Autodesk Desktop Connector – Invalid File or Folder Names!

by Dennis Collin

Recently I had a conversation with a customer who was receiving an alert message about the invalid folder or file names from their Desktop Connector (DC). Other symptoms include certain files and/or folders can be seen in the web view of ACC in the browser but do not appear within the Connector environment.

Fig 1, Names with leading or trailing spaces alert.

When looking at the impacted files, a list of folders display with the problem where names of the folders contain a trailing space which means they will not be visible on the Desktop system, although they do exist and can be accessed within the cloud.

Fig 2. Filename alert log being displayed.

To fix the problem shut down the Autodesk Desktop Connector.

• Locate and delete the affected local desktop connector folders (described in log file in Fig 2.).
• Access the folder on ACC or BIM360 and remove the offending trailing or leading space.
• Restart the Desktop Connector and if necessary, sign in.

Local copies of the affected project folder will be recreated and take their properties from the cloud location.

The error message should not appear and Desktop Connector will report a no issues status.

Fig 3. All’s well with the world, DC up to date and no reported issues.