AUTODESK CIVIL 3D CAD MANAGER’S GUIDE
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SQL must be installed separately, regardless of whether the Vault is located on the local
workstation with Civil 3D or on a separate server. MSDE can be installed on the same
computer after installing and registering Autodesk Civil 3D as explained in the previous
sections.
Using Civil 3D and Vault
Vault and Civil 3D are integral to creating and managing Civil 3D projects. All the drawings
and related data for Civil 3D projects are managed and checked into the Vault located in a
specific directory on the server. Other team members can access the Vault and use this
data on their projects.
Without doubt, users are accustomed to accessing drawings using the Open command,
editing the drawings and drawing objects, and then using the Save and Save As
commands to store those edits. In addition, if your organization uses Land Desktop, you
also access project data from an external project database.
Using Civil 3D 2007 requires a fundamental shift in how users save and retrieve project
data, and in how and where data is saved. The most common method for working with
project data in Civil 3D is using Prospector to access Vault.
Logging into Vault: To create and manage projects and project data, you need to access
Vault. You can log into Vault locally if the server is installed on your machine, or from a
network server. Do this via the Prospector tab of the Toolspace in Civil 3D.
Creating New Projects: A project is a database directory that contains all the drawings
and related data for an engineering project. To set up a new project in Civil 3D, use the
Toolspace to first log in to the Vault, and then create the project.
Adding Project Data: Once you’ve created a project, you add data to it by first attaching
a drawing. At the time a drawing is attached to the project, you can also add the data
objects within the drawing. Adding drawings is done via the Prospector tab, which
launches a wizard to guide you through the process.
Working with Project Data: Working with project data involves checking drawings in and
out, and more.
• Check Out: If you want to open a drawing in a project and edit that drawing, you
need to check out that drawing. This step gives you write access to the drawing
and locks the drawing to prevent others from using it. It is important to note that
there is a process change here, in that you need to use the Check Out function
from the Prospector tab to properly open and edit a drawing file from a project.
Once you have done so, you can continue to work on that file with Civil 3D as
you always have.
To communicate the various states of the data, Civil 3D uses a set of icons.
These icons are shown in the following table:
