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Brian Schanen joined Autodesk in 2005 as a Product Designer and currently is a Customer Success Engineer for Autodesk’s Data Management products. Brian has taught at Autodesk University numerous times and has authored white papers on Vault and Productstream. He works with customers to implement a complete digital prototyping solution specializing in Autodesk Inventor, Autodesk Vault and Productstream. Brian lives near Detroit, Michigan.
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Introducing Autodesk Vault Workgroup 2010
February 27, 2009 11:06 PMby Brian SchanenAutodesk Vault Workgroup 2010 provides new technology built on top of Autodesk Vault focusing on Document Management. These new features address the need for Data Management beyond base Autodesk Vault. Key features of this new technology are Revision Management, Lifecycle Management, and Release of files. In this post, we’ll examine some of these new features at a high level.
Revision Management
Companies often use variations of these revision schemes, and many are based on legacy systems or workflows. Vault Workgroup provides the flexibility to define revision schemes based off of existing or import from a pre-defined file. An example of a custom revision scheme that customer might use is ASME Y 14.35M. This is an alphabetic scheme that omits the letters I, O, Q, S, X, Z.
Lifecycle Management
Lifecycle states ensure the right user gets access to the right files at the right time, protecting your data integrity. In addition, Vault Workgroup comes with a configurable transition from one lifecycle to another. Using groups and permissions, administrators can define what the next available state from a given Lifecycle is. Autodesk Vault Workgroup comes with four Lifecycle Definitions out- of-the-box.
The provided lifecycle definitions can be copied and edited. In addition, customer lifecycle definitions can be created.
Enhanced Property Management
As files are checked into Vault, properties may be extracted and indexed for searching at a later time. These properties compliment the file data and Vault ensures that this data is accurate and complete. Many organizations have business rules that go beyond what is described in the file. Often times the files that are vaulted do not have inherent properties or metadata. Autodesk Vault Workgroup provides a common interface to extend the use of properties for both indexed and User Defined Properties or UDP's. These can be used for tracking, grouping, and reporting.
Categories
Vault Workgroup 2010 introduces the use of Categories. A Category provides standard behaviors on files with respect to lifecycles, permissions, revisions, and release policies for an automated method of Data Management. Categories are initially an opt in feature for any file that is checked into Vault. The user, given the appropriate permissions, can assign a category to any file manually or let Vault Workgroup automatically categorize files.
Additional Features of Vault Workgroup include:
- Non-CAD Access
- Folder Level Security
- Workspace Synchronization
- Batch Plot
- Automatic File Rename
Stay tuned for additional posts about Autodesk Vault Workgroup as we’ll take a deep-dive into the areas mentioned above.
-Brian Schanen
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Vault Copy Design and Libraries
February 20, 2009 09:42 PMby Brian SchanenDuring the Copy Design command in Autodesk Vault, the default behavior for Inventor files that are 'Libraries' will be set to Reuse, not Copy. These files are intended to be standards, and not often copied. There are times however that a complete copy of a design is needed, including library componenets. The following steps outline the procedure to copy or replace library parts during Copy Design:
- Create a new Single User Project file. (Note: when you create a new project in Inventor, a 'Vault' type is default. Be sure to select Single User).
- Drag and Drop this to the "$" root of Vault.
- During Copy Design, be sure to use this project file.
- Ensure that "Copy Design From" is pointing to "$".
- Change the Library files to either Copy or Replace.
Thanks Madhan!
-Brian Schanen
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Property Editing tips with Autodesk Vault
February 13, 2009 08:48 PMby Brian SchanenAutodesk Vault provides functionality to index, search, and group file properties from files Checked In. In addition to this functionality, Vault allows users to edit these properties through an easy to use Wizard interface. In this example, we edit a handful of Inventor Part files and a Microsoft Word document – all at the same time!
Starting the Edit Property command is performed from the Edit menu>Edit Properties or Ctrl+E. You can either have the files pre-selected, or start the command and use the Add Files button to populate the list.
When the file list is complete, click Next to move onto the Edit properties screen. At the top of the listed files, click the Customize View button to choose the properties you need to modify.
These will appear as columns, similar to customizing the grid in the Vault Properties, History, Uses, and Where Used areas elsewhere in Vault.
Now for the exciting part. In our example we need to update the property ‘Project’ to 10 Vaulted files (nine Inventor and one MS Word). If the properties are different between these files, then proceed with filling in the values as necessary.
But…if the values are all the same, enter the value one in the top cell. Then drag from the lower right corner of the cell all the way down the list. The result is the property value filling in all the cells.
This example used only ten files and was a great time saver, and it only gets better with more files. Additional functionality in this grid includes a right click menu that provides Copy/Paste, Capitalize, and Find/Replace.
When the edits are done, and the properties are filled out, simply click the Finish button to complete the Edit Property Wizard. Autodesk Vault will update and version the files, then post a results window where you can create a report. Click Close when you’re finished.
-Brian Schanen
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iPropWiz 2009 for Inventor just released
February 2, 2009 10:49 PMby Brian SchanenAn updated version of the popular iPropWizard is here – iPropWiz 2009. The iPropWiz is a powerful property management tool for Autodesk Inventor that helps companies enforce standards. iPropWiz complements Autodesk Vault by ensuring all necessary data is filled out within Inventor before Check In. For a list of new features, video tutorials, and to download a 15 day trial, check out http://www.ipropwiz.com
