Ghost Objects And Intralink Woe 1

[dcharles]

Please help.

Prior to our company getting Intralink, we spent many a man hour designing an assembly, sub assemblies and components that are driven by inputs given on a layout sheet. Every thing integrates wonderfully, until we installed Intralink.

The problem is that unknown to us, there are 3 ghost objects that appear in Intralink, and will not let us rename or copy the assemblies in question because of these ghost objects. We were told by PTC to create blank models and rename them to the ghost objects name.BY doing this, it works but it won't let us delete them. I've been through every model, drawing and none of the ghost objects are dependant on anything. But in Intralink they say they are dependant on other models and drawings. But when I go into those 'depending' models/drawings, the ghost parts are not mentioned in any of the scripts.

Question is, how can I delete these Ghost object for good? Or will I have to start the models/assemblies from scratch? I really hope not, there is many months work in there. Apart from this, everything works as it should.

ProEnginner 200i2
ProIntralink 3.1

Please help

Cheers

 

[dcharles]

SOrry we are running 2001 PRO E

 

[Tofflemire]

Hi Dcharles,

You have to fix all the assemblies outside of Intralink. use the tree item display command to see suppessed objects, either resume them or delete them.

Only import ONE assembly at a time into Intralink, if you have ghost take note of the file name and then delete this from WS. Leave all problem assemblies until the last after you have time to fix and reimport.

If you have drawing ghosts here are 2 config.pro setting that you show put into your config.pro, but turn off cleanup_drawing_dependencies when not importing into Intrlaink.

open_simplified_rep_by_default "NO" change to "YES"
cleanup_drawing_dependencies "NO" change to "YES"

cleanup_drawing_dependencies is a hidden command so you have to type or copy the whole line into the config.pro

Tofflemire

 

[dcharles]

Cheers for replying.

I have had a look 'outside' Intralink but the model tree doesn't show the offending (ghost) parts, neither does any of the information listings within the model/assembly. Spooky?

I cannot import only one assembly into Intralink as the main assembly feeds 3 small sub assemblies.

I am at my wits end.

 

[Tofflemire]

Hi Dcharles,

Do you want to send the Assembly to me via email? If so send to Jeff@metocean.ns.ca
In the Problem assembly move the insert here function (model tree_ after the first compenent, this reduces the file size, I'll take a look at it for you.

Tofflemire

 

[Tofflemire]

Hi Dcharles,

Just reading you problem again, have you imported the 3 sub assemblies first, are these clean? If not I would bring these 3 in first to rule them out as having ghost objects.
One other thing did you verify all the Assemblies and sub assemblies to ensure family table instances went in WS.
I still think there is something hiding there, another issue is that you may not be able to find these problems until Intralink is upgraded to 3.2, I imported into Intrlaink 3.0 but when we upgraded to to 3.2 there were some hidden dependencies that popped up later.

Tofflemire

 

[ohio30]

I know of your problem.. I had a similar problem. Ghost objects are not handled well with Pro/E 2000i2 and Intralink 3.0 or 3.1.
My suggestion to you is to get off both versions... switch to Pro/E 2001 and Intralink 3.2 They are tools in Intralink 3.2 that probably (you never know until you try) will handle your ghost object problems.
FYI: You may have to migrate your vaults to get to the Intralink 3.2 release? This is huge task, but well worth the trouble.

 

[Triston]

Try out the Global Reference Viewer if you have it... It can show you the hidden external references you might not have relized you had...

Most gost objects get created because before intralink you could refence an an object, then delete or remove it and not have you model fail... since it is not really needed (copy geoms for example)... But INTRALINK is a far more intelligent program and Knows that there are relationships that may be one day needed... These are the Ghosts... sometimes you can just delete them... but other times the require much more effort...

Here is a document link that should be inforamative for you...

http://www.profilesmagazine.com/p23/tips_dougherty.html

...

Maybe there is something there that will help!

 

[ZGuy]

Check to make sure that there area no models (parts or assy's) that were members of interchange assy's. The model will have a hidden dependancy to the interchange assy that was not kept.

Open to the model that I-Link says is dependant upon the ghost object. Set up - Interchange - Remove

If the ghosts were once used tools for interchanges, this will clear them easily.

Ghost could have been a regular assy created as a tool to mirror another model. If mirrored model was saved b4 the 'tool' was quit and "erase not displayed" you may likely be stuck w/ the PTC recomended technique until you migrate to later versions of Pro and I-Link.

One method to avoid many, but not all, ghost dependancies is NEVER TO IMPORT into I-link. A better method is to create a W.S., open a linked session of pro. Open the model/drawing to be migrated in Pro. When you save it in Pro, it will save in the W.S. This does reduce the # of unwanted dependancies though it won't eliminate them.

Good luck. I have a folder in C.S. just for the ghost object models that I have had to create 'cause I wasn't able to clean them or had time to fight the tougher ones.

Tom

 

[onlyadrafter]

Hello,

This may not be the best solution, or it may not even work in your circumstances, but we also have had this problem and the way around it was to suppress the rogue part, add a different part. The children then need to be re-constrained to this new part. The old part can be deleted from the assembly. You then re-do the above but with the old part. This has worked for me twice now. But the ghost is a right pain the a**e.



Hope this helps.

----------------------------------

maybe only a drafter
but the best user at this company!

 

[peppinu]

I am bringing up this subject again.
In 2001 and Intralink from time to time we had this problem of
trying to delete 3d objects from the workspace and Intralink was requesting that a drawing also had to be deleted. "cleanup_drawing_dependencies" used to solve it. Now we have Wildfire 2.0 and Intralink 3.3 and this config option is not working any more.
Any suggestions?

Joe Borg

http://www.methode-eur.com

 

[Tofflemire]

Hi Joe,

If I recall, if you did not have simplified reps in 2001, you have to set the config option "open_simplified_rep_by_default" to yes. You may also have to do this in Wildfire.

Hope that works.

Tofflemire

 

[peppinu]

We never use simplified reps, so I think the problem is somewhere else.

Joe Borg

http://www.methode-eur.com

 

[Tofflemire]

Hi Joe,

We do not either, just try it and see..

Tofflemire

 

[peppinu]

We tried it in conjunction with "cleanup_drawing_dependencies" and still did not work. Is there a procedure on how to do this?

Joe Borg

 

[Tofflemire]

Hi Joe,

After you have set both options, open the drawing and save it again, you should get a pop up window telling you the link was clean up. That is how it worked in 2001 and Intralink 3.2. You should not have to delete the drawing then.

Tofflemire

 

[peppinu]

Tofflemire
I think the problem now was that when we set this option we did not exit of proe. We exited and logged in again and it worked.
Thanks

Joe Borg

 

[Tofflemire]

Joe,

I/m glad I could help. I was not sure if it would work in Wildfire and Intralink 3.3.

Tofflemire

 

[Tofflemire]

Joe,

I just rememeber another thing. Do no leave these 2 options set to yes all the time. I can not remember the reason right now, but I was told this from PTC tech support. Maybe someone else reading this can remember why not to.

Just turn these option on when you have a ghost object in a drawing.

FYI, The ghost object is being created from a model that was once used to create view in the drawing. The view may have been delete and the model was delete from the list in the drawing models... just some piece of the link was left behind.

Tofflemire