Product Center

[cadguy13]

Hi guys,

Is anyone using Product Center for Solidworks?

What are the pros and cons?

Thanks,

cadguy

 

[MadMango]

My company just dropped WTC's ProductCenter after spending $50k USD and wasting 24 months. We had nothing but trouble implementing and using it.

To be fair though, the representative my company worked with at the start was rather poor, and told us everything we needed to hear in order to make the sale. After word got out about this, WTC let the representative go. We were totally under the wrong impressions of what we could do with the software and how flexible it was.

Pros:
Can help manage the associative files of SolidWorks, plus many other different file types. Has WorkFlow capability which is nice if your company is ECO heavy. SolidWorks Integrator meshes well into the SW interface. Easy to use. Great technical support.

Cons:
Doesn't like batch loading of files. Interface from screen-2-screen isn't homogenous. You are dependant of ProductCenter to verify it is compatible with SW Service Packs before you can install them. It's very easy for users to totaly destroy and loose data in the Vault if they don't know what they are doing.

If I was brought into the descission making efforts for selecting a PDM solution, I would strongly suggest several things.

1- Clean and organize your legacy data first. Ensure all file names are consistant and there are no revision information in the file names.

2- Ensure that the PDM solution can be interfaced with your existing management software (PDM, ERP, etc), or can at least make use of the same databases.

3- Ensure you have well thought-out and sensible procedures in place for engineering efforts to manage your data files manually. If the system isn't working without PDM, chances the PDM software won't help.

4- My personal suggestion is to use PDMworks from SolidWorks if you want to manage your SW files. If you need enterprise wide PDM (which is ProductCenter's main purpose) then look into SmartTeam, also from SolidWorks.

I don't want to steer you into a different direction. There are comapnies that have successfully implemented and operate using WTC's ProductCenter. They wouldn't be in business this long if they weren't a viable solution.

Wanna Tip? faq731-376
"Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities."

 

[JNR]

Agreed. (BTW: SmarTeam belongs to Dassault System like SW, but it does not come from SW - they are independent - but SW is involved).

NO PDM system is going to be a walk in the park to implement. There is NO SUCH THING as out-of-the-box PDM (as opposed to minor file shuffling masquerading as PDM). Any sales person who tries to tell you there is should be immediately shown the door (he can dust the boot print off his pants on his own time). Depending on how sophisticated a system you purchase you should budget up to 3 times the amount of time to implement as you think you should. It may well be cost effective to employ a consultant who knows the system WELL to help you. Do a non-critical pilot project or realisitc simulation first.

We use SmarTeam. It is good, but has it's foibles like everything else. Certainly the user interface is much better than it used to be. Our (part time) SmarTeam adim. guy has written a lot a custom API, VBA and MACRO stuff which does a huge amount to simplify, streamline and improve the whole thing - very nice. I am sure he would be happy to discuss it with you if you decide on this program. Definitely go straight to the Oracle version!!!! The cheap version is a piece of s#$#%t. ('scuse my language, but I still remember those days....). You will defnintely need to address file naming and configuration naming, quite probably even change what you are currently doing. However, it does work very well. One other thing to remember when you have files that reference others - for example in-context edits - you will really have to consider what you are doing. This is not necesarily a SmarTeam issue, but a PDM one. We avoid these like the plague in most cases. But there are other ways to achieve this type of relationship if necessary.

Finally, you will always have the "wait for Rev/SP approval" issue with any CAPABLE PDM system. They have to go into the SW files and do ~things.....~ so you want to be sure that they are not going to hose your database. (We still have scars...) On the other hand we never load new revs or SPs of ANY software until the dust has settled anyway, so no big loss there.

3/4 of all the Spam produced goes to Hawaii - shame that's not true of SPAM also.......