No Workspace/No Workset uses last workspace name and won't allow browsing

I am not able to reproduce this issue.
I redirected my configuration so its a custom location, select a workspace and workset - there is no "recents"listed as this is a clean start. I select the browse button and browse to a file in that workset and open it. I close the file and select no workspace and no workset (again no recents listed) I select the browse button and it allows me to browse and select a file. No error message. I closed MicroStation completely, and restarted it, then selected no workspace - no workset, and still no error.

Tim,

Do you have a folders setup for No Workspace and No Workset ?

To overcome this issue. I have to create a No_workset.cfg and point the project variables to a fake location i.e. H:/, just so I can use the browse option.

As DavidG mentioned.... WHY? Its function is not NOT link anything to a workset, so wjhy do we have to setup the links

Ian

Take a look at (but DON'T change) msconfig.cfg, try a search in the text for "nowork" just to find the right area...

Lines 301 to 306 define the place where NoWorkSpace/NoWorkSet.cfg lives.

In my test setup with drives P (= project data: WorkSpaces/Worksets) and W (= resources: Organization) I can reproduce the information message (note this is not an error message, it speaks the truth, MicroStation is looking for a file and it is not there!) by deleting the copy of NoWorkSpace/NoWorkSet.cfg I put there as described in Solution 1 below.

I offer two solutions:

Solution 1

The easiest: Copy NoWorkSpace/NoWorkSet.cfg to the place it's looking.

Solution 2

No one likes untidy folders so in C:\ProgramData\Bentley\CONNECT Edition\Configuration\WorkSpaceSetup.cfg which is where I assume redirection to your equivalents of P and W is being done add a variation of the if loop contained in msconfig.cfg, change the two instances of the variable _USTN_WORKSPACESROOT to _USTN_ORGANIZATION where indicated:

In my case this is:

# To hide the NoWorkSpace folder from the users

%if !defined (_USTN_WORKSETCFG) && exists ($(_USTN_ORGANIZATION)NoWorkSpace/NoWorkSet.cfg)

 _USTN_WORKSETCFG = $(_USTN_ORGANIZATION)NoWorkSpace/NoWorkSet.cfg

 _USTN_HAVEWORKSET = 0

%else

 _USTN_HAVEWORKSET = 1

%endif

Where I have already defined:

_USTN_ORGANIZATION = W:\MstnCONNECT\Organization\

Copy NoWorkSpace/NoWorkSet.cfg to the matching location

This can be anywhere you like (on your LAN!) as long as the location and the if statement match. You could change the folder name but if it is out of sight why bother, that will only obscure its purpose.

Unknown said:

but if it is out of sight why bother, that will only obscure its purpose.

What is obscure it why the file needs to exist at all.  Is its sole purpose appears to be so we don't get an error message?  

So far we've just gone in circles. It needs to exist because the program is looking for it.  Is that its whole reason for existence?  

MicroStation has always been designed to use project configurations. Open V8i without a PCF and you might well get errors depending on the configuration, generally in a text window.
MicroStation CONNECT edition is designed to use WorkSpaces and Worksets in the same spirit as V8i. This message is an informative one to tell you that the configuration file that has been designed to handle a user's choice to select No WorkSpace/No Workset is not in the location that it is expecting to find it. There are two solutions available at present, as described above.
The way this works may well be due for refinement, I have not checked for relevant SRs or Enhancement requests yet, just addressed the immediate question.
Is choosing No WorkSpace/No Workset likely to be a common user choice or is it just that this came up during testing?
If it is likely to be a common choice, why so?

Unknown said:

If it is likely to be a common choice, why so?

Why not? Even if

Unknown said:

MicroStation has always been designed to use project configurations

why shouldn't there be an invisible way to do without, to just fire up and get on - in a single user environment for example?

Unknown said:

If it is likely to be a common choice, why so?

Why not? Even if

Unknown said:

MicroStation has always been designed to use project configurations

why shouldn't there be an invisible way to do without, to just fire up and get on - in a single user environment for example?

As long as this tiny configuration file is in the expected place (or configured to be hidden away, if the presence of the 'NoWorkSpace' folder is unacceptable) the informative message will never be seen, so yes you can just fire it up and get on with it. If you don't want to engage with the Workset features that's fine.

Looking again at the content of C:\ProgramData\Bentley\CONNECT Edition\Configuration\WorkSpaces\NoWorkSpace\NoWorkSet.cfg it says at the top:

# Configuration File used for opening stand-alone DGN files that don't

# belong to a WorkSet.

# Set search paths to 'My Documents'

That is what this file is designed to do.

Why is it using 'My Documents'? Because that folder is always present so we know it will be found. We deliver a working testable configuration that is then amenable to change.

For anyone that does not want the search paths for No Workset to point to 'My Documents', the usefulness of the NoWorkSet.cfg file turns out to be that the network/standalone/'NAS box' copy of NoWorkSet.cfg can be edited to point to the desired location, e.g:

%if exists (C:/MySketches/)
  _USTN_WORKSETROOT = C:/MySketches/
%else
  _USTN_WORKSETROOT = $(HOMEDRIVE)$(HOMEPATH)/
%endif

So quite handy really.

Marc,

So I set up MS using this method of pointing to a workset.cfg.  It seemed to be working and eliminates the error message when browsing however I have a cell library that was inadvertently associated with a project.  I now see this when opening the file from "NoWorkspace/NoWorkset.

How do you unassociated a file from a Workspace/Workset? 

I searched MicroStation CONNECT help for "Workset". The second result down, "Including Files in the Active WorkSet" also tells us how to disassociate with a key-in, scroll down to the end of the page.

Thanks, I didn't think to look for the opposite of what I was trying to do.