Using Creo Illustrate connected with Windchill PDMLink

[rsoukup]

We have a group within our organization that has been starting to dabble a in Creo Illustrate over the past few weeks, and we are having issues getting files to import from Windchill PDMLink.  To start off, we are on Creo 4.0 M060, Windchill 11.0 M030 CPS11, and Creo Illustrate 4.2 in place for our organization at the time.

What we are finding is that if designers (those with access to the CAD documents) are working with Creo Illustrate WITHOUT being connected to Windchill, we can export the files from Creo, and import into Creo Illustrate with no issue.  Those designers can also send those files to our Technical Writing team (no direct access to CAD documents), and the Tech Writers can import those files into Illustrate without issue.

We begin to experience issues when we connect to Windchill.  We are not able to import our CAD documents into Illustrate when connected.  We get the file structure, but no viewables whatsoever.

What we are wondering, is there a best-practices guide or recommendation on how to use Illustrate in a Windchill Connected Environment?  Should we be trying to import the CAD documents, or should we be having our publishers publishing and storing .pvz files from the CAD documents and then using and managing THOSE .pvz's in Windchill?  Ideally, it would be nice to have the Illustrate files following the versions in Windchill similar to the CAD data, but we are unsure how to get started.

Just reaching out to see if anyone has any more experience in this area that would be willing to share what they find to be useful.  

[ClayHelberg]

This can be a little confusing, but you are on the right track: when you access CAD information in Windchill from Creo Illustrate, it will only let you use a PVZ version of the CAD, not the original engineering CAD objects. This is intentional, to prevent any potential changes to engineering data from the tech pubs side.

You can configure your Windchill publishing rules to automatically generate the necessary PVZ objects (saved as Graphic Dynamic Documents, a subtype of EPMDocument). Once the publishing rule is set up, you will get a new GDD object (PVZ file) every time a CAD document is created, and when a CAD object is updated, the corresponding GDD will also be updated. This preserves referential integrity, so that you will get a notification when you open your c3di file if the source PVZ/GDD has changed since the last time you edited the illustration.

[rhudd]

Hi @ClayHelberg 

Could you advise me how to create a GDD (PVZ file) which is linked to a CAD file in Windchill. I only need this for one CAD file so I don't want to set-up a publishing rule.

[ClayHelberg]

In theory, it should be possible, but a lot depends on how your Windchill server is set up.

The process would be something along these lines:

* Upload the locally generated PVZ file as a new Windchill object (type will depend on WC configuration)

* Select the newly created Windchill object, and from the Action menu select "Edit Associations"

* Add an association to the desired CAD object or WTPart if you are using them

You may need to consult with your Windchill administrator to work out the right object types and permissions to make this work.

[ClayHelberg]

An additional note: you may need to create a new Windchill soft type for this, and it should be added as a subtype of EPM Document-> Dynamic Document.