Exporting X-CAD Design Management Data

You can access CAD data stored by X-CAD Design and use a simulation activity to export the CAD data to the working directory.

See Also
About X-CAD Design Management and Process Composer
Creating a Reference to a Document
Creating a Download Rule
In Other Guides
Searching with Predefined Queries
  1. Open X-CAD Design Management, and save the CAD data in a X-CAD Design Management document.

    The CAD application can be configured to automatically store files in X-CAD Design Management documents. Alternatively, you can manually upload CAD files to X-CAD Design Management documents. See the Designer Central User's Guide for more information.

  2. Open Process Composer, and create the simulation activity that will export the CAD data.
  3. Create a download step that will read the CAD data; for example, a step that will open the file in the working directory and generate a finite element mesh.
  4. Display the content of the simulation activity.
  5. Create referenced content from a selected data category of the simulation activity. The referenced content refers to the X-CAD Design Management document containing the CAD data.
    1. From the 3DSearch page that appears, use the 6WTags to show only Document type objects.
    2. Select additional categories and tags to add additional filters. For example, you can search for a specific revision, owner, description, or creation date.
    3. Select the CAD data, and click Submit.
    The referenced content appears in the selected data category.
  6. Toggle on the referenced content, and select Create Download Rule from the Actions menus.
  7. From the Create Download Rule window that appears, do the following:
    1. Select an Export Method of DesignerCentral Export.
    2. Choose an Exporter of DesignerCentralExport.
    3. Click Done to create the download rule and to close the Create Download Rule window.
  8. If desired, toggle on the CAD data to export, and select Actions > Set Input/Output > Set to be Input from the Content page toolbar.
    If you access the impact graph of the activity, the CAD data appear as input to the activity.
  9. When you run the simulation activity, Process Composer exports the CAD file from the X-CAD Design Management document to the working directory, from where it is accessed by the selected connector.