About PPR Contexts

A PPR Context can contain products, items, processes and resources. It enables you to create a manufacturing context. In the current model, processes comprise systems and operations.

This page discusses:

What is PPR Context?

A PPR Context allows you to create a manufacturing context, which contains products, items, processes and resources.

The following restrictions apply to a PPR Context:

  • Duplication is not possible.
  • Configuration management is not supported.
  • Content lifecycle is not managed.
  • Change actions are not supported.
  • Filtering is not supported.
  • Versioning is not supported.

A PPR Context is a container that accommodates relevant PPR objects. An existing PPR Context can be re-used based on options. It is not always necessary to save a PPR Context in database. The PPR Context node has no lifecycle and should not be managed as a PPR object. It is useful for managing exports and working on small, simple contexts, usually with a single user.

Product

The product is the physical part of the virtual design definition.

Item

A item describes how to transform products by implementing item instances or fasteners. This description defines the manufacturing transformation of a product.

Relations between these transformations are achieved by data requirement links and precedence constraints.

Process

Processes are the actions undertaken within manufacturing. In the current model, processes comprise systems and operations.

Systems are time-driven components that constitute production. A system's purpose is to support planning, flow description, and layout. Systems can implement items and can be implemented by resources.

Operations are time-driven components that constitute the different steps of a system. Operations can realize items.

Resource

A resource can be the layout of a production site or a component (such as a robot, machine or tool) used in the item to build a manufactured product.

The difference between a product and a resource consists in how they are used within the item. With a resource, a product is created, manipulated or assembled. Typically, a resource has a relation to an item indicating that this item is implemented on this resource.

A resource can host executable task programs (manual or automated).

PPR Session

A PPR session allows you to display two, three, or four partitions that are necessary for digital manufacturing definition and simulation.

Here is a typical tree showing four partitions: one each for products, items, processes, and resources.



Note that these top nodes are fake nodes. They must be expanded to show all the objects that are included in each partition.



Explore and Open PPR Contexts

The Explore with Manufacturing Context Builder command is available on a PPR Context for exploring all the objects aggregated under the PPR Context.

The Open command opens the PPR Context, if the objects under the various nodes are still the same as the ones aggregated under the explored PPR Context. In that case, no PPR Context is created on the fly at opening.

Export PPR Contexts

Users often need to extract PPR content from a database For example, to keep content before cleaning a database or import the content in a new database. The best way to do this is to export content as a 3D XML file which can then be imported in another database, wherever it is located.

Export Procedure

To export a PPR Context and its children, the procedure is described below.

  1. Search PPR Context, explore it and expand the first level below the PPR Context if not already done.
  2. Select the PPR Context and, using Ctrl, also select all the root items.
  3. Select Share > Export. The Export dialog box is displayed.
    1. Select the 3D XML authoring format.
    2. Specify the directory where the 3D XML file will be stored, and the file name.
    3. Define which children and which representations must be taken into account. The recommendation is to select the With expanded children from database and With all representations options.

    4. Click Preview to check the content of the file before export.

  4. Click OK in the Export dialog box. The PPR Context is then exported.
Note: When you export a PPR Context containing items with associated resources to a 3D XML file, only the links to the resources are exported along with the items: the resources are not exported.

In order to export/import successfully, you must export each item and resource as separate 3D XML files. When you import to a new database, import both 3D XML files. The item-resource link will be resolved, allowing the item to find the associated resource.

Import Procedure

Import of a 3D XML file can then be done in a new base thanks to Add > Import > 3D XML.

Delete PPR Context

A PPR Context can be removed using the Delete command from the search results panel.

See the Collaborative Lifecycle User's Guide: Deleting Content.

Note: In the Delete dialog box that appears after selecting Delete , the Whole structure option is not available for PPR Contexts.