Hints & Tips

For this newsletter we will take a look at some of the common questions asked where answers are not so obvious. During the training courses, many of these questions are explained but for those who have been unable to attend....

Managing 'Splitters'
What are splitters ? I can hear nearly everyone asking that exact question.

Well... Splitters are a special way of managing Assembly Manager attributes from imported CATIA models. Currently when importing a CATIA model it is possible to read the solid attributes within Assembly Manager with the following options set during import.

However, when the data has been imported the information is presented as a single line of text and requires mapping to the relevant Assembly Manager data fields. This is done by splitting the text string using 'separators' and identifying the splitting field order. For example, the code field could be populated with all the relevant attributes: "code ; description ; supplier" , separated by a separator (in this case, a semi-colon). Different Catia file suppliers may have different templates for this management and the part list data can belong to different fields using different separator. The ability to set multiple configurations makes it possible to create an individual setup for each supplier.

Now we know what a splitter can do - let's look at a real example :

OK, we have imported a Catia file and the Assembly Manager data has been read directly into the SUPPLIER field. The result is displayed as "Hasco ; Cavity Plate ; K20/296x446x136/1.1730 ; 296x446x136 ; 1.1730" - This represents (in order) : Supplier ; Description ; Code ; Dimensions ; Material.

So, to correctly populate the Assembly Manager fields, it is necessary to create a new splitter configuration.

The 'Default AM Field' indicates which Assembly Field will be read when applying the splitter configuration. The order of the lowest level data fields must match the text order as each field will be populated with the relevant text in the corresponding position.

With the splitter correctly defined, it is only necessary to select the geometry within Assembly Manager and select "Apply Splitter" from the context sensitive right hand menu.

If you have any tips or tricks that you would like to share, please email me with a short description (marc@vero.co.uk) and I will add them to a future Vero Newsletter.

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