WFH - Performance issues working remotely connecting via VPN

I am currently working remotely connecting via VPN. MicroStation takes over 10 min to load a small file and several min to execute any command. what options or procedures can I follow to improve the performance. (i have high speed internet connection).

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  • Check the following link which has some suggestions.

    5 Factors That Affect Your VPN Performance Explained

    Wireshark is a good tool your IT/Network administrator can use to troubleshoot network issues.

       

  • I have been advised that CONNNECTION client slows down broadband speed which is not good when working from home.

  • Help desk department. according to them the problem is the CAD profile. they are saying the profile is creating a shared folder on the network

    Do they mean your Windows account profile? What is the name of that shared folder?  What files can you see there?

    Alternatively, it could be your MicroStation user preference folder.  MicroStation keeps its user preference file (*.upf) usually in a Windows local folder, but with a VPN that could be on the server.

     
    Regards, Jon Summers
    LA Solutions

  • i believe they are talking about the upf file. i went through  a procedure to move the user files to a local folder. but that didnt fix the issue. 

  • Within our organization we have found that MicroStation is too clunky and slow to respond for volume production CAD personnel.  Specific points of pain include attaching cell libraries with more than 100 cells (larger the library slower the response), batch plotting using any resources on the office network from home, and initially opening MicroStation.  To a lesser degree simple tasks like changing active color, lineweight or linestyle will take a few seconds instead of instant.  Just a couple seconds here and there for volume CAD production people add hours to their workload.  I have had to copy resource files local and create a duplicate set of config files to create temporary "sandbox" environments for those people to use from home, and created some VBA macros that they can launch daily to copy updates off the server to update their local setups.

    Occasional users struggle with the remote working performance but CAD work is not a significant percentage of their daily workload so it is merely a nuisance rather than a real problem.  The software is still fully functional, just not as responsive as they are used to.  This lag is still vastly superior to remote desktop due to the choppy mouse movement that plagues RDP and screen sharing applications.

    I'm not sure if this information helps or not but it is my experience setting up a few hundred office personnel to work productively from home indefinitely.  A few side notes . . . we have two different VPN options and neither of them make a difference in remote connection speed.  The problems with laggy software performance are identical on either one.  Also, our organization is also in the middle of switching away from an MLPS style network.  The office still on the old network have ALL external traffic (yes, that means remote workers as well) through the firewall at the main office in PA.  So our Kansas and Nebraska employees trying to change linestyles have their traffic routed from their house, through PA, then back to their local office, then back through PA before heading to their home.  Upgraded offices like those in Colorado and California communicate directly from their home to the local office and back.  The latter have far fewer problems than the older configured offices.  Not an issue with MicroStation directly but a couple other considerations that aggravate the issue beyond our control.

  • You would need to change the configuration where MicroStation is looking for the .upf file also.  MS_USERPREF is the variable you are looking for.  Depending on what level of config file it is set at you will need to redirect it to the new location if you want test that as part of the issue.

  • Thanks Ian, I will pass this information to our Help Desk folks. 

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