New Review VS New Change Request VS New Promotion request

[Markh74]

Good day

I am New to Windchill and I would like to try and get clarity on the following.

At this stage we are only working with documents in Windchill,

Plans, Processes, Procedures, System requirements and so on which are all Documents.

We have various Authors  that create the Documents, however we also have Product specialists that need to review these Documents to verify the info is correct, make changes to the content and perhaps add sections.

What process should I use for this in Windchill. Create New Review VS New Change Request VS New Promotion request to send a document for review and changes.

[avillanueva · Accepted solution]

Reviews are just what they seem like. Its structure process to capture a design review or other type of review but that state of the document does not change. Promotion Requests are simple signoff processes that at the end, will move something to a new state. It does not have to be released and can be some interim state of your choosing.  Many people use Promotion Requests for initial releases. A more formal process is Change Requests and Change Notices. You can design the workflows to do basically the same thing this has the advantage of linking the previous released version to the newly released versions and showing differences. A review and signoff would be conducted and also can have items moved through multiple states (In Work to Under Review to Released for example).

We looked at design reviews when they came out but typically document the review as part of our Change Request/Notice process. We also use Promotion Requests for our documents when we have lower level, ad hoc signoff.  Our CR/CNs have formal CCBs by program but Promotion Notices allow for authors to pick a varied list of approvers to sign off. Again, each are very configurable to your business needs. 

[Markh74]

Thank you for the info. 

Just so that I understand,

I create a new Document, lets say it is a System Requirement Spec for a new product and somewhere down the line the client asks for a few changes to the spec which needs to be updated in the document. The Author makes those changes but the document needs to be reviewed by the engineer to ensure the changes are valid and the document will go to the next revision say from A.1 to A.2 after making these changes. Can I click on the document and choose "Actions - New Review" for it to be reviewed and taken to the next revision.

[avillanueva]

No, Reviews do not change anything. They just document a review was conducted. And A.1 to A.2 would just be an iteration, not a new revision. If A was released, you would revise that to B first, make the customer changes and then kick off a new review against B. To get B released, you can use a Promotion Notice or CR/CN to do this. That would handle locking down the next revision.

Some customers have an alternative process when the CR captures the proposed changes that are reviewed and validated BEFORE the next revision B is created. This follows a more formal workflow where approved changes are directed to authors or designers to implement. In the CN process, the new revision B would be created and eventually released.