CAD Structure comparison report

[pyalavarthi]

Hello all,
We don't create WTParts for CAD Documents in Windchill 10.1.
Looks like the compare structure function is not available for CAD
Documents in the iteration history.
I am wondering if anyone has customized existing BOM comparison report or
some other report to show the differences in CAD Structures between
iterations/version. Also we did not install Business(Cognos) Reporting
module.
Not sure if that helps to generate such a report easily. Any insight will
be helpful.

Thanks,
Prathap <">http://goo.gl/LuT5>

[FrankMenendez]

I know this has been discussed in the past but I wanted to poll the community to learn the latest on what companies are doing. For companies that have real number values for component quantities within ERP where UOM is EACH - What are you doing to get around the Integer value requirement for quantities that have a UOM of EA? Interested to anything related to Windchill 9.1, 10.0, 10.1.

The issue: Business requirement is for UOM to be the default EA (each) but the quantity value has to be a real number (fractional value). Windchill requires the qty value to be a whole number when UOM is each.

I am looking forward to replies from those companies with the same business requirement and are using Windchill 9.1 or later.

Thx again

[avillanueva]

Hey Frank, can you give an example? I saw a case where another site
wanted to do this for chips from a single wafer. Let's say that you
have 10 chips that you can make from a single wafer (maybe we're stuck
in 1972). You would structure the chip assembly that it needs 0.1
wafers to make 1 chip. In ERP systems they have a BOM Quantity as well.
It turns it on its head. The chip assembly has a BOM quantity of 10 and
use 1 wafer (each). So out of one wafer, you make 10 chips. I do not
know if PDMlink 10 supports this but I have not seen it in 9.1.



A work around would be to use some other unit of measure like sheet.
That would support fractional quantities and allow you to use 0.1 sheets
of that wafer. I have no issue with the integer quantity because that
is what each is, at least that's what my 2.3 kids say.





From: Menendez,Frank,IRVINE,R&D [

[AL_ANDERSON]

Solar recognizes and accepts that "EA" should be a positive, real number.
It is a counting unit, not a fractional unit. Moreover, this is critical
to accept since when you have QTY 4 EA in a CAD model, you want to have
exactly 4 Reference Designators (one for each occurrence), not some
fractional number of occurrences.

That being said, Solar uses 0 "each" for many items that in our ERP system
they want on routings for manufacturing, but they do not want to drive any
material purchasing. This is not a particularly "best" practice, but it
is so ingrained in our culture that we have customized Windchill to allow
it as follows:

1) We created "Zero Each" in addition to "Each" as a UOM.
2) We set all usage links that has 0 "Each" to 0 "Zero Each."
3) We create a java listener that listens to any creation or modification
of a usage link to change any non-zero "zero each" usage link to "each"
and any 0 "each" to "zero each" automatically. In all cases, you cannot
have a fractional "each" or "zero each" - if you try, then you get the out
of the box error that you have to use positive integers for "each."

On RTP to ERP, we use our middleware to transform all "zero each" usage
link UOMs to "each" - so that it works perfectly well in our ERP system.

This approach works very well for us.

If you need a fractional each, then you should not use each. You should
use "feet" or "box" or "as needed" or anything other than "each."

Al



From: "Villanueva, Antonio UTAS" <antonio.villanueva@utas.utc.com>
To: "Menendez,Frank,IRVINE,R&D" <frank.menendez@alconlabs.com>,
-
Date: 09/18/2012 12:54 PM
Subject: [solutions] - RE: Real number values for UOM of EACH for
QTY



Hey Frank, can you give an example? I saw a case where another site wanted
to do this for chips from a single wafer. Let?s say that you have 10
chips that you can make from a single wafer (maybe we?re stuck in 1972).
You would structure the chip assembly that it needs 0.1 wafers to make 1
chip. In ERP systems they have a BOM Quantity as well. It turns it on its
head. The chip assembly has a BOM quantity of 10 and use 1 wafer (each).
So out of one wafer, you make 10 chips. I do not know if PDMlink 10
supports this but I have not seen it in 9.1.

A work around would be to use some other unit of measure like sheet. That
would support fractional quantities and allow you to use 0.1 sheets of
that wafer. I have no issue with the integer quantity because that is
what each is, at least that?s what my 2.3 kids say.


From: Menendez,Frank,IRVINE,R&D [

[FrankMenendez]

Yes - another example would be labels on a roll or sheet. There may be 10 on a sheet. When one label is used, it should resolve to 0.1 sheets - but the ERP system has the UOM of EA. Changing this UOM now in ERP will possibly cause other downstream issues.

Today - we simply use the other UOM's as you stated. We also added a few for our other use cases. But this issue with ERP is the primary driver.

The other issue is with CAD driven Product Structure - today in 10.1 - only EA can still be used where owner links are leveraged and quantities cannot be fractional. There is a work around that I presented at the conference but it's not one that can be easily implemented by a large user base due to complexity.



From: Villanueva, Antonio UTAS [