Inventor 101 – Why does it take so bleeping long?

Are you tired of getting errors upon opening or editing files in Inventor? Do these same files take a long time to load? Chances are that those errors are blown/orphaned constraints. These will typically happen when you remove/delete a feature or greatly modify a component to the point the existing constraint can’t automatically repair itself.

A little background on why a blown constraint can cause a delay in the opening of the file: When in the process of opening a file, Inventor is scanning and applying the constraints as designed by the user. When a constraint goes corrupt or as I refer to it, “blown” due to a major redesign that, for example, removed the edge the blown constraint was originally tied to. During the opening process Inventor is feverishly working in the background using every means it has, to automatically repair that constraint. If one process fails, it moves to the next and repeats this for every blown constraint.

With that in mind, let’s say your file has 50 blown constraints and it takes Inventor 1 minute to attempt each of its tricks to repair said blown constraint, that’s 50 minutes you’re waiting for the file to attempt to repair those blown constraints. That’s 50 minutes for which you may not have gained anything, and you’ll still need to manually repair those constraints.

Sure, you can kick the can down the road and let the next person worry about it, well, that next person may very well end up being you and as luck would have it, it’ll always happen when you don’t have the time. So fix these when you see them.

Another thing to keep in mind, at some point, ignoring these errors will prevent the file from opening altogether. Once that happens, you’re out of luck unless IT can load an old backup version of the file (here’s where Autodesk Vault could help as well).

If and when you attempt to repair these blown constraints, open Design Doctor and go through the steps one by one. Don’t be shocked if you see 50 or 100 or more of these blown constraints. Chances are, a good portion are tied to other constrained items, and fixing one, will cascade down to those others.

For example: I ran across a file that had just over 100 errors like this. But correcting the 1st one, knocked off a rather large chunk of them, the 2nd knocked off a few more and with only the 3rd constraint repaired, all 100+ errors were cleared. Took all of maybe 10 minutes if that.

Now, granted, this will not be the case every time, but you will see this happen. Plus, you’ll gain the added effect of the file opening much faster due to Inventor no longer attempting to fix those errors for you on the Open command, which is why you’re still reading this, right? You are still reading this I hope.

The general rule of thumb is: When you see the red cross in the Quick Access Tool Bar, open Design Doctor and fix those errors.

One last tidbit to this post as a bonus and a teaser for my next blog post:

If and when a file is acting weird all of a sudden, run it through the Inventor Task Scheduler’s migration task.

Why, you ask? Yes, you did, I heard you, you asked, don’t deny it. Well, if I tell you here, it ruins the surprise for my next blog post, Inventor 101 – Knock Knock Knock, “Housekeeping!”