Autodesk Suites 2013: Deployment path can easily exceed 256 [260] characters

When creating a deployment for your Suite, please try to keep the deployment path as short as possible or you may get an Error 2350 - FDI server error.

The number of characters in the a sub-component of the Suite past the AdminImage can be quite long and you may not notice this problem until you create the deployment.  Here is a sample path of a file in Autodesk Infrastructure Modeler 2012 Premium:

\\fl1\shared\Apps\Programs\Autodesk Infrastructure Modeler 2013\AdminImage\x64\Components\ESM\Program Files 64\Autodesk\Essential_Skills_Movies\3dsMax_Design_2013\de-DE\html\essential_skills_movies\design\resources\images\
esm_design_2_create_objects_36x36.png

The number of characters starting at AdminImage is 196 characters and the Windows character  limit is 260 characters.  About 75% of the path is taken up by the Suite.

Some additional reference posts:

http://upandready.typepad.com/up_and_ready/2011/05/error-1603-and-1304-during-deployment-creation-revit-architecture-error-1304error-writing-to-file.html

http://upandready.typepad.com/up_and_ready/2011/09/windows-the-cautodesk-folder.html

At this time, the development team is aware of this issue and I would like to thank to Rusty Gesner for sharing this tip with the community.

Comments

[David Harrington]

Interestingly enough I had this problem just today. The path that failed:

\\tpa-mail\installs\autodesk\Infrastructure Modeler 2013\64bit\

So I started cutting, and this worked
\\tpa-mail\installs\autodesk\Infrastructure Modeler 2013

So the character count up to that level should provide enough insight as to what can work.

[David Lau]

Thanks for sharing your comment with the community!

[Olivier]

I had also this problem for all my 2013 deployments....

I've shorten as much as I'm allowed to on our servers but it still hanged up after the 6h taken by our Duilding design suite deployment !

I do not understand
_why the BDS installer cannot count how many characters are needed for the longest file name and tel us that the path will be too long or how many character remains BEFORE starting the deployment (and not cancel everything after 6h lost !!!)
_Why guys responsibles of the deployment or the file naming are using such long directories and file names !!!! the here above filename "esm_design_3_import_manage_object_36x36.png" takes already 43 chars and fails the 6h install process for an icon !!!

I hope it will be resolved ASAP...

I know I can use Ant Renamer to batch-shorten some words but I suppose that the deployment will not work any more ?

[David Lau]

Thanks for your comments, the development team is aware of the issue. Do not shorten the path using batch utilities, it could break the deployments.