At times, an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) with a 3DEXPERIENCE platform may have many suppliers that might not have a 3DEXPERIENCE platform. Thus, it becomes challenging to work on data received from OEM in a non-3DEXPERIENCE environment at the supplier's end. Hence, the supplier's data needs to be modified for the design upgrade. Therefore, a proper mechanism is required to exchange data from an OEM with a supplier.
This CATPractice highlights exchange of data between CATIA V5 and 3DEXPERIENCE among OEMs and suppliers in a non-3DEXPERIENCE environment.
CAD Engineers, CATIA Admins, Designers, Managers, IT administrators
Exporting Data from OEM to Supplier
The OEM launches the Export command from the MySession Action bar on the data, he wants to export.
The OEM defines access rules (Read-only, For Edit, Exclude) for each data to export.
In export panel, for each object, “Purpose” field can be set to three values:
For Edit: Data will be put into export package and can be modified by the supplier.
Read-only: Data will be put into export package but is not supposed to be modified by the supplier. This is the purpose set by default in the export panel.
Exclude: Data will not be put into export package.
Importing the Modified Data from Supplier to OEM
While importing the modified data from supplier to OEM, the import view is populated with several columns:
The Purpose at Export column containing the Purpose (access rule) for each data defined during the Export.
The Supplier Status column containing the Status of the data from the supplier package. There are four possible statuses: Existing/Unchanged, Modified, New, Removed/Deleted.
Automatic propagation on New Objects inside Import panel
Whenever a New object is selected its parent will also be selected.
Alternatively selecting an object aggregating a New object will automatically select this New object. This will ensure consistency for new objects.
What happens if data has been modified by OEM in the meantime?
If data has been modified by supplier and also by OEM , data cannot be selected in import panel to avoid overwriting the data on the 3DEXPERIENCE side.
If children documents have been modified by supplier , those children will be selectable for import.
Such cases are valid but may be confusing to the user because modification done by the supplier on selected children are actually mounted in session at the end of import, but not the structure defined on their CATProduct parent. The below warning is then displayed at the end of import command:
What happens if data sent as Read-only are modified by the supplier?
If data sent as Read-only has been modified by supplier, data cannot be selected in import panel to avoid overwriting the data on the 3DEXPERIENCE side.
Use Case: Exchanging Data between CATIA V5 and 3DEXPERIENCE
Scenario
OEM with data stored in the 3DEXPERIENCE platform wants to modify some designs through a supplier without access to the platform.
Personas
- Design Engineer at OEM: Saves the data from the 3DEXPERIENCE platform to CATIA V5 and shares it with Supplier.
- Design Engineer at Supplier: Receives the date from OEM, modifies the design and shares the modified data to the OEM.
Workflow
Prerequisite Roles
3DSwymer (IFW-OC), Collaborative Industry Innovator (CSV-OC), Collaborative Designer for CATIA V5 (UE5-OC)
Exchanging Data between CATIA V5 & 3DEXPERIENCE
Here are the steps to follow:
Step 1: OEM Exports Data from CATIA V5
Step 2: Supplier Modifies the Data in CATIA V5
Step 3: OEM Imports the Modified Data to CATIA V5 and Saves it in the 3DEXPERIENCE platform
Exchange mechanism uses a package, a zip file, which is out of the control of the 3DEXPERIENCE platform and requires great caution. It was designed for a specific lifecycle of packages: package is generated at export, package is modified by supplier, package should be deleted after import.
It is user's responsibility custody to delete package at the end of export.
It is strongly discouraged to import the same package twice, especially if some package modifications have been performed between both imports. Whenever a new modification is to be performed by supplier, whole process should be initiated again, starting with an export command that generates a new package to be sent to the supplier.
If the supplier has created new CATIA files, these files should be saved on the disk, either in an existing folder inside unzipped package, or directly inside the root folder of the unzipped package.
- To avoid conflicts with the original exported data set, it is recommended to use the branching capability. Create a dedicated branch and then export the data set for the supplier which can be imported later with fewer checks. The changes can then be merged using the New from Revision lifecycle command.
