Great topic Selective delete in windchill 9 and 10

[rrich]

It is good to see so many admins are passionate about this topic. Maybe PTC will take some time and address this issue. The fact that this is possible in ILINK3.4, makes me request it be added into Windchill. As an admin we should be able to make the call to delete any item at will from the database. Yes we know there could be some problems with assemblies or other things not working correctly but it should be our option to deal with it. Maybe there should be something like a recycle bin, delete your object. Test for fallout. If fallout is too catastrophic, restore file from recycle. Either way put the admin in control.

Thanks for all the great postings
Ron

[DonSenchuk]

As part of some sort of request for PTC to address this, I'd also like
to see an in-depth explanation on why it needs to be deleted in the
first place.



Since it's an old iteration, just ignore it. (Or, I suppose, change just
that iteration to the "Obsolete" life-cycle state.) Every PDMLink system
I've worked with has hundreds (or thousands) of files nobody has a use
for. They all get ignored and life goes on without hiccups or problems.



I understand people's position that THEY, not PTC, should be the
ultimate deciders on what stays and what is deleted and I understand
their reason for wanting such control, but in this instance I don't
understand why leaving that one file alone is such a big deal.



(Bob Lohbauer's situation is slightly different in that he wants to
delete all iterations back to the released version, not a single
iteration in between the released one and the latest. This has more
merit, IMO, than keeping both the latest WIP and the Released, but
deleting one iteration in between.)

[Lohbauer]

Don,

You are correct. What I wanted to do in deleting earlier iterations was ill-advised. One of the important aspects of any PDM is to retain an unadulterated history. That precludes deleting. So I did as you recommended and that worked well, thanks.

It seems to be a philosophical question on whether deleting iterations is a best practice. For my case I had a released model that had been iterated and I wanted it obsoleted and the new WIP rev was a problem. But, since it was released it had a product life that needed to be retained. That becomes a business decision whether to allow that. From what this thread holds it sounds like it would be possible but the lengths you need to go through to do it sound like an implicit warning not to.


Bob Lohbauer