Mandatory Antivirus, Backup, & Other Third-Party Exclusions

Not version-specific

Tekla PowerFab Tekla PowerFab GO

To guarantee the stability of Tekla PowerFab and especially the Tekla PowerFab Remote Server Service, specific directories and processes must be strictly isolated from third-party monitoring. Antivirus, EDR, backup, and other third-party monitoring solutions may intercept file operations; without the mandatory exclusions detailed below, this interference may result in performance degradation, including, but not limited to, file locking, API timeouts, and Remote Server crashes.

Directory Exclusions (File System)

Configure your Antivirus, EDR, and Backup software to ignore the following directories and subdirectories completely. This includes "Real-Time Scanning," "Scheduled Scanning," and "Behavior Monitoring."

Component	Default Path (Verify on your specific install)	Reason
MySQL Data	`C:\mysql`	Critical. AV scanning here could cause database latency and corruption.
Application	`C:\Program Files\Tekla\Tekla PowerFab`	Prevents AV from quarantining certain files.
Public Data	`C:\Users\Public\Documents\Tekla`	High-frequency I/O location for temporary reports, logs and communication during backups and restores.

Process Exclusions

Modern EDRs (CrowdStrike, SentinelOne, Defender for Endpoint) inspect processes even if the folder is excluded. You should whitelist the following executables to prevent them from being hooked or throttled. Some examples are included below, but you should include anything that begins with "Tekla.EPM*", "Tekla.PowerFab*", and "FabSuite*"

mysqld.exe (The Database Engine)
Tekla.PowerFab.Remote.Server.exe (The Remote Server Service)
Tekla.PowerFab.exe (The Client Application)

Make absolutely sure that you are not reading and writing to the MySQL installation folders, especially with backups. We have a native backup solution, and this is the only way the PowerFab database should be backed up. For more information, see Save a backup copy of the Tekla PowerFab database.