Provide capability within UI to change the type on a persisted wtDocument, EPMDocument or WTPart from one sub-type to another within the hard-type.

[JeffAngelo]

You should have the ability to change the type on WTDocuments, EPMDocuments and WTParts from:

• root hard-type to a sub-type
• sub-type to root hard-type
• sub-type to different sub-type (of the root hard-type)

For example, WTParts may be created initially using the "Part" hard-type. Later, the business determins that a new sub-type of WTPart (i.e. Electrical Part) is needed and the new sub-type is created. Some of the existing "Parts" need to be converted to "Electrical Parts". The UI should allow such a change. The user should have the option to apply the change to all iterations or limit the change to the latest iteration. Common attributes between the old and new type would be retained, non-common attributes would be lost (on the changed iterations only).

[GregoryPERASSO]

Agree !

[MichaelP.Hayek]

The ability to change object type to a sibling/child/parent type is on the Windchill roadmap at least to correct oops-es (i.e. inadvertant type selection at object creation time).  But the use case above seems to go beyond oops-es.  Couple of questions:

1. What if the Type to be changed to has a different LC template?
2. What if the object is in the middle of a Workflow and the new Type has a different WF template or even the same template?

[JeffAngelo]

1. If new Type has different LC template then provide a method in the UI to map states from old to new.

2. Possibly prevent Type change to objects while they are in the middle of a Workflow.

[PreetiGupta]

Totally agree, We have a command line utility which does that today. It would be nice if it is available out of the box,

[MikeLockwood]

Really good points on what if's above.  But - We have successfully used the home-grown tool that Preeti mentions for 5 years now on many thousands of documents with no issue.  We're only going from / to OTB WTDoc <> RefDoc.  Both have the same (basic) LC and Versioning, and no attributes.  Note: We have two subtypes of RefDoc that different LC, Versioning and have attributes, but these are not involved.

We didn't create this tool - we got from another admin. Happy to refer you to him if you like.

[bmr]

Hello Preeti

can you tell me what command line utility you use?

Thanks

[ToddSwartz]

Preeti, Mike, have yoiu come up with better answers on how to retype?

[khines]

I would also be interested in this feature.  Please provide the command line utility to us all.

Thank You,

Kitty

[BenPerry]

I see KITTY HINES‌ has just commented on this old idea.  I have voted down because of the existing method.  It should be hard to change the type because of all the factors that go into the decision.

FYI...Please refer to Re: Re-Type a Document (change soft-type)? discussion for more details on how to use the tool.

[ChrisPLM]

Hello

in addition to all those good comment, I would add that the UI would provide to do it for many objects at once.

However, if there are thousands of object concerns, I would prefer using a script to do the changes directly into the database rather than using the UI.

[dritter-3]

If there is a chance to receive a functionality "Change Subtype" as an OOTB functionality in future, it should also include a IBAs/attributes clean-up in case the attribute setup of the current subtype differs to the new subtype (e.g. if the new subtype does not have some attributes the values should be cleared...).