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Welcome to the demo: Parts Catalog Generator - basic operation
In this demo we will show you the typical procedure
to create an online Parts Catalog
from a drawing and a parts list,
that come from seperate sources
and have no electronic links to each other, in any way
The basic workflow consists of 4 phases,
which correspond to the 4 tabs in the main application window
These are:
Model,
Analyze,
Review
and Publish
In the Model phase we will import the drawing
and the parts information file, that we want to publish
and we'll prepare them to be linked to each other
In the Analyse phase we are going to tell PCG
what to look for in the drawing
We want to make sure that only the position numbers are selected
and not other textual information that may be present in the drawing
In the Review phase we will check the results of the analysis
If the results need improvement,
we can return to the Analyse phase and alter the settings,
or we can correct individual faults in the data in this step
In the Publish phase we can determine what to publish and for whom
So, let's get started...
In the model phase we will create a new project,
add a drawing to that project,
import a parts list into the project
and map the parts list to the drawing
When we start up Parts Catalog Generator,
it opens up with a dialog screen,
where we must create a new project
We are asked to name the project
and to specify the location for it to be saved to
Hit "OK" and we enter the main application window
We are automatically directed to
the first phase of the process, to the "Model" tab
Here we will import the drawings and the parts lists
and we will tell PCG what goes with what
We have several options to import the source material
We can import the drawings first, in pdf format,
or we can open a structured Parts List,
from which PCG will find the related drawings to import
or we can import data via a Mechanical Tree
In this demo we will use the first option:
we will first import a drawing,
then add a parts list
and then map the parts list information to the drawing
So, we select the drawing and click "Open"
The drawing is added to
the "Assemblies and parts" list on the "Structure" tab
The next step is to add the parts list to the drawing
With the drawing selected, we press
the "Assign parts list to assembly" button
A window opens up where we can add a parts list
via the button "Import parts list"
We can import parts list information from different sources
e.g.: a Bill Of Materials exported from a partbook pdf,
or a data export from a database like SAP
A pop-up window shows us the contents of the parts list
and offers us the possibility of assigning
the number of rows for the head information
Hit "OK" and we see the parts list show up in the list window
With the list selected we now hit
the "Create new mapping" button to define how
the information from the parts list will be mapped
to the output Bill Of Materials
You are free to map as many or
as few of these columns as you wish,
except for one required field
and that is the "Part number" field,
which will map the position numbers from the drawing
to the part numbers from the list
However, as you can still determine
which columns to publish via the publishing preferences,
we advice you to map as many columns as possible
As you can see here,
PCG has already mapped several columns automatically,
but in the case of the "Quantity" field,
not quite correctly
So, we select the "Quantity" field
and from the dropdown list
we select the column "Amount"
This Excel file contains article descriptions in 4 languages
and of course we would like to make use of that
in our Parts Catalog
So, we select the "Description" field,
select "Article description English"
from the dropdown menu
and we set "Translatable" to "Yes"
Immediately a plus sign appears
in front of the "Description" field
When we click that
we see a number of languages displayed
English was assigned already,
so now we assign "Article description DE"
from the dropdown list to the German language
French is not there, so we leave that as it is
and we assign the Dutch description
and finally the Chinese description
So now we hit "OK" and "OK" again
and our mapping for the drawing is done
By hitting the "Next" button,
we move to the next step in the process:
the "Analyze" tab
In the Analyse phase we are going to tell PCG
what to look for in the drawing
We want to make sure that only the position numbers are selected
and not other textual information that may be present in the drawing
So, we will set the character height for the position numbers
and we may set some advanced options, e.g.:
Defining areas such as borders and whitespaces,
which will be omitted from the identification process
and from publishing
Defining filtering for the parts information
And adjusting process settings
to achieve better results from the identification process
These advanced options will be dealt with in seperate demo's
With the drawing selected we hit
the "Set character height" button
This opens up a low resolution preview of the drawing,
where we zoom in a bit on one of the positon numbers
and then we click on the button with
the black character "S" in the blue rectangle
and then we click on a number in the drawing
A green field appears and the character is highlighted in red
This means PCG has succesfully identified this character
We hit "OK"
We can set quite a number of different advanced options here
to optimise the results of the identification process,
but we will leave that for a different demo
What we will do, however,
is to check the "Enclosed numbers" option
When we were looking at the drawing just now,
we saw that the position numbers
were enclosed in circles
That offers us the possibility
to optimise the identification process here,
by telling PCG to only look for
enclosed numbers in the drawing
So, we select "Circle" from the list
and we select "Ellipse" as well,
as we can't be sure
that all of the circles are perfectly circular
Now we will proceed with the analysis
We hit the button that states "Analyze 1 drawing"
The button turns into a process bar
and below it the process steps are displayed
When the process is finished
we are automatically switched to tab no. 3: "Review"
In the Review phase we will check the results of the analysis
If the results need improvement,
we can return to the Analyse phase and alter the settings,
or we can correct individual faults in the data in this step
We will check whether all of the numbers in the drawing
have been identified correctly
and whether they have been mapped
to the corresponding numbers of the parts list
Contrary to other parts catalog software,
PCG has been designed
to work with all sorts of input material,
not just data of perfect quality
Now, especially if you work with imperfect data,
e.g.: poorly scanned drawings
or incomplete parts lists,
you should always review
the results from the analyse phase
Even if you have a large number of drawings,
you should at least pick some at random
to make sure everything went according to plan
Now, if the results are not perfect,
you can either go back to the analyse phase
and use the advanced settings
to further optimise the process,
or you can compensate for
individual faults in the data right here
So, with the drawing selected in the list,
we hit the "Review results" button
A preview opens up and we can see here,
that all of the position numbers
have been correctly indentified
and mapped to the corresponding numbers
in the parts list
So, we hit "OK"
Now we can proceed to the last step:
the Publishing
So hit the button "Next"
In the Publish phase we can determine what to publish and for whom
We check the publishing preferences for the drawing
and finally, we publish the Parts Catalog
As you can see,
we can set a number of options here,
but we will leave that for the advanced demo's
So, let's publish!
OK, so here we have our output
You can see that the numbers in the Bill Of Materials
correspond to the numbers in the drawing
and when we double-click a number,
the "Part information" window opens
We can order a part right here
by setting the order quantity
Hit "Close"
The part is now selected in the Bill Of Materials
and if we open up our Shopping basket,
we see it contains one item,
which we can view by clicking on it
And, yes, it is our part,
so close again
and e-mail the order
So, all we need to do now
is enter our name, etc.
and we can order our spare part online
Well, this concludes our demo
Parts Catalog Generator - basic operation
For more information on the various advanced options
you should take a look at
the "Advanced options" demo's from the list
Thank you for watching this demo
Goodbye