Creating a Catalog  

Creating a Catalog
Adding a Chapter
Adding a Link to Another Catalog
Adding a Family
Adding a Part Family
Adding a Keyword
Adding a Family Component
Adding a Generative Part

 

This section introduces the Catalog Editor workbench which provides interactive commands to create and modify your own catalogs by adding chapters, keywords and descriptions.

 

Creating a Catalog  

  1. In the Start menu, select Infrastructure -> Catalog Editor.
    The Catalog Editor workbench appears.
    An empty catalog containing a first chapter is created.

Another way to create a catalog is to:
  • click the New icon or select the File->New... command
  • then, in the New dialog box, select CatalogDocument and click OK.

The icons available in the Catalog Editor are updated, i.e. grayed or not, according to the contextually edited element. For example, if you double-click a family you will only be able to add a keyword or a description.

The Keyword Name is automatically added if a chapter or a family is added with interactive commands. However, to ensure compatibility with the Batch, the keyword Name is not added through batch procedure.

Now let's add elements to our catalog!

 

Adding a Chapter  

A catalog consists of chapters and each chapter consists of families. In our example, the ALL_FASTENERS.catalog consists of a chapter, ALL FASTENERS, and three families, SCREWS, NUTS and PINS.

You have opened the ALL_FASTENERS.catalog.
  1. In the left-hand part displaying the catalog structure, double-click to activate the chapter under which you want to create a chapter or a subchapter. This chapter must not be a family.

  2. Click the Add Chapter icon or select the Insert -> Add Chapter... commands from the main menu.
    The Chapter dialog box appears.

  3. Key in the name of your new chapter in the Name field.

    When creating a sub-chapter, you can check the Copy Keywords option to copy the keywords of the father chapter. The values of the copied keywords are identical to those of the father chapter but you can modify them.

    After the sub-chapter has been created, new keywords added on the father chapter will not be propagated to the sub chapter.

  4. Click OK.
    The new chapter is created and displayed in the catalog structure.

 

Adding a Link to Another Catalog   

You can create a link to another catalog.
  1. Open the catalog to which you want to create a link.

  2. Activate the ALL_FASTENERS.catalog window.

  3. Click the Add link to another catalog icon or select the Insert -> Add link to another catalog... command from the main menu.

  4. Activate the window of the other catalog, then select the chapter or the family to be linked.
    The link is created.

An icon is displayed in the graph and its appearance changes according to the selecting item: family or chapter.

 

Adding a Family  

The family you are going to create will be directly added to the current chapter.
  1. Click the Add Family icon or select the Insert -> Add Family... command from the main menu.
    The Component Family Definition dialog box appears.

  2. Indicate the name of the family in the Name text-entry field.

  3. Click the Type selection button and select an application type from the displayed list.

You can check the Copy of Keywords option to copy the keywords of the father chapter. The values of the copied keywords are identical to those of the father chapter but you can modify them.
 
 
  1. Click OK.
    The family is created.

 

Adding a Part Family  

A part family is made of components referring to a .CATPart document. This part is unique but has been assigned different sets of parameter values, each of them being stored in the form of a table (a "design table") either in a Microsoft Excel file on Windows or in a tabulated text file.
For more information on design tables, see Design Tables in the Infrastructure guide.

This section shows you how to add a part family from a selected document (i.e. a .CATPart document) managed by one or more design table.

Bear in mind that:

  • the design table must contain a column entitled PartNumber, otherwise you will not be able to add the part family to the catalog. Each description is associated to a row in the design table using the PartNumber keyword
  • you cannot add a part family if the generative part referenced by the design table is already opened in an editor
  • Excel files are not supported on UNIX. As a consequence, if your design table is in .xls format, you need to convert it to the .txt format to be able to use it. You must then reroute the link of the .CATPart document from the former .xls design table to the new .txt design table: to do so, select the Edit -> Links... command then use the Replace button


  1. Select a chapter.

  2. Click the Add Part Family icon or select the Insert -> Add Part Family....
    The Part Family Definition dialog box appears.
    A default name, that you can modify, is given to the part family.

  3. Click the Type selection button and select an application type from the displayed list. 

  4. Under the Reference tab, click the Select Document button to define the document that will be referenced.
    Note: This selected document should be a CATPart with at least one associated design table, otherwise an error message will be displayed.)
    The Type field will be automatically filled according to the file you selected.

    If the document you selected contains more than one design table, the following dialog box appears:

    You select a design table from the list and click OK to validate your choice. Note: If you added the keyword CATCatalog_ResolveDescription to the design table, the descriptions containing the value TRUE (or T) will be resolved.

 
  1.  To define the Resolution mode, click the Resolution mode selection button and select the desired mode from the list.

    • Descriptions can be resolved - resolve the Description manually via the user interface or an API
    • Descriptions will be resolved - always resolve the Description
    • Descriptions cannot be resolved - never resolve the Description

     

    You can create and resolve a Part Family in one step by choosing the Resolution mode Descriptions will be resolved.

     

  2. To define the Synchronization mode, click the Resolved Description synchronization mode selection button and select the desired mode from the list.

    • Always regenerate the Part
    • Regenerate Part only if the Design Table row has been modified
 
  1. Click the Browser Preview tab to specify the type of browser preview you want to use:

    A Default document preview, which is the document stored in the .catalog file, is displayed. This default preview corresponds to the icon used by default to represent the catalog, i.e. .

  2. You can either choose to preview the document you point to by leaving the Default option activated or you can activate the External file preview option to preview an external file in .jpg, .bmp., etc. format.

    If you click the External file preview radio button, you can select a file in the Select File dialog box. The complete path will then be displayed.

    The "Store preview in catalog" option lets you save the preview in your catalog.

  3. Click OK. The part family is created and displayed in the specification tree.
    A sheet containing a component for each line of the design table is also created.

  4. When you double-click the part family in the specification tree, any corresponding information contained in the design table is displayed. Each information corresponds to a keyword in the chapter.

Note that you can hide or add part family definition and keyword values by selecting the corresponding item from the contextual menu.

Note: If the part family is not resolved, the images displayed in the Preview tab are based on the generic part for performance reasons. The display is based on the resolved parts only if the part family has been resolved.
 

 

 

Adding a Keyword  

The keyword will be added to the current chapter.
  1. Click the Add Keyword icon or select the Insert -> Add Keyword... command from the main menu to display the Keyword creation dialog box.

  2. Specify a name for the new keyword.

  3. Use the drop-down list to select the keyword Type. This list provides all knowledge types, i.e. Integer, String, Boolean, Angle, and so on.

  4. Enter a Default Value for the keyword. This value can be unset by clicking the Unset button. When you position your pointer on the Value field then right-click and select Range.... This command lets you define a minimum and a maximum bound for the description value.
     

You can uncheck the Visibility option if you do not wish the keyword to be visible. In that case, the keyword will be visible in the Catalog Editor only and not in the Catalog Browser.
 
  1. Click OK.
    The keyword is created and associated to the selected chapter.

The With discrete list of values option enables you to assign legal values to the keyword.

 

Adding a Family Component   

You can add components to families.
  1. Double-click a family to activate it.

  2. Click the Add Component icon or select the Insert -> Add Component... command from the main menu.
    The Description Definition dialog box appears.

    The three buttons detailed below are the only way to modify links to catalog components. You cannot use the Edit->Links... command to do this because it is relevant only for links between catalogs and not for links to components such as CATParts, CATProducts, etc.

  3. Click the Select document button if you want to select a referenced object. You can select the following document types:

    • CATDrawing (Generative Drafting or Interactive Drafting documents).
    • .CATPart (Part Design documents)
    • .CATProduct (Assembly Design documents)
    • .CATScript (macro files generated by Version 5)
    • .CATGScript (Generative Script files created by Version 5)
    • .igs (IGES documents)
    • .model (V4 model documents)
    • .session (V4 session documents).

    Your choice is displayed in the File name field.

    Or: Click the Select external feature button to choose a PowerCopy, a Details, a Formula or Rules Checks features in another document open in the current session.

    Or: Click the Select document in session button lets you create a component pointing to a document already opened in your current session.
    Clicking this button opens the Session document window which enables you to select a file from the list of currently opened documents as shown below:

    This window lets you filter the files by type and displays a preview of the selected file. This file will be considered as a "Document" in the Type field.

    Note that as far as ENOVIA LCA or ENOVIA VPM documents are concerned, the DocId is taken into account in the File name field.

  4. Click the Keyword values tab. This tab enables you to set values for all keywords you have previously defined.

  5. In the Keyword name list, select the element for which you want to set a value.

  6. Enter your value in the Value field.

    Note that you can click the Unset button to unset the displayed value.
  7. Click the Preview tab.
    A default document preview, which is the Referenced document, is displayed if you point to a document. If you point to a feature, nothing is displayed.

  8. Choose the Local preview option if you want to refer to a document stored in the .catalog file or the External file preview option to preview an external file in .jpg, .bmp., etc. format.

    If you click the External file preview radio button, you can select a file in the Select File dialog box. The complete path will then be displayed.

    You can also directly click the Select an external preview file button instead of clicking the External file preview radio button.

  9. Click OK when you have finished. 
    The description is created.

  10. You can either choose to preview the document you point to by leaving the Default option activated or you can activate the External file preview option to preview an external file in .jpg, .bmp., etc. format. If you click the External file preview radio button, you can select a file in the Select File dialog box. The complete path will then be displayed. The Store preview in catalog option lets you save the preview in your catalog.

  11. Click OK.
    The part family is created and displayed in the specification tree. A sheet containing a component for each line of the design table is also created.

  12. Double-click the part family in the specification tree, any corresponding information contained in the design table is displayed. Each information corresponds to a keyword in the chapter.

    Note that you can hide or add part family definition and keyword values by selecting the corresponding item from the contextual menu.

 

Adding a Generative Part    

This section shows you how to add components managed by a design table to an existing part family.
Excel files are not supported on UNIX. As a consequence, if your design table is in .xls format, you need to convert it to the .txt format to be able to use it. You must then reroute the link of the .CATPart document from the former .xls design table to the new .txt design table: to do so, select the Edit->Links... command then use the Replace button. (For more information on the Replace button, see Replace in the Infrastructure guide.)
 
 
  1. Double-click to activate the part family to be edited.

  2. Click the Add Generative Part icon or select the Insert->Add Generative Part... command.
    The Part Family Definition dialog box appears. The name of the active part family is displayed and can be modified.

  3. Click the Select Document button and choose the component that will be referenced.
    The Type of the selected document will be automatically displayed.

    If the document you selected contains more than one design table, the Part Family Design Table List dialog box appears to let you choose the desired design table.
  1. Click the Browser Preview tab and specify the type of browser preview you want to use.

  2. Select the Resolution and Synchronization modes. See Adding a Part Family, steps 5 and 6.

  3. Click OK to validate.
    The new generative part is added to the part family. When you resolve the generative part, the associated part family components will be generated.