Migration tips and tricks

1. Data Migration Preparation

• Clean-up data. Resolve any unresolved references or break the links.

• In the Application Options dialog box, Save tab, turn ON Prompt to save for migration.

• How to identify data that is not migrated:

  • CTRL+D in the About Autodesk Inventor dialog box to see the migration flag.

    

    Migration required.

    

    Migration is not required.

• The Inventor menu Manage MIGRATE is enabled.

• Design Assistant shows a list of nonmigrated files.

  • Open files or entire folder. In Design Assistant, select View and click Customize to add a column called Needs migrating:

    

    

Note: Select View Details to view properties columns.

Files in Design Assistant can be opened directly in Inventor.

2. On-demand migration vs. Task Scheduler

On-demand migration and Migration command

On-demand migration occurs when you Open, change, and then save a file in the new release.

• Be sure to back up data files.

• Migrate bottom up:

  • Migrate .ipt first, then .iam, and then .idw.

• Do not continue to work in the session you are migrating in. The migration process keeps both the migrated and unmigrated data in memory.

Task scheduler Migration

• If you start with .idw, Task Scheduler automatically migrates bottom up.

• Backup data files.

• Task Scheduler allows migration of entire projects, which is not possible with automatic migration.

  • Time considerations
  • If you have the time, turn on Rebuild all.
  • If you do not have any time to spare, turn on multi-tasking.

3. Migration: Design Data and Styles

• Correct the Project file folder option paths.

  • Paths in IPJ file path do not automatically point to the correct location.
    • Default IPJ paths are OK.
    • Hard-coded IPJ paths need change.

• Migrate any custom style library.

  • Use the Inventor Style Library Manager tool.
  • Or manually export .xml in release n and import the .xml in release n+1.
  • Migrate material and color styles to Material and Appearance library from Inventor 2013. For more information, click here.

• Migrate threads.xls and clearance.xls.

  • Method 1 (when many customizations exist ):

    • Use the old version Threads.xls and add new content into old version Threads.xls from new version Threads.xls.

  • Method 2 (when few customizations exist):

    • Use the new version Threads.xls and copy the customized content into the new version Thread.xls from old version Threads.xls

4. Migration wizards

• There are two Migration wizards under the Startup menu:

  • Use these wizards to migrate styles or resources.

• Key differences:

  • Drawing Resource Transfer wizard (.idw →. idw)‏

    • Move or replace borders/title blocks and symbols between drawings.
    • The only one of the three tools that is drawing specific.

  • Style Library Manager (.xml → .xml)‏

    • Not restricted to drawing styles (treats color and materials as well).‏
    • Moves drawing styles (.xml files) between Style libraries and also creates new style libraries.
    • Primarily used for migration purposes.

  • Limitations: Neither of these tools allows you to:

    • Replace a dimension style on existing dimensions in batch mode.
    • Swap a title block for a title block with a different name.