Can "Send to Folder" action be disabled in Export Wizard via SDK?

Is there a way to disable the "Send to Folder" action in the Export Wizard dialog using the SDK? It's easy enough to disable the a command from a menu using the command ID and aaApi_EnableMenuCommand. I am looking for perhaps a similar way to disable (or better yet, remove) the Send to Folder option inside the Export Wizard. Otherwise I will likely have to grow my own version of the Export Wizard to suit our requirements - something I'd rather not do if there are easier options.

 Thanks.

Parents
  • It is odd you want to keep "Export to folder", but disable "Send to folder". Keep in mind, that when a master file is exported, its references are "sent to folder". The dialog was designed in such way, that export action may be not available. In this case it falls back to copy out action (the export action gets disabled). There would be an odd situation if both actions were disabled.

     There is no interface to disable the action in export wizard, but you may hook to AAHOOK_COPYOUT_DOCUMENT. But be aware, that it is quite common operation in PW. Open as readonly for example calls it. Once again, why do you want to disable it?

  • I'm aware of the issue regarding references essentially not being "managed" even when you do a managed Export. And believe me, if you worked where I work, you wouldn't find this request odd in the least.

    The reason I asked the question is because I was asked to look into it. We currently have completely disabled the Export command in PWE for all but Admin types, but we are getting a lot push back from users. Therefore we are trying to find a middle ground where we can at least force the export to be a "managed" export (even with exported references not being managed), as opposed to the free-for-all that the Send To Folder option currently is.

    I hadn't thought about a hook, but could I accomplish the same "effect" by hooking AAHOOK_DOCUMENT_EXPORT_WZRD? If so, how? I'm not seeing anything in the AADOCEXPWZRD_PARAM structure (I'm assuming it's structure is _AADOC_EXP_WZRD_PARAM) that could be used to differentiate the operation as check out vs a copy out.

    Or perhaps write our own Export function call to the Export dialog using aaApi_ExportDocumentDlg and passing the document command id of IDMD_CHECKOUT to the lExportCmd parameter?

    Please note that I post here on a voluntary basis and am not a Bentley employee. 

  • I complete understand this request.  We try to emphasize in our training over and over that Send To Folder is not a way to circumvent ProjectWise and make it a glorified file transfer system, but that it is intended for the occasional milestone snapshot that needs to be burned to dvd. Pointing out that it is very difficult to get the files back into projectwise helps some but I can definitely see the desire to be able to disable the function!

    Probably the most mis-used functions. We've had several calls at a deadline where someone was trying to get their files back into projectwise only to find the references weren't working, oh then when we did fix that they discover all the references they had originally was out of date.

    Some users don't even learn after shooting themselves in the foot like that and do it again.

     

     

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  • I complete understand this request.  We try to emphasize in our training over and over that Send To Folder is not a way to circumvent ProjectWise and make it a glorified file transfer system, but that it is intended for the occasional milestone snapshot that needs to be burned to dvd. Pointing out that it is very difficult to get the files back into projectwise helps some but I can definitely see the desire to be able to disable the function!

    Probably the most mis-used functions. We've had several calls at a deadline where someone was trying to get their files back into projectwise only to find the references weren't working, oh then when we did fix that they discover all the references they had originally was out of date.

    Some users don't even learn after shooting themselves in the foot like that and do it again.

     

     

Children
  • Kevin van Haaren:

    I complete understand this request.  We try to emphasize in our training over and over that Send To Folder is not a way to circumvent ProjectWise and make it a glorified file transfer system, but that it is intended for the occasional milestone snapshot that needs to be burned to dvd. Pointing out that it is very difficult to get the files back into projectwise helps some but I can definitely see the desire to be able to disable the function!

    Probably the most mis-used functions. We've had several calls at a deadline where someone was trying to get their files back into projectwise only to find the references weren't working, oh then when we did fix that they discover all the references they had originally was out of date.

    Some users don't even learn after shooting themselves in the foot like that and do it again.

    Exactly. I could go on and on about how much this command has been abused here. We opted to take on the issue by disabling it in PWE, hiding the local working directory, and combined with captive environment we have pretty much locked things down about as hard as we can to prevent the kind of non-sense we were seeing. Of course, now we're having to justify actions to management, etc. Which is what led to my post. We may end up writing a custom Export command, but for now, I at least have the answer I need to give back to management.

    Please note that I post here on a voluntary basis and am not a Bentley employee. 

  • I am beginning to feel this pain as well.  Users get pretty creative when they want to be...
  • You can use the advanced menu example in the SDK to create a custom menu and hide normal menu functions.  You can use the SDK  to also create custom functionality and make it accessible from the custom menu. The example is in C:\Program Files\Bentley\ProjectWise\SDK\samples\mymenu

     

     

  • We have had discussions with B. while using Version 2004 about entirely disabling/grey out the Export command for a Common User while still allowing Admins to have it to perform their tasks. At the time, some custom solution was discussed, and that of course would cost us $$$... so it went nowhere, opened a CR instead...

    The ability of a User to extract an entire Project from the PW system to any Windows folder of choice is, IMHO,  a security risk that is entirely unnecessary.

  • I assume you are saying that a non-admin user is a security risk.  We have on occasion pulled an entire project and put it in a different datasource. I wish it would have taken less effort than it did, but not being able to Send To Folder the tree would have made the transfer much harder.  So it has been my experince that it is needed at times but for Administrative use.