Doing a "save as" on an assembly with references in 2003...

Use SolidWorks Explorer...gain back productivity.

Kurt,

I also was surprised to experience this same thing a few months ago. I was too busy to post here, but am glad to see your confirmation. I have never really figured out SWX Explorer as the other poster mentioned. May be worth another look.

jk

If you are copying an assy...

Start SW Explorer

Open the assy

Right click the assy name in the feature tree, select "copy"

Check the option "save children"

Name appropriately.

Click "Apply"

Done.

What do you mean by "all references are lost"? Do you mean just the name that is shown in the FeatureManagerTree?

I seem to recall there being an issue early on (SP0?) where some text was not getting updated correctly/immediately... though the file references were actually correct. What service pack are you using?

To test: after doing the [File|Save As], select [File|Find References]. Are the referenced files listed correctly on the dialog?

-- Dean Mazure

Dean,

Good point, I just ran into the same issue. There is actually an option that everyone should check out. Under tools, options, external references there is an option "update part name in feature manager after replace" or something close to that.

Why would you not want the names to update? I dunno, probably just to confuse the hell out of someone (like myself!)

Todd

I remember running into the issue one day of replacing a part with another file of a different name and only the first instance of that part would actually have its name changed - the others would all stay as they were. However, if you did a RMB on one of them and went to properties, they did, in fact, point to the proper file. I wrote it off because a reboot of the machine seemed to fix it. But, I agree, why would you ever not want the name to update????

WT

I think this setting is a legacy of the way SWX worked previously. If you choose to save all files as part numbers only, in older versions you would only see part numbers in the feature tree in an assembly which wasn't very helpful. This could be overridden in the component properties dialog box so a description could be shown instead, but the descriptions got overwriten in some circumstances (I can't remember what they were however). The setting you're describing stopped the descriptions from being lost. Now we can show the description property in the tree it's possibly not required any more. Shane