Configuring Reference Designator Properties

You can configure Reference Designator Properties

A Reference Designator is used on a Bill of Materials (BOM) as an identifier for a component. As business administrator, you can use property settings to specify the format of the Reference Designator and whether it must be unique. You can also specify whether the Reference Designator is a required field.

Either a Find Number or a Reference Designator is required. If both are set to not required, the system defaults to Find Number required. This setting is independent from the uniqueness setting. If uniqueness is set for Find Number or Reference Designator, then if a value is entered it must be unique compared to all other values. A blank is not considered a value and is allowed if the attribute is not required.

See Also
Configuring Properties
  1. Create or open the text file to contain customized properties. For more information, see Editing Properties Using MQL.
  2. To specify that the Reference Designator be unique, follow these steps:
    1. Add or edit this line in the file used to import properties into a page object 

      emxEngineeringCentral.ReferenceDesignator.Unique=true

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:

      • true = The Reference Designator must be a unique value and is case sensitive.
      • false = the Reference Designator is not required to be unique.

      You must set either the FindNumber.Unique property or the ReferenceDesignator.Unique property to true. (The installation sets both properties to true by default.) When Engineering BOM Management is installed alone, if both properties are set to false, the app behaves as if the Find Number is unique.

  3. To specify that both the Find Number and Reference Designator be unique, follow these steps:
    1. Add or edit this line in the file used to import properties into a page object 

      emxBOMPartManagement.EBOMUniquenessOperator=or

      The app uses the EBOMUniquenessOperator property when both the FindNumber.unique property and the ReferenceDesignator.Unique properties are set to true. (Both properties are true by default.)

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:

      • or = Users can enter either the Find Number or the Reference Designator. In either case, the value must be unique.
      • and = Users must enter both the Find Number and the Reference Designator and both values must be unique.

  4. To specify fixed or variable length for the Reference Designator attribute in the BOM, follow these steps:
    1. Add or edit this line in the file used to import properties into a page object 

      emxEngineeringCentral.ReferenceDesignatorLength=0

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:

      • 0 = Specifies that the reference designator can be any length.
      • Any positive integer value = Specifies that the reference designator must be a fixed length. For example, a value of 8 means that the reference designator must be 8 characters or less.

  5. To specify that the Reference Designator field is a required field, follow these steps:
    1. Add or edit one or more of these lines, depending on the major part type (Part, Electrical Part, or Mechanical Part): 

      type_Part.ReferenceDesignatorRequired=true

      type_ElectricalPart.ReferenceDesignatorRequired=true

      type_MechanicalPart.ReferenceDesignatorRequired=false

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:

      If this property is set to true,

      If a setting is not defined for a subtype, the app looks for a setting for the parent type. If no setting for the parent type is defined, the app looks up the type hierarchy until it finds a setting.

      • true = When users enter or edit a Reference Designator, the app validates the Reference Designator based on the ReferenceDesignatorRequired setting for the part being added or edited.
      • false = The reference designator for the specified part is not required.
      Note: If either the FindNumberUnique or ReferenceDesignatorUnique global property setting is set to true (but not both), the app shows that value as a required field, regardless of the settings for type_Part, type_ElectricalPart, or type_MechanicalPart.

      If you add a type that needs a different setting, you must define properties for that type. The format is: symbolic name for the type, followed by the property setting. For example: 

      type_ResistorPart.ReferenceDesignatorRequired=true

  6. To specify the delimiter for a list of reference designator values, follow these steps:
    1. Add or edit this line in the file used to import properties into a page object 

      DelimitedReferenceDesignatorSeparator=,

      You can specify a reference designator as a single value, a group of values delimited by a separator, or a range of values.

    2. The delimiter for multiple values can be any keyboard character (comma by default). Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements.
  7. If needed, continue editing the page object. If finished, save the page.
  8. When finished updating the text file with all properties you want to modify, including the ones shown here, use the text file to modify the emxEngineeringCentral.properties page object. For more information, see Editing Properties Using MQL.