PDM/Works vs Generic RCS

[rokahn]

What is the advantage of PDM/Works vs generic source control applications such as freeware RCS.

They seem to do the same thing and PDM, although it's integrated, doesn't add much by its integration. For example, in PDM/Works, one must manually refresh the status of files to find out if they're newer than the vault. And if you open a sketch in a part and exit the sketch by saving (even if you don't save the part), the file will show up as newer than the vault version.

The only advantage I've noticed is PDM/Work's visual representation of dependency of files to assemblies.

Windows integration is nice but I can get CS-RCS (a windows GUI for RCS) for $100/seat and it's integrated into windows explorer. This means we can use it for all documents around the company.

Is there something I'm missing about the benefits of PDM over std RCS?

 

[CorBlimeyLimey]

Does CS-RCS handle configurations?

from (the City of) Barrie, Ontario.

If you ain't makin' waves, you ain't kickin' hard enough!

 

[Standing]

rokahn,
I do not know anything about RCS.
Some of the features I like about PDM/Works is the ability to put in Revisions, Revision versions, Custom Properties, Configurations, Window preview, Report writing, adding short note upon check-in, storing AutoCAD, Word and Excel forms. PDM/Works is linked within SolidWorks. Our VAR can handle any questions we have about PDM/Works. PDM/Works comes with SolidWorks professional. We did not need all the options that SmarTeam offered and once we started PDM/Works my work has been a lot easier.



Bradley

 

[ctopher]

In case you don't know, PDMWorks will not control revisions for each configuration. It is a file management system, not revision control system...but does handle revs for the files.

 

[rokahn]

Any revision control package allows one to check in arbitrary numbers of revisions with comments. They also allow one to check in arbitrary file types (Word, Excel, etc).

As the two earlier responders brought up, a generic RCS pkg won't know about SW configurations. I don't have much experience with configurations and I don't know how critical it is that the version control package understand them and allow users to select configurations through the PDM as opposed to manipulating configurations outside the revision control package.

I'm not sure how RCS would handle custom properties or how important this will be (I'm setting up our organization system for a small workgroup and we don't have experience).

FYI, my programming friends advised me to use Tortoise CVS which is a generic revision control system available for free from GNU.

http://www.tortoisecvs.org/