Simple Automatic Counter Based Title Creation
Typical Company Profile: Both small and large design teams with multiple users
Most companies adopting the 3DEXPERIENCE platform will have multiple SOLIDWORKS users creating new designs and modifying existing designs. As discussed in the previous methodology, having each user manually define the Title of each new part and assembly themselves, could quickly and easily result in duplicate titles being created.
Therefore, to eliminate the risk and potential confusion of new files being saved with a Title that already exists, the 3DEXPERIENCE platform offers the ability to define an automated sequential Title naming scheme. Automatic naming of the Title is controlled by the Auto-name option located in the SOLIDWORKS settings in the CAD Management section of the Collaborative Spaces Configuration Center. This is accessed by the 3DEXPERIENCE platform administrator via the Platform Management dashboard.
With the Auto-name setting on, when a user saves new files to the 3DEXPERIENCE platform from SOLIDWORKS for the first time, the Title of each resulting Physical Product is automatically populated with the next sequential value generated by the CAD Family object “Content Naming Rule” e.g. SW-00001, SW-00002 etc.
A platform administrator can define the format of the content naming rule via the Content Naming Rules section located in the Collaborative Spaces Configuration Center. The naming rule must always contain a counter in combination with one or all the following, prefix, suffix, and interfix.
To help users identify a component after the Title has been generated by the content naming rule, it is recommended that the ENOVIA Description field is used to capture the descriptive name of the item.
Note: The Content Naming rule is only intended to provide a simple counter-based naming scheme. If your requirement is that the primary identifier for SOLIDWORKS designs must include attribute values then using Enterprise Item Number is the recommended solution. Enterprise Item Number is covered in the next section.
Automatic Counter Based Naming Example
The following example shows the process of saving a drawing and its referenced assembly to 3DEXPERIENCE for the first time with Auto-naming turned on.
- A pre-existing drawing called Hook Race.slddrw, and its referenced assembly Hook Race.sldasm are saved to 3DEXPERIENCE for the first time.
2. The CAD Family Content Naming Rule generates new and unique Titles for each file.
3. After the save operation is complete the new Titles are displayed in the MySession task pane, and in the Feature Manager Design Tree.
Tips and Recommended Practice
For quick and easy identification, using the Tree Display setting for Component Name and Description, the information displayed in the Feature Manager for each component can be configured to show both Title and Description, or Description only.
If a part, assembly, or drawing has been saved locally to disk before saving to the 3DEXPERIENCE platform for the first time, the original file name will remain unchanged. Only the Physical Product Title will be automatically populated by the content naming rule. When using SOLIDWORKS connected to the 3DEXPERIENCE platform the Title is the primary identifier of each item (Physical Product, Drawing, etc). To avoid any potential confusion between the Title and file name on disk its recommended that the File Name column in the SOLIDWORKS MySession task pane is hidden. To hide the column right mouse button, click on the column header, select Customize View, followed by the column name.
Summary
Automatic naming provides several benefits for both small design teams and larger enterprises. Every SOLIDWORKS file saved to 3DEXPERIENCE is assigned a unique Title. This eliminates the risk of saving files to 3DEXPERIENCE with duplicate Titles and resulting confusion this can potentially cause within a company.
The descriptive name of an item can be easily modified by editing the Description field on the ENOVIA properties dialogue, either in SOLIDWORKS or one of the dashboard web apps e.g. Bookmarks Editor. As the SOLIDWORKS file names cannot be changed once they have been saved to the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, this methodology offers a simple workflow that anyone can adopt.