How to view a Microstation drawing

I've tried searching this newsgroup, but got lost in all the s01, dgw,
dgn, paper space expressions...

All I want is to have my architect send over the drawings of my new
house - she told me she works in Microstation, and I've downloaded and
installed Bentley View thinking she could just mail me the files and I
would be able to open and look at them...

Well, I asked her to mail them over (I asked her to send me the
drawings as dgn-files), but all I got was two *.s01-files, which I
understand has someting to do with "paper space" or something (I've
never used Microstation or Autocad myself, so I have no idea what this
actually is... sorry!).

I suspect that my architect is very good at architecture, but not so
qualified when it comes to computers...
What can I specifically tell her to do in order to have her send me
the correct files so I can open them in Bentley View?

Help is highly appreciated!

Regards,
Christopher

 

Ask her for the DGN file. For example: MyHouse.DGN

~Inga

 

You could ask her to tif the s01 file. She needs to select the tif.plt plot
file in her printer settings & hit print then email the file to you. What
you view the file with depends on your operating system. Win XP has a viewer
which you use by just clicking on the tif file in windows explorer.

 

And just to elaborate on what everyone else has said:-

Most software, like AutoCad, requires that the file extension is a known one
e.g. .dwg.
MicroStation has a default extension of .dgn but it can be anything, or even
no extension - It is clever enough to read the file content to see if it is
a valid MicroStation file.

AutoCad keeps the 'model' in a reserved 'space' called Model Space, and
provides multiple Tabs containing each layout. MicroStation V8 does a
similar thing. Prior to the current MicroStation (V8) it was usual to keep
the drawing border(s) in a sheet file(s) and 'attach' the actual drawing
'model' as a 'reference' file. For convenience these sheet files defaulted
to an extension of .s01, s02 etc.

If you have just been sent the sheet file you will probably just see a
drawing border. If you open the 'Reference' dialog from the 'File' menu you
should see at least one reference file attached. You should ask your
architect to send this / these files.

HTH

 

Inga,

I now specifically asked her to send me the dgn-files (not the
S01-files) and she then sent me the following files:

www.grenness.com/sheetsnitt.dgn (18kb)
www.grenness.com/sheetsnittbb.dgn (22kb)
www.grenness.com/sheetv_skjema.dgn (28kb)
www.grenness.com/plan.dgn (33kb)

(feel free to open them)

When I open them in Bentley View, all I get is a black screen
(canvas?) except for some notes written on one of the drawings.

What am I (or is she) doing wrong?

Regards,
Christopher

 

I don't see anything but a few textnotes either.

If you FILE>REFERENCE you'll see that there are som "references" missing. =
more dgn-files to get.

 

Not to solve your problem but I have got to ask why you have placed 100
borders into one file as cells. Is this the way Inroads does it? This kind
of problem is why I use a project Title and reference it so if I have to
change one thing I do it on the master file - once!

Dennis Barker
Innovision Technologies Pty Ltd
Sydney Australia

 

Hmmm...

Sorry, I seem to have replied to the wrong message. Must have been a very
late night!

Dennis Barker
Innovision Technologies Pty Ltd
Sydney Australia

 

Thanks, Thomas, I've asked her for the missing dgn-files - hopefully
this solves everything!

Thanks again,
Christopher