Multi-Language drawings in Productview - How to?

[AlejandroSamped]

Hello,

I would need advice regarding a requirement that I have for CAD drawings using Pro/E WF4 and Productview 9.1.

It is regarding what we call "Multi-Language drawings". For our manufacturing plants, we need to create manufacturing drawings on which we can switch between different languages for the annotations within these drawings themselves (in ONE drw only); and most importantly, that we can switch between the different languages in ProductView to get the drawing as needed for anyone out on the floor.

On the Pro/E environment, we have been doing this using different "layers" which contain the different languages. However, this doesn't work in ProductView 9.1, which doesn't support the switching between layers that have been created in Pro/E. Also, if we used sheets with the same file name, that could create problems when updating one of the sheets, so that one sheet is updated, but the other which is written in the other language is not updated.

On another note and less importantly, do you know if Creo View provides this functionality?

I would really appreciate your comments,

Thanks, Best Regards,

Alex Sampedro.

[AlejandroSamped]

Hello,

We are still facing this challenge, and I notice that many colleagues are entering this topic, it has many views. Would it be possible to have a reply? From PTC maybe?

Thank you very much,

Alex Sampedro.

[ChrisPLM]

Hello

have you tried to use layers ?

You could have a layer per language. ProductView recognizes layers and you can turn them on and off.

[AlejandroSamped]

Hello,

Yes, I have tried layers and no, it is not a satisfactory solution. First of all, not all viewable formats recognise the Pro/E layers. For example, HPGL. Secondly, for the viewable formats that can "read" the layers which are present in a Pro/E drawing, the information contained in those layers is wrong. Meaning that language layers in the Pro/E drawing work well (the notes are corresponding correctly to the layers, you can hide/unhide), but when you activate/deactivate those layers in ProductView, the notes are not associated in exactly the same way. For example, there are notes that will not disappear from the viewable and will overlap each other.

I have tried different configurations of the "Worker" too, it does not work, the content of the Pro/E layers will not propagate correctly into the ProductView layers. The layers are there, the name is the same, but its content is wrong.

Therefore my conclussion was that we cannot use layers to achieve the goal of Multilanguage.

[gkoch]

This is not my area of expertise, but when you say "The layers are there, the name is the same, but its content is wrong.", have you opened a case with PTC Technical Support for this?

At least you should get an explanation why this happens, for examples rules or exceptions that have to be taken into account when using layers.

[AlejandroSamped]

Yes:

https://www.ptc.com/apps/case_logger_viewer/auth/ssl/case=11250397

The conclusions that we reached with the PTC visualization expert Jürgen Husemann were, quote:

"The required additional DXF functionality of the Creo View Client is only available in the

Creo View Client MCAD.

The Lite version does not have the required license for the "load frozen layers" function.

Creo View Lite will not retrieve the content of the user-defined layers created in Creo Parametric 2.0."

In Productview it was impossible to get this working, so then I tested Creo View. Some months from now, we are planning to use the Lite version, which has options that make the user think that the layers are going to be shown correctly. Indeed, it shows the layers, but then the content overlaps, as I explained before...

However, only the more costly version of Creo View, Creo View MCAD, has the key option that propagates correctly the information from Pro/E layers to viewable layers ("load frozen layers"). We have another setback, which is that we would not like to change the viewable format from HPGL to DXF.

Therefore, at this moment we are trying to find alternatives to achieve the high level goal, which is to create Multi-Language drawings for people that don't use Pro/E. Using layers will not work for us. How do other companies create Multi-language drawings for the people on the shop floor? I'm sure that we cannot be the only one with this problem...

We do not like the sheet approach since this is too risky, the user can forget to update details in the other sheet.

[ChrisPLM]

Hi,

I am not authorized to view the link you provided, but that is fine.

Obviously, you have spent a lot of time and effort trying to find the solution. It seems that there is one but you need to buy additional licence. This is obviously not what customers want to hear for basic functionalities (this remind me cross section not been capped on ProductView 9.1 Lite (possible on the pay version) but now this is available in Creo View Lite....)

I am sure you already looked at all possibilities but since it is not mentioned, I thought it is worse asking.

You are always refering to HPGL or DXF format. Why do you need those format. I understand you use Creo View to view those representations. As you know Creo View can read other file formats. Have you tried plt or pdf ?

We use layers and I really do not understand why you can't make it work.

As for your last question. We are an international company. Our drawings do not generally contains many notes (we are trying to move as much text as possible our of the drawings. we used to put text that actually belongs in the ERP routings/process plan). So we have English as common language and sites can add their local language if they want to. Therefore the text and translation can be all in one language. This works because we do not have a lot of text.

Our biggest problem is actually elsewhere. Trying to make people understand what 3D is about rather than sticking to the old way of thinking in 2D but that is a completely different topic.

I wish you all best luck to find a suitable solution. Maybe in the next version of Creo View will have what you need free of charge.

Best regards