Windchill Systems/Software Engineering Ideas

1. What product and version are you running? Windchill RV&S 12.5 2. What is the problem? When creating/editing a query it is not possible to switch between AND/OR operation, therefore it is necessary to delete the whole filter-block and create a new one. 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. No practical workaround known. 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. When creating/editing a query it is often necessary to switch between AND/OR operation. To avoid extra work, it would be helpful to just use a "Toggle" button to switch between AND/OR.   5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) This problem leads to extra work, as all already added filters have to be removed to be able to create the correct query with the necessary filters. With the help of a "Toggle"-button, this could be solved with one click. ... View more

1. What product and version are you running? SOLIDWORKS 2022 SP5, WWGM Version 13.0.0.1 2. What is the problem? It isn't possible to customize the PTC Windchill UI permanently in SOLIDWORKS That means: - Hide / Show PTC Windchill Toolbar in part / assembly / drawing - Delete any windchill functionality from PTC Windchill Toolbar - Hide PTC Windchill command manager tab in part / assembly / drawing   If you make any UI - PTC windchill customization in SOLIDWORKS the changes (HKCU/SOFTWARE/SOLIDWORKS/SOLIDWORKS 2022 / User Unterface) are set automatically to the initial values when SOLIDWORKS is closed and restarted. The reset to the initally values occurs when the PTC Windchill Addin is activated.   3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. No workaround is available. The customization has to been done every time you start SOLIDWORKS again 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. The user shouldn't  use "Create new CAD-Document" from the PTC Windchill Toolbar cause a incorrect CAD-Object is created. To avoid issues the command "Create new CAD-Document" has to remove permanently from PTC WINDCHILL toolbar. The issue only exists with the PTC Windchill Addin, all other Addins we are usinf aren't affected . 5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) More than 1500 users are affected . ... View more

1. What product and version are you running? Windchill RV&S 12.5 2. What is the problem? The Textfilter of "where"-filter does not work correctly for large documents. For example a user wants to filter for all content items containing a specific word. In some cases a few contents are missing in the result list. In other cases, no results are displayed when there should be results. For example, searching for "shall" in a standards document (containing about 700 contents) will not return any results -> 390 items should be displayed. Searching for "temperature" in the same document returns 5 results instead of 8.   Because of the problem described, it is also not possible to create an Advanced Filter with all necessary filters, as the "Text"filter is not working correctly. Accordingly, the "Perspective" cannot be shared (as the "Show items containing" filter is not taken into account).   The fact that the issue described above leads to many other problems does not need to be mentioned again. 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. Using the "Show items containing"-filter is currently the only known workaround and leads to severe limitations and other problems (such as those listed above). 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. Filtering documents or searching for individual terms is part of the daily routine. It is used and needed on a regular basis. 5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) This problem leads to many hours of extra work, as all the documents have to be checked requirement by requirement to ensure that no item is overlooked. ... View more

Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. 1. What product and version are you running? Windchill PDMLink 12.0.2.13 2. What is the problem? Setting the effectivity date is not user-friendly and requires many (15) clicks. 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. Today we have created a customization. In Change task we add "Initial Effectivity Date" attribute. This is automatic todays date as value. This date will be set as effectivity date (Exact) with open end date. The user can change it if they need a different effectivity date for all resulting objects. - Whenever you add new parts to an already created CN or CR, you have to set an effective date for them, because it is automatically set only at the time of creation. 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. Setting the effectivity date is very time-consuming. We always use the effectivity qualifier "Exact", so this should be the default value. In most cases we need to set today's date exactly, so also this date should be set automatically - the user should change it only when it should be different from today, instead of setting it every time. 5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) This situation affects to all users who create and modify parts in Windchill (the number of users is growing all the time) - it is a waste of time for unnecessary clicks, feeling that the system is underdeveloped - from the user's perspective it's amazing that the process is so long.   Suggestion for new solution: Add preference "Default Effectivity qualifier". The effectivity qualifier will automatic be set to Exact. This will save the user for 6 clicks   Add Preference "Default effectivity range from today" By setting this 0 the default effectivity date will be set for todays date. By setting it to 1 the default effectivity date will be set for tomorrow. If set to blankt no effectivity date will be added by default. This will save the users for 8 clicks.   Add attribute "Initial effectivity date" to Change task. This will be the date calculated from "Default effectivity range from today" and will automatic be set to all objects with dosen't already have effectivity date set. example   User can set the effectivity date to a different value if they need a different date. Ether by changing "Initial effectivity date" or set effectivity date for single objects.   The Initial effectivity date should be automatic added to all resulting objects with empty effectivity date when user click "Finish" on the change Task. ... View more

Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. 1. What product and version are you running? Windchill PDMLink 12.0.2.13 2. What is the problem? In BOM Transformer, the user in "Manage Filters" does not have the option to set the chosen filter as the default: In the structure view in the browser, when "Manage Filters" is selected, the user can quickly and easily choose which filter should be the default:   - this is very helpful for users working with many different views, so it would be a big improvement if the user could set this in BOM Transformer just as easily. 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. Currently in BOM Transformer, the default filter is managed by user preferences, but this solution is not user-friendly:    next   The user needs to know that he/she should go to: Associativity - Filter - Downstream - Saved Filter Name and enter the exact name of the saved filter.   The change is not simple or intuitive. 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. Setting and each change of the default filter in BOM Transformer is time-consuming and not very intuitive. For a user who needs to change the default filter at longer intervals, it is problematic and creates the possibility of accidentally changing other settings when the desired update is made. 5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) This situation affects users working with more than one view, (the number of users is growing all the time) - it is a waste of time for unnecessary clicking and the possibility of accidentally changing other settings when trying to update. The Idea is related to this article - Article - CS401082  ... View more

Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. 1. What product and version are you running? Windchill PDMLink 12.0.2.13 2. What is the problem? Working with BOM transformation in BOM Transformer. After copying the parts on the upstream side and pasting them into the downstream side, their order in the structure is randomized: This makes the work of creating the structure more difficult and creates the possibility of mistakes when the structure is built from many similar elements. After each operation of pasting or adding a part to the structure, the order of the sub-elements should be sorted according to the line number column, so that the structure is readable and the user does not have to check where the just added part is located.   This is when view definition contains sorting order by Line Number. See Article - CS402468 - While Sorting Parts by Line Number in BOM Transformer not working as expected in Windchill PDMLink (ptc.com)   Solution could be to add preference "BOM Transformer - Automatic refresh"  for automatic refresh after paste/add/remove/replace parts in BOM Transformer. This automatic refresh should not show popup to "Adjust Expansion Criteria". 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. After copy/paste, when the parts are arranged randomly , using the "refresh" button sorts the structure correctly, unfortunately, with the next copy/paste the problem of random arrangement of parts returns, so with the current functionality of the program after each copy/paste operation the user should perform a refresh.   We are working with many different views. Using refresh we get popup: User must select No to keep the current filter. If selecting Yes the users must reconfigure the filter.    When creating a structure on the downstream side, the user has to repeatedly use the copy/paste function at different levels - such behavior of the program makes work more difficult.  The structure should be readable, and the lines on both sides should be arranged the same. If the use of "refresh" is required, it should run automatically in the background after each copy/paste operation. 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. Currently, after using copy/paste, the structure is sorted randomly and not very readable. This creates the possibility of easier mistake. Having to refresh the structure after each copy/paste is cumbersome and causes negative feelings among users - the program gives the feeling of being underdeveloped. 5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) The possibility of mistakes in the built structure is always a big problem (when in the structure we have several equally classified parts with only a small difference in their dimension - when the elements in the structure will be swapped by order it is very easy to paste or add parts into the wrong one). The described situation affects all users working with BOM Transformer who build structures using copy and paste. We are a big global manufacturing company and BOM transformer are heavily used by many of our users.  Current solution require many more clicks than needed. Hours of work could be saved by automatization of refresh. Users will be more effective and more happy with working in MPMLink. ... View more

1. What product and version are you running? SolidWorks 2022 SP5, WWGM Version 13.0.0.0 2. What is the problem? WGM Message boxes doesn't appear on the screen in that WGM is running. In a multi screen environment the user have to search for the wgm message boxes that have to be confirm. There should be a preference in the WGMCLIENT.ini to control that all message boxes that are initiated by WGM appear in the sreen in that WGM is running. 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. The given workaround doesn't work: • Invert display 1 and 2 via "make this main display" option. • Optionnally unlock and move the taskbar to the screen of choice. 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. If the users don't recognize the windows on that the wgm message box appears they wait for any software response. In the worst case they will terminate the SOLIDWORKS and WGM process via task manager and  unsaved changes are lost. 5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) More than 1500 users are affected and they are loosing time and work.  ... View more

1. Describe your environment: What is your industry? What is your role in your organization? Describe your stakeholders. Automotive 2. What version of Windchill are you currently running? RV&S 12.3.1 3. Describe the problem you are trying to solve. Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. It should be possible to: Reset/restore a requirement to a previous state Reset/restore a group of requirements to a previous state Attaching detached requests back to the document Delete requirement without hanging over trash cans Reset/restore document properties Reset/restore complete document 4. What is the use case for your organization? After a document or the project structure or project contents (permissions/roles, documents, elements such as Review/CR) have been accidentally rearranged, deleted or manipulated, the original document can be restored before the desired change. 5. What business value would your suggestion represent for your organization? ... View more

1. Describe your environment: What is your industry? What is your role in your organization? Describe your stakeholders. Automotive but in general this idea will help every industries and every user. My role is Senior Solution Architect. Stakeholders are every user of Windchill RV&S but mostly Reviewers and Managers. 2. What product and version are you currently running? 12.5 soon upgrading to 13.1 in next 4 weeks. 3. Describe the problem you are trying to solve. Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. Currently we have really nice OOTB feature Document -> View Difference which can compare 2 instance of same document. Detailed article below:- Viewing Differences (ptc.com)   But this window we can't launch using URL because diffsegment command is not supported here. Check supported here:- Article - CS119067 - How to create a link (or provide an URL) to a report, dashboard, chart, issue/item, member or change package in Windchill RV&S / Integrity Lifecycle Manager (ptc.com) 4. What is the use case for your organization? This feature what comes with OOTB is really nice but situation is mostly user are unaware about such and doesn't utilize often. Or even if user know they have no idea what all things can be compared and in which use case i shall use this or not. Specially concrete use case where this feature can really help, most users are not able to recognize such situations.  My suggestion and idea is this feature shall be supported via URL where in URL we can pass document ID as well as 2 instance of document which could be now, label, revision, date, branch, edit etc. and then clicking on this URL directly launches view difference screen with difference. I can think of many use case where this can be helpful:-   During Change Order Review, Document Review or in general during any important review steps of an organization we can provide such URL easily to -reviewers- and they can easily check the difference just by clicking without any configuration manually. Concrete use case during my current project we create Label in document before it goes for change process and after it goes for change review. If i have this possibility i can easily provide such URL with lable name in URL argument and reviewer just click on that, window pops up and they see and recognize difference easily.   I can easily implement this using an custom feature or addons or even by custom reports but this feature is already existing we just need to support on client URL possibility and many use cases can get benefit out of it. 5. What business value would your suggestion represent for your organization? My expectation is this view difference (diffsegment) shall be supported for URL where just clicking on URL diff screen opens with difference directly. OOTB:- This is so powerful feature we just have to use this in nice way and such URL support opens many door where utilization of such functionalities increases in daily business. Vielen Dank / Many Thanks, Kapil Jain ... View more

1. Environment: Automotive Industry / Product Development 2. Version: RV&S 12.3.1.2 3. Problem: Working with bigger screens with 4K resolution the text in RV&S is getting hard to read. Ther is a complicated way to change the resolution of the client by: 1. Go to <client_install_dir>/bin 2. Select IntegrityClient.exe 3. Right click and go to Properties dialog 4. On IntegrityClient properties dialog, go to Compatibility tab 5. Check the Change high DPI settings -> Override high DPI Scaling behavior with Scaling performed by value set to System 6. Click Ok 7. Restart client It would be much better to be able to define a resolution in the client, preferably in the properties. 4. UseCase: Different Users have different hardware setups. Bigger screens with higher resolutions become more common. It would allow the user to change their local settings depending on the screen they use much easier. 5. What business value: Quality of live improvement and user acceptance  ... View more

Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. 1. What version of the software are you running? Windchill RV&S 12.5.0.3 2. What is the problem? Resynchronization percentage/process cannot be seen in the resynching details 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. We cannot see a possibility as workaround to check this 4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. Please check the attached screenshot, in that case the people would know, that how much percent of bigger files' upload or download is ready up to the given moment 5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) Users would like to see the progress of the resynchronization or if possible, any sandbox synchronization activity in a synchronization percentage bar ... View more

1. Describe your environment: What is your industry? What is your role in your organization? Describe your stakeholders. Medical devices, DevOps sw engineer, stakeholder for this particular feature request is our test team 2. What product and version are you currently running? Windchill RV&S 13.0 3. Describe the problem you are trying to solve. Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. The last Result field does not come up in the charting.  We need a chart that will show the status of the last execution (Test sessions verdict) for the test case item   4. What is the use case for your organization? We need a chart that will show the status of the last execution (Test sessions verdict) for the test case item. 5. What business value would your suggestion represent for your organization? This would allow us to generate a chart with the final test session verdict.  Better and faster reporting for the test team. ... View more

1. Describe your environment: What is your industry? What is your role in your organization? Describe your stakeholders. Windchill RV&S user and administrator in Automotive industry. 2. What product and version are you currently running? Windchill RV&S 12.5 and 13.1 (Both Windows versions for Server and Client) 3. Describe the problem you are trying to solve. Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. From the GUI, when exporting items into an Excel Workbook using the "Export Items to Excel ..." function, a XLS Workbook is created, opened and automatically saved. Moreover, there is no way to export to Excel from command line interface (CLI)!There are two issues with this Excel file :   the file is saved into a forced path (C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Temp\) with a random name (PTC<some_big_number>.xls) the file type is forced to XLS (the "old" spreadsheet type for Excel) Issue (a) leads to have many files into user's Local\Temp, with no clue on how and when they were generated. User has to "Save As" the file to some other location with a more explicit name while files are accumulating in their Local\Temp folder. Even if user can not select the file name when the Workbook is generated, it may be helpfull to have a default file name that relies on the context (query or document from where it was created) and on the date/time of creation.   XLS file type (from issue(b)) is now pretty old and has some limitations. Much modern Workbook types with less limitations exist : "Office Open XML" (xlsx) was introduced in 2007 and "OpenDocument" (ods) was introduced in 2005. It would be nice if some of these "newer" types were supported. 4. What is the use case for your organization? We wanted to export some data into an Excel file to feed some of our other tools, but the tool expects some xlsx file, so users have to 'Save As' xlxs the generated files. Moreover, we would like to automatize these exports but this was not possible as there are no CLI export available. This is a bit limitating! 5. What business value would your suggestion represent for your organization? If all the features described above were implemented, this will reduce steps for user to get their working Workbooks. ... View more

1. Describe your environment: What is your industry? What is your role in your organization? Describe your stakeholders. We are automotive and my role is solution Architect & Implementation Specialist. 2. What product and version are you currently running? Windchill RV&S. Soon going on 12.5 3. Describe the problem you are trying to solve. Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. Currently when we break permission inheritance tree on child project we can provide any groups which should be having access to this project. But it doesn't help if any user doesn't have permission of it's parent. Then this break permission is not adding any value because we always have to give parent permission. E.g. /ABC - Parent or Main Project Now DOC is child of ABC so structure is :- /ABC/DOC.   Now if below group DOC Administrator, DOC ReadOnly and DOC Team has no access of /ABC they can't access DOC also. Then this restriction is not helpful.   Wish is if specific group is selected and permission inheritance is broken then it shouldn't be mandatory to have parent project access, instead this child project should work independent of main project now.   PS: This was also an use case during PTC Work Group meeting.   Vielen Dank / Many Thanks, Kapil Jain ... View more

1. Describe your environment: What is your industry? What is your role in your organization? Describe your stakeholders. We are automotive and my role is solution Architect & Implementation Specialist. 2. What product and version are you currently running? Windchill RV&S. Soon going on 12.5 3. Describe the problem you are trying to solve. Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. There are couple of requests come on this useful option called "Create From Template", i tried to analyze some of them and thought to write which can be helpful for most of the audience.    Pain Point 1:- When we create an document from template using option Create From Template, there is no linkage between template and document we created. When there is an update in template, document which are already got create from template has no option to bring those new changes if document owner wants them. And no way to notify as well. This is very common request which we get from multiple stakeholders.   Possible Solution 1:- When user create an document using Create From Template, document and content which got created should be branched link with template. This way in future an customized solution can be made which sends notification or flag whenever there is an update in template and document owner can see flag and decide whether they need those changes or not. (PS: I do have this solution already between 2 branched document but it can only work if document is branched.) that's why template and document we created should also be branched.   Possible Solution 2:- Not that better solution like above but still an workaround, there should be some trigger event when create from template option is used. Then also i can think of some customized solution which can first link both document somehow which can later used to transfer the changes from template.   Pain Point 2:- There should be an possibility to partially create an document from an template. Since now we can create document from template but it will use entire template. There should be an possibility to select just one section (or some part) from an template and then only that much template should be utilized for document.   Of course there can be more points as well which can be helpful but at least these are quite generic in my perspective. Happy to see how others are using this Create From Template feature. Or what are the pain points others are facing in this? Looking forward to see other's views on this. Vielen Dank / Many Thanks, Kapil Jain ... View more

We recently upgrade from Integrity 10.7 to Windchill RV&S (Integrity) 12.3. The inline rich content editor in document view is nice, but it can be very annoying sometimes. When the column for a rich content text field is narrow, it really blocks a lot of the real content. Plus, when you highlight a word (double click on it), another rich content editor toolbar shows up! There should be an option to disable the inline editor toolbar (and we can customize the viewset to show the editor options at top, not inside the table cell). ... View more

1. Environment: Automotive Industry / Product Development / Requirements Engineering 2. Version: RV&S 12.3.1.2 3. Problem: Working in the edit item view inside of a rich text field I can only scroll effectively by using the scrollbar. When I use the mouse wheel for scrolling I have the issue that I scroll in the field and the view simultaneously.  This was described in  Article CS 362015 but unfortunatly not planned to fix. I would like to bring this up again as a quality of life improvement suggestion.   4. What is the use case for your organization? Fixing this issue the general user acceptance of the tool would improve. Day to day frustration would be minimized. 5. What business value would your suggestion represent for your organization? Quality of live improvement and user acceptance. Increase in productivity. ... View more

Please include detailed documentation such as screenshots, images or video. 1. What version of the software are you running? RV&S 13.0.0.3 Modeler 9.4 Creo Parametric 7 and 9 Creo Illustrate  Arbortext Workgroup Manager for AutoCAD + AutoCAD Workgroup Manager for Inventor + Inventor and others  2. What is the problem? PTC application are NOT supported for VMware 3. Are you using a workaround? If yes, please describe it. No workaround  4. What is the use case for your organization? Describe how your idea would work in context or how it would apply to a practical situation. We expects that all PTC Products will run on VMWare Horizon in future.  We have a to move all PTC application as publish app in VMware horizon. Reason:  1) Better security  2) Better control on update 3) Better hardware  4) Better performance  overall better IT infrastructure  5. What impact does this problem currently have on your organization? (Number of users affected, hours of lost productivity, etc.) As per Gartner reports VMware is best tool available in the market.  PTC applications are NOT supported with VMware. It impact company to go on with the best solution in the market.  All the user will be affected because of unsupported VMware.      ... View more

Currently, in a PTC Integrity for document types there is no global search & replace mechanism to search for and replace text. In addition, the search string should be highlighted in color. Only search & replace is present for long text field under the rich text editor. Kindly introduce the functionality in future releases.   ... View more