Managing your Windchill

I've been implementing Windchill for smaller deploymentsfor a long time and agree with all these statements. That is why I wrote my course: "Applied Windchill 10.0 System Administration". It is a hands-on approach to system administration that really helps new system administrators get past the initial learning curve. It captures step-by-step instructions for installing Windchill and implementing many of the undocumented and lightly documented tips and tricks like named Windchill processes, Windchill launch/shut down/clear cache commands, and configuring system notifications for specific Windchill errors. Students troubleshoot basic server failures and perform preventative system and client configuration to prevent known issues from occurring.

This course really helps new administrators get past the learning curve and greatly improves on-site administrators' confidence in taking over a Windchill system implemented by a reseller or PTC. I found even experienced administrators pick up some new information from the applied course. It really is a necessity for PTC customers who want to do it themselves. I've seen many DIY jobs and they always miss a few production quality implementation and maintenance configuration steps (primarily because of a lack of or overwhelming documentation). These systems run but they could run better and with less manual maintenance.

It can't cover everything related to system administration in three days but it covers the most common configuration, monitoring, and maintenance tasks. I posted a message to the network forum describing Applied Windchill 10.0 System Administration training, complete with syllabus if anyone is interested.

Kind Regards,

Matt Meadows

Solutions Architect
VIRSO Inc
O: 618 937 8115
C: 314 749 8377
E: mmeadows@virsoinc.com

Great.

I feel all warm and fuzzy about Implementing Windchill 10 here in April. I will be the System and Business Administrator, but the install will be done by Tristar.

I would love to learn the install process to support ourselves down the road, but it sounds like it will take a lot of time and practice to pull it off.

Thanks for the great information on this everyone.

"Too many people walk around like Clark Kent, because they don't realize they can Fly like Superman"

As the leader for Windchill Publications, I’m grateful for your feedback and committed to improving our documentation to better meet your needs.

In regard to this thread, Jeff Zemsky and I hosted a session at the Technical Committee meetings held in Needham this January in order to discuss process flows that could be included in a “quick reference” for Windchill administrators; as Mike proposed, that quick reference guide would then link to more detailed information in the Windchill Help Center. We are planning to survey attendees in order to set priorities among the list of business and system administration process flows they identified for inclusion in the guide.

During the session, we had a wide-ranging discussion of administrator documentation, and Jeff and I left with a list of action items that include ongoing TC activities, including a request to return with more information about our roadmap for Windchill documentation and the Windchill Help Center.

In Reply to Mike Lockwood:

Appreciate the good press below… ☺

We’ve been fortunate in that our management has supported (for 10+ years now) being a bit patient while we’ve been able to “come up to speed” on each area in turn, and has supported having an excellent admin team with a lot of freedom to act. Also though, we’ve invested pretty much all hours that otherwise would constitute a real life studying manuals and guides / playing the system, etc. to get to this point. Feels like “the Big Bang Theory” at my house my wife says.

My requests to PTC continue to be:

A)

- Fully document the simplest possible cases* with the most common hardware, OS, configurations, etc.

- Prove these out fully by having several people try to use it; edit and clarify as needed

- Then and only then, come back and add pointers to all the possible additional complexities, branches, what-if’s, etc., and put these in various addendums, appendixes, TPI’s, etc, etc.


B) Do above assuming that the customer will need to create an actual step-by-step procedure; provide an editable (e.g. MS Word) example, for the user to save-as and then edit. Yes, this pretty much cuts out the high $ consultants, but it’s the right thing to do if there is a commitment to support the DIY’ers.

* For example:

- Install Windchill 9.1 M050 with Oracle 11g on a two-machine system with Oracle on the 1st machine, PDMLink only. This entire procedure is about 1 ½ pages.

- Install Windchill 10.0 M020 with Oracle 11g on a laptop, PDMLink only. This entire procedure is also about 1 ½ pages.

- Conduct a test upgrade from the 9.1 system listed above (with total data consisting of one Document, no configurations, no customizations) to the 10.0 system listed above. This entire procedure is about 3 pages. We did exactly this to start prep for Windchill 10.

The info is truly scattered over many separate places, and ~95% of it has to do with all the special cases and possible complexities. The hardest part by far is pulling out the core info to do the primary tasks. Our only chance of success to date has been to laboriously collect all the pieces back into one place each time, then create a new document from scratch, starting always with the simplest possible procedure, then gradually building from there one step at a time. All of us went thru school doing exactly this, right? It works.

Note: We’re working closely with PTC on upgrading to 10 now; lots of good results from this effort, truly a success story in the making.

I have one question to add to Mark's original set of questions.

When defining a Statement of Work with a VAR, do you recommend going with a fixed rate cost or an hourly rate and what are your reasons for choosing one over the other?

I am new to Windchill and have not been through the training for Business Admin. or System Admin.

PTC claims that Windchill 10 is easy to use and administer.

Is this true?

"Too many people walk around like Clark Kent, because they don't realize they can Fly like Superman"

Thanks for the great response Ben.

I guess I just have to dive in and see what happens. I am starting off with Windchill 10 and I don't know if this would be an advantage or disadvantage for me since I have nothing to compare it too.

In Reply to Ben Loosli:

Easy is always a relative term. 🙂

What are you (or PTC) comparing WC 10 against?

It is easier to use than WC9.x.
It is harder to use than Intralink3.x.

It may be a little easier to administer than WC9.x.
It is a lot harder to administer than Intralink3.x.

It is still complex and hard to initially configure.
It is a whole magnitude harder to configure than Intralink3.x.
The install process is a lot easier than it was for WC7 and somewhat easier than WC9.x.

Your mileage may vary, but WC is not in the economy class.


Thank you,

Ben H. Loosli
USEC, INC.