't want them to waste their limited resources on maintaining migration/import tools for a million versions.
On the other hand, I have run a lot of old versions of software because new versions were 'improved' to uselessness (skype) or the company was acquired or folded. I know that no one at Onshape wants their baby defiled but some years from now when the venture backers are ready for their fat exit, it will happen. And good and bad things will follow. Probably no better example of what will happen than Dassault acquiring Solidworks.
If Onshape had more resources, I'd push for them to develop an open format for history based cad data. I think their business model could handle it.
In this day and age there is no excuse for ignorance regarding data security (protecting data from both baddies and accidents). I know the Onshape guys are not ignorant and I know that their upstream cloud substrate vendors are not ignorant. So I'm not worried that a flooded data center or script kiddie with squirrel hax are going to get at my IP. And there's good reason to expect that my secretary and the old forgotten backup hard disk on the shelf are the weak points in my data security anyway.
It would be interesting for Onshape to allow me to pay for extra redundancy if I need.
For peace of mind I'd like Onshape to publish a little more info on their contingency plans; enough that I know they have it under control, not enough for the info to be used against them. This is a start: https://www.onshape.com/security and there's enough public info on their upstream providers to guess how well they will be able to react to natural disaster or political instability.
For now, I'm happy that the level of security they provide is adequate for what I might use it for. There are couple types of work that I would not use Onshape for. That's fine.
Bottom line, I don't want to download a local copy.
The fact that a local backup of the native file format might be useless without Onshape is also no reason to discard the baby with the bath water-- there are plenty of scenarios that deliver value from the backup by reloading it to Onshape.
The idea that Onshape may do a better job with security than you could is also not a great excuse for not having the ability to backup. There are no end of companies out there that have made mistakes, been hacked, or had problems of one kind or another that one could argue know more than any of their customers about it. Nevertheless, a backup would've been darned handy in the aftermath of those situations.
In the end of the day, these arguments about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin if there is no backup may not even matter. You may simply be confronted with customers whose own standards and audit procedures require that you have your own backup of the data or that they must be able to receive a backup. That's another reason why almost every SaaS vendor offers a mechanism to deal with the problem. It's something I've seen up close and personal having been responsible for R&D or CEO of multiple SaaS vendors. It's tough to argue with purchasing, the lawyers, and various customer's hard-earned scar tissue about why, "This time it's different."
The ability to backup is something that's table stakes for a SaaS vendor to ante up.
Github recommending backups be taken is new to me and my first impression is that it makes no sense, but I'm always keen to learn. Do you have a link to this I can use to educate myself with?
I agree with you that there will be organizations and people that want a local copy of Onshape native data and that it will be non-negotiable. However, not every customer is a good one. Selling cloud based CAD to customers that don't understand how the cloud is different than the computers on their own desk might not be worth the trouble. It's up to Onshape to decide whether they want to serve those potential customers.
Onshape manages the backups for me. Just like they manage installation, security, upgrades, and all the other administrative headaches that software (and data) on my own computer brings. That's what SaaS is all about.
It's true that there are companies that cut corners and that there are SaaS companies that have failed to properly secure their data. I think that you address this with due diligence rather than trying to do part of your vendors job for them.
Although my hobby use might actually lead to adoption at my workplace, the hobby use can't justify paid edition. With the plans as they have been stated for the Free edition, and no way to offline-archive (and potentially later restore) my older designs, I would have to throw away old work anytime I did new work. At that point, I'm better off switching to a tool that allows some form of archiving.
or if document ownership is moved to another user (this could have also better ways to achieve)
But the main reason would still be peace of mind to sceptic people who like to see where things are and that way feel better about using Onshape. This is just my experience as a cad software reseller since 2006.
In my opinion you should be able to select a live version or revision of the design (just like SW pack and go) and store it natively on a local hard-drive (including the history tree and associativity). Then Onshape should have an import wizard to import older archived files to work with the latest version with history tree intact.
We have over 2TB of CAD/FEA data stored, archived and backed up and would not be happy having "ALL" of this data exposed on the cloud given that we have strict confidentiality agreements with our clients and also may need the data should we have a claim on our Professional Indemnity Insurance. What happens if Onshape go bust or are bought out or hacked? e.g. Delcam acquired by Autodesk, Sensable acquired by Geomajic etc......
Bearing in mind some of our data is safety critical and have a legal obligation to store files, Is it just too much of a risk relying on the Cloud and Onshape?
I am frustrated as I love the concept of your software it just falls short for the legal risk and requirements for an Engineering Design Consultancy.
Comments please.
Thank you
Also, what's wrong with something like step files of models and PDFs of drawings being stored locally, but the "native" resides only in the "cloud"? The conundrum you describe is always one that will exist when data is created and edited in it's own proprietary format. You allude to that fact by your extension with regards to Delcam and Geomagic. This is not a cloud/non cloud issue here, it exists with any software product that creates data in this way. If my current mainstream design tool went defunct today, I would be creating STEP files of the models and shopping for a new 3D CAD product tomorrow. I already have the PDF files of the 2D drawings. (the current mainstream tool is starting to really work on making itself defunct, so I have plans thought out on how to migrate).
Keep in mind.... native data in Onshape is not file-based like current products you may be familiar with. There are extremely good reasons for it being this way in Onshape, and I suspect underlying and supporting the exact things you love in the software.
I'm curious... Can you explain the legal risk and requirements for Engineering Design Consultancy?
These are not tongue and cheek questions, I'm trying to understand what exactly you would be trying to address.
1) Would you be as relaxed about their safety if they always slept at a "safe" location which was not your home?
2) Would their grandparents understand you answering question 1 with a "Yes", if some harm happened to them, at some future date?
.... or is it also about more complicated things, including (but not limited to) delegating of responsibility, and verifiability of safety, particularly in the context of holding things (in trust) for others?
Here's a less emotive analogy than my last attempt.
I recall once, in a mountain rescue situation, when I lent a piece of important safety equipment to another person in whom I had complete trust.
It was the sort of item you can only trust if it has not been subjected to misuse, and some sorts of misuse would only be evident if witnessed at the time.
When I went to get it back, I found he had lent it to another person, in whom he had complete trust.
To me, that was a serious betrayal of my trust.
It's not intended to be an accurate analogy, and it certainly doesn't prove anything, but it might just get some logs rolling for people who have no clue what the resistance to cloud storage might be about, for certain business models.
And what happens if Onshape suddenly goes down or changes at some point in future? If there is enough of these backup's, there will be code to view and export them into another format. This is the power of internet.
What would you do if you don't have local backups and someday onshape.com just says: 'Domain for sale, click here to acquire' ?
What can you do if you live in another side of the world?
Nobody wants it and it isn't likely, but think of what can happen if, say, the plane from 'Onshape to cad conference' crashes?
This is the worst case scenario, but I don't understand why we couldn't have possibility to create also local backup - it doesn't take anything away from Onshape being full cloud cad with built inside PDM and versioning.
That why I created IR for this, vote if you like.
https://onshape.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/207464077-Local-backup-of-entire-document
The complete mitigation of risk in my children's life is not my ultimate goal with them, and it leads to children that haven't experienced enough and met enough diversity in life. It doesn't allow them to be all that they could be. I want a reasonable level of risk with a good level of experiences for them. My kids are arrows in my quiver that I am shooting out into the world so that they can do great things, both for their benefit and the world's.
But still I think the whole document with everything in it should be able to download as a backup file. Maybe cad data should be stored in step/parasolid format together with native?
Current export system is too laborous if you have dozens of tabs filled with multipart-studios and when we really start using what Onshape provides, we are probably going to have a lot more than just cad models stored in our documents.
I think you know it better than me how much data there is going to be after say 15 years..
Do you think it's all good for next 20 years as it is currently (data is in cloud, no local backups, business relies completely on access to cloud servers)?
20 years is a long way out. I think acceptance/perception of the issues will have changed by then, and a lot technically will have changed by then.
2TB of data on the cloud? mmm, I feel rather un-easy not knowing where the server, mirror servers and backups are stored. Could probably accept live projects on the cloud. Local storage on a server, you control your own destiny. Parasolid, STEP and PDF files are good for recording a point in time but are dumb files that do not store associativity and the history tree. We recently had a complex surfacing project based upon a previous project (7 years old), we recovered the SW files from the archive, opened in a newer version of SW and hey presto made changes to the design using the history tree. Saved the client a fortune.
Putting the technical and legal aspects aside so as not to "Cloud" the main issue (pardon the pun!)
We have a company policy if a software system or organisation such as CAD drives our company then its time to find something else.
It should be the decision of the company whether to store "Native" CAD files (i) locally (ii) on the Cloud or (iii) or a combination of both.
If these are Parasolid, STEP or PDF then it really destroys the objective of having a powerful parametric, history based CAD system.
I have had an official response from OnShape regarding storing "Native files" locally, and it seems there is "No definitive answer" and if it is implemented then it won't be for a number of years.
Your reaction probably would be influenced whether you are a company that designs your own products or whether you are a consultancy that provides a design service. All I ask is that you take a step back away from the monitor, keyboard and mouse and think about the implications of long term commitment to Onshape and storing potentially years of data on the cloud, controlled and priced only by Onshape.
So if you are happy storing all your hard work on the cloud and downloading dumb files like parasolid or IGES then Onshape is the right solution.
(for all you novices, when I say dumb files I mean when you import a neutral format such as parasolid or IGES back into Onshape then you loose the history tree and the features you created - direct modelling or feature recognition maybe the answer but it never recovers the original design intent).
I am disappointed that the basic question on this thread has been knowingly left unanswered since June 2015 and I have had to invest time, debating and questioning with some emotional responses from other users.
Storing data with OnShape cloud is a risk that you loose control of your own destiny, your data is subject to uncontrollable upgrades and reliant on another business being Solvent (OnShape). Legally, I would not like to expose my clients to uncontrollable risk.
Again my opinion is that you should have the choice whether to store files (native or dumb) locally, on the cloud or combination of both.
I will keep my free account open for now to play, but I wont be wasting any more time unless Onshape decide to resolve their internal conflicts and stop making a technical case for an indefensible commercial reality.
Thank you.
I have couple more questions on this matter, what if Onshape lost user data for some yet unknown reason (hack, virus, terrorism or just simple human mistakes)? System would be alive but data would be missing, in this case I would be so happy to have my weekly backups in local drive.
How can we count on pricing structure in long run? With Onshape there is no way to drop maintenance other than switching to free plan..
Can you describe the worst case scenarios with knowing how things run inside Onshape?
Just to think out loud, everything else than Onshape accidentally losing data (and backups) is same with any modern cad system. Most of them run a license server that makes sure you have rights to open your files. If they decide you don't, then you can't open anything - same as Onshape. Only difference is that you can probably find hacked version of installed software which can open your native files - but this is not the way for professionals to continue work.
What I'm saying is that every license, contract or other agreement must be built on mutual trust. No text can cover every situation future brings and in the end - all this happens just between humans. I give you money, you give me right to use your software. It's just that you're fairly new as a company and asking for us to store all our design data on your servers without having local copies. When Onshape has been around for ten-twenty years without problems, it would be easier to 'join'.
All that said, Onshape team, you have built amazing cloud cad platform, first one in the world. Could you be the first company in the world to create a standard 3d model file/package with history - dragging others with you? There is no hurry, just finish the platform to meet most of needs but keep this in mind for future during development.
Our business depends on our users trusting us. I think a big price increase without a grandfathering plan or some sort of fallback option would undermine that trust. Regardless of what happens, locally stored data would be of no help there.
I'm not sure what you mean by "worst case" here -- I have trouble coming up with a scenario (even a zombie apocalypse) that would leave our service operational but destroy the CAD data.
Thanks! Regarding transferring history, that is very hard to the point of being effectively impossible: subtle differences in how features regenerate (due to thousands of little options in kernel calls, versioning changes, and differences in non-kernel internal logic) lead to much larger downstream effects in models of even moderate complexity. But we'll see what we can do -- it may be possible to make transfers work well enough that some models could be fixed up with manual effort.