From the release of Bentley View 2023 onwards, Side-by-Side installation will be supported for Major Releases. Minor Release updates will upgrade a Major Release and a Major release and Minor Release will not be able to sit Side by Side. Users will have the ability to run multiple major releases Bentley View on the same machine. Installation of Bentley View 2023 and onwards will by default occur alongside any previous installations. Removing previous versions of Bentley View will require a manual uninstall. Please read The application version naming FAQ for more information on major and minor releases.

If you wish Bentley View 2023 to work with the same configuration as Bentley View CONNECT Edition, then you must review and complete the following tasks during and after the installation process to share the configuration among two Bentley View versions.

Set the default Delivered Configuration directory during Installation

During the installation of Bentley View 2023, you must define the same directory path as the Delivered Configuration directory of Bentley View CONNECT Edition. The default Delivered Configuration directory path is "C:\ProgramData\Bentley\Bentley View 2023\". Change this directory path to "C:\ProgramData\Bentley\Bentley View CONNECT Edition\" as shown in the following images:

Note: While installing Bentley View CONNECT Edition, if you installed the Delivered Configuration to the custom directory (Other than "Bentley View CONNECT Edition" directory) then you must select the same custom directory while installing Bentley View 2023.

Set Custom Configuration directory during Installation

During the installation of Bentley View 2023, if you wish to share your existing Custom Configuration, then you must set the same directory path of the Custom Configuration directory of Bentley View CONNECT Edition. Bentley View CONNECT Edition Custom Configuration directory is "D:\Bentley\WS". You should browse the same directory during Bentley View 2023 installation.

Note: MicroStation Configurations are not version dependent. Bentley tries to minimize any disruptions to Configurations, however in some Open products there may be instances where some configuration changes take place. Please refer to the release documents of those products.

Copy and Paste the "prefs" folder after Installation

If you wish to use Preferences and User Configuration from the previous version, then after installation, launch Bentley View 2023 and close the session to set the default preferences at "C:\Users\<user.name>\AppData\Local\Bentley\Bentley View\23.0.0" directory.

Now copy the "prefs" directory from "C:\Users\ASN\AppData\Local\Bentley\Bentley View\10.0.0" and paste at "C:\Users\ASN\AppData\Local\Bentley\Bentley View\23.0.0" to replace the existing "prefs" directory.

Bentley View 2023 should work seamlessly with the existing configurations. This configuration will be shared between Bentley View CONNECT Edition and Bentley View 2023 versions.

Note: You must follow step 3, every time if there is any change in preference settings in Bentley View CONNECT Edition which you wish to use in Bentley View 2023.