Version Management in Manufacturing Finder

Manufacturing Finder supports change management by applying a minor version filter in the navigation tab. It also supports the minor/major functionality in the Smart Completion command and the Relations Navigator panel.

Note that this change management capability applies to product and manufactured item structures only.

This page discusses:

See Also
Managing Minor Version in Manufacturing Finder
Completing and Opening PPR Content
Relations Navigator

Introduction

Manufacturing Finder contributes to the support of customer change management, where the user manages the interchangeability of the manufactured items. In particular, to reduce the effect on some minor design modifications, the minor version functionality is available.

All the minor versions are a part of a minor family. The minor family is a part of a global project that enables any object of the family to be used in a given structure.

According to the minor/major sensitivity of the link that references the object, the application analyzes the component of the structure as a minor sensitivity case or a minor insensitivity case.

The family contains a Best So Far (BSF) minor object that can be considered as the default or current object.

For Manufacturing Finder, the support of minor/major components is provided by filtering on the minor version.

In this context, the focus of this function is to provide a view of a structured assembly with the correct information regarding the minor status.

Filter

Managing the minor version in Manufacturing Finder is done by means of a minor version filter.

The main impacted functionality in Manufacturing Finder is the smart completion mechanism that introduces a specific consideration of the minor versions in the completion.

Other impacted behavior includes:

  • Default behavior of the expand mechanism: by default, the Expand command returns the BSF of the family.
  • Overload inside a filter (Expand with Exceptions): the Expand command returns the BSF object of the families.
  • Overload of a minor version through Filter command: a minor version of an object can be obtained from the Filter command.

See Filtering Data.

Note: For a session that has multiple root nodes containing minor versions, you must keep only a single root node for a given fake node. Roots can be removed using the Remove Tree contextual command. Then, you can select one of the possible minor versions.

Smart Completion and Relations Navigator

Support is provided for the minor/major functionality in the completion mechanisms provided by the Smart Completion command and Relations Navigator panel.

For multiple manufactured item roots, you must keep only one root that will receive the minor versions filter.

For the completion, several cases are possible. Also, depending on whether the completion is done from manufactured item to product or from product to manufactured item, the behavior is different. Note also that completion of the Manufacturing Finder session is not possible when several minor versions of an object are identified.

Completion from Manufactured Item to Product

A minor version of an object is identified when completing the Manufacturing Finder session and no minor filter is applied on the root: a minor filter is created on the root according to the minor version characteristics.

A minor version of an object is identified when completing the Manufacturing Finder session and a minor filter is applied on the root. If the filter contains a minor version of the same family, then it has to be the same as the minor version of the completion. Otherwise, a warning is issued to suggest modifying the current minor version filter.

Note that completion of the Manufacturing Finder session is not possible when several minor versions of an object are identified. A possible solution is to reduce the set of objects to be completed to avoid identifying several minor versions of an object during the completion.

Completion from Product to Manufactured Item

For the completion from product to manufactured item, the product can be implemented by manufactured item minor versions.

The behavior is different for user-defined completion and completion using the Relations Navigator.

Completion from Smart Completion and User-Defined Completion

Only the BSF minor version is kept and inserted in the Manufactured Item branch of the tree in the following conditions: several minor versions of an object are identified when completing the Manufacturing Finder session and no minor filter is applied on the root or the minor filter does not contain a minor version of the family.

Only the corresponding minor version is kept and inserted in the Manufactured Item branch of the tree in the following conditions: several minor versions of an object are identified when completing the Manufacturing Finder session and the applied minor filter on the root contains a minor version of the family.

Completion from the Relations Navigator

Minor versions of an object are displayed in the implementing column.

By double-clicking one of the implementing objects that contains a minor version, the manufactured item is updated with a compatible minor version filter or a warning is issued to indicate that the object cannot be inserted due to incompatible minor versions.