NX5: Can you display all external references?

[Simon205]

Hi,

Is it possible to display all references to a .prt file in NX5?

For example, if I open a part file, is there an easy way to show all assemblies, sub-assemblies and drawings that reference it?

Cheers,


Simon

 

[hudson888]

Simon,

I know of no way to do so in Native, but if you have Teamcenter then it will displayed under references.

Cheers

Hudson

 

[potrero]

Isn't there a dos utility that does something like this?

 

[hudson888]

Okay there is ugpc.exe which given an assembly as its starting point will find the components. There is also ugzipc which you can google for on the net and download as a third party add on. It does the same thing but creates a zip file. Either of these only work in native, but you don't need them in Teamcenter anyway.

Now Simon was using a term "external references" That if I'm guessing right refers to a lot more that just what ugpc.exe does and he probably picked it up elsewhere. One of the things ugpc won't do is look up the tree using a component to discover what drawing or other downstream use is made of it in other assemblies. That is a pretty big task by the way if you think of it in terms of knowing what files are related right throughout the entire file system of your machine or even and organization's network.

The other task one step beyond that would be to know which files all the linked geometry and expressions are drawn from. Again it isn't something for which I'm aware of any such function in native. I suppose that two or more versions of the same file may exist on a system to further complicate things as well.

Anyway that's what I can tell you.

Cheers

Hudson

 

[cowski]

There is such a tool in native. Search for the term "where used" in the assemblies help file. The help file will give you a sense of the capabilities and limitations.

 

[JohnRBaker]

Note that using the 'Where Used' feature in 'native' NX can be very slow since it uses a 'sledgehammer' method (it literally looks at every file in the search paths and sees if the designated file is referenced or not). Depending on how large an archive you're asking to be searched, it could take hours.

However, this is the sort of thing that PDM systems, like TeamCenter can do in seconds if properly set up.

So the bottom line, if you expect to perform these types of searches, you should seriously consider the longterm benefit of moving to TeamCenter, noting that there are many more reasons to use a PDM system, but certainly fast searches is one of really useful ones.

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Design
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

http://www.plmworld.org/museum/

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[shasbarg]

You can use ug_edit_part_names with the -list option to display all external references in a part. This includes assembly information, WAVE data and IPE.

S

 

[shasbarg]

Err maybe I should pay more attention to the original post. What I listed will give you what the part in question references not what refers to the part.

S

 

[Simon205]

Thanks for all the replies and suggestions. I was hoping there would be something more simple, like SolidWorks' File>Find References which finds all upstream & downstream files which are referenced to the file in question (be they assemblies, drawings or other parts), but it would appear not.

We will getting Teamcenter sometime soon, so hopefully that'll help things!

Cheers,


Simon