Didn't have any luck the last time I posted this question, and it may be that nobody knows an answer, but I thought I would try one last time. I've tried in the eng-tips.com Solidworks forum also with no luck, so there's apparently no obvious answer. Anyway, I'm working "direct" now for a company and am transitioning them to SolidWorks from AutoCAD, and I'm working in SolidWorks 2005. Perhaps2006 or the Beta of 2007 has the following problem fixed, but I can't test that. I would certainly think that it would be worth fixing if it's broken.
The Truarc retaining rings in the Toolbox are a bit of a problem to ME specifically because my new employer (like many companies) don't buy from Truarc. They buy from Rotor Clip which has basically identical parts -- at least geometrically -- with analogous part numbers. That's NOT the problem. The problem is to do with creating and then editing a new set of standards data.
What I wanted to do was to "Create New Standard" (using the Truarc library as the "Designed From" source) for Rotor Clip retaining rings. Then of course I wanted to edit the standards data for that new standard library so I could put in proper part numbers for Rotor Clip. There are "Export" and "Import" functions available from the "All Configurations" tab for each of the various kinds of External and Internal rings. That's a really nice thing, ostensibly enabling one to export to a spreadsheet, modify the data wholesale there and then reimport into the standards data. The only problem is that the "Import" function doesn't work!! It appears to work -- or at least be doing something -- when you 'point to' the spreadsheet that has been modified, but after finishing the Import function (without any error messages) nothing has actually changed. The data is just the same, and I can confirm that also by trying to insert parts from that Toolbox library. I note that if I don't make the modifications according to understandable rules I DO get an error message, so obviously there IS code evaluating the spreadsheet as it is trying to import the data.
For those who want to use this great functionality, that's really frustrating. I have checked to make sure that the problem exists on more than one installation, and have also checked to make sure that I'm not trying to modify a file with a Read Only (or Hidden or System) attribute bit set. No such luck. Does anyone know of a "fix" or am I SOL? Does anyone even know whether this functionality works in 2006?
TIA Mark 'Sporky' Stapleton Owner, Watermark Design, LLC (my one-man company)