I know we can't be the only ones with this headache. Customer sends
2D or 3D files. Sometime later they send new "corrected" files but don't give it a new document number or revision. Our database doesn't care (it uses unique longint number to identify) but when you start looking for a file we depend on PN+rev. That's also how the customer will identify it. It looks to me like we are going to have to add a third identifier when searching for the file.... How do other folks handle this?Mark B.
whoever receives the customer file can't rename it per your conventions?
Why not use a simple PDM system?
You can create a history of each file the customer gives you and give it a revision internally,
Mike
mark Bannister wrote:
This may be more workable in some cases than others, but can you insist on a new revision when new files are sent? I have done this on occasion. Although some customers sometimes resist making a revision for what are often described as "minor" changes, they generally understand the importance once it is explained.
Well, sometimes this works. Other times the customer's revision system is so cumbersome that they don't it use unless the change is significant. Typcially this is why I get a file without a revision change.
This is the sort of thing I guess we are going to have to do. I can't think of anything else.
One machine shop I work with receives many files from a wide variety of clients and undocumented "revisions" are not unusual. Their approach is to put an electronic date code on every file received from clients. Unless the client sends two versions of the same file on the same day, each file is unique and correlated with the history by date. All hard copies that are printed include the date code so the hard copy can be tied back to the correct digital files. This date code is a third identifier, but it proves to be a useful addition for a variety of reasons.
I've seen this a lot in lots of company's. Their so proud of the fancy ISO system that they got figured out, but the thing is so convoluted and needs so many different signatures, paperwork and a flow chart just to try and figure out what the hell your doing and all you want to do is a simple spelling correction....So people cut corners.
It's good for the competition though.
ISO certification....it doesn't guarantee that a company won't make a junky product, it just guarantees that they can make a well documented junky product.
Dave
The other posters have offered some good thoughts on this and I won't say much that way because I have been there other than having to unconfuse a confused customer is not always something engineers should be doing. One could after all construe two different files with the same p/n and revision as a way to get "free" changes out of a vendor.
On a more practical note this is something that SW Utilities was made for. When you get two models with the same identifiers, run them through compare geometry and document the changes. That information is likely to be the most useful in jogging the customer's memory. Use DWGEditor for 2D files bringing one in on one layer and the other on another layer.
Where is this command?
It is an add-in. If you bought SW Office, then you have it. You can (or, at least, could) buy it separately as well.
Jerry Steiger Tripod Data Systems "take the garbage out, dear"
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