GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA Version 2.0

Transcription

1 Release Notes GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA Version 2.0 February 2014

2 Introduction GRANTA MI from Granta Design is the leading materials information management software system for engineering enterprises. GRANTA MI meets the disparate needs of the materials experts, product designers, engineering analysts, data publishers, and other professionals who work with information related to metals, composites, ceramics, plastics, and other materials. GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway enables data and tools from GRANTA MI to be accessed from within CAD, CAE, and PLM software. Users can access and browse a corporate materials database (and/or Grantasupplied reference data), choose applicable materials, and assign those materials to parts within their design or simulation model. A variety of analytics, dashboard, reporting and data output tools are available, depending on the host system and the GRANTA MI modules licensed for your corporate installation. GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA is an application running within the CATIA product design and innovation software from Dassault Systèmes. Scope of these Release Notes These Release Notes cover the following versions of this release of MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA: Version 2.0.0, which is compatible with GRANTA MI Version 2.0.1, which is compatible with GRANTA MI Version 2.0.2, which is compatible with GRANTA MI Version 7 All of these 2.0.x versions of MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA support CATIA V5 (V5R18, V5R19, and V5R20). For comprehensive instructions on installing and configuring this software, see the document Installing and Configuring GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway, included in your MI:Materials Gateway installer package. Note that instructions for post-installation configuration, specific to CATIA, are provided on page 6 of these Release Notes, below. For full end-user resources and User Guide, see How can installing this release help you? Version 2.0 of MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA features a new user interface for enhanced ease of use and productivity, support of materials version control and notification, and a variety of other enhancements. Table 1 on page 4 summarizes the benefits to specific categories of user. Listed by function, new capabilities introduced in Version 2.0 include: A new User Interface providing an enhanced user experience: o New, modern look & feel toolbars and icons o Faster, more responsive operation o More intuitive context (right-click) menus o Double-click default actions on menus o Context-sensitive menus for single or multiple selection 2014 Granta Design Ltd page 2 of 7

3 o Configurable columns in tables, including option to display/hide o Filtering on column contents o Progress bars showing status of many actions o Search results ordered by rank o Page sizing on search results Support for CATIA single part mode. Previously, MI:Materials Gateway relied on a CATProduct file being open now, in addition, the system will also operate when a CATPart file is open. Enhanced interaction with assignments: o Hierarchical BoM representation instead of flattened list of parts. o Assignments can be copied and pasted between components. o Ability to remove process and surface treatment assignments. o Column showing CAE material model assignments. Assignment configuration: o Default model assignment. A new configuration option is available to enable additional properties such as linear-elastic properties to be imported to the CAD model when a material is assigned. This is a server-based option, and will apply to all users. Note that default model assignment is available in Version (for MI Version 7) only. o Support for functional density. Previously, MI:Materials Gateway operated only with single-point density values. In recognition of the requirements of companies for whom density is a function of temperature, support for this has now been provided, including in the Bill of Materials dashboard and report. Support of materials data Version Control, and associated notification. Note that this requires Version Control to be activated in the relevant databases. o When MI:Materials Gateway is launched, the version of each assignment in the CAD/CAE model is checked against the version of the associated record in the database. o Out-of-date assignments are notified to the user, who can choose to update them all, or consider and update each one individually. o Filters may be applied to the assignments page to show only out-of-date assignments. o Version control support also now extends to versioning of the FEA exporter programs themselves, where this has been implemented by your GRANTA MI administrator. This feature is available in Version only. Enhanced handling of units o Reports are now produced in the unit system selected in Gateway. Additional report and data output flexibility o BOM export to XML file. Assemblies and sub-assemblies now have a menu item enabling export of the Bill of Materials to a file, according to the available schemas. In Version (MI Version 7), this may be configured on or off by the GRANTA MI system administrator. o Support for additional Bill of Materials report formats: PDF, CSV, XML, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word Granta Design Ltd page 3 of 7

4 Individual debug log files o An individual debug log file is now created for any 24 hour period in which one or more MI:Materials Gateway sessions is run making it quicker and easier to identify an issue in system operation, should one occur. The name of the resulting file (previously simply debug.log) now has the format gateway.hostname.yyyy-mm-dd.log. For example, gateway.catia V log. Table 1 Benefits of this release, categorized by applicability to specific interest groups Interest group Relevant features Key benefits Business process owners, for Materials Data Management Design/CAD and Simulation/CAE communities CAD and CAE systems administrators Support of materials data Version Control New User Interface, with refreshed look and feel, and faster operation Enhanced interaction with assignments Assignment configuration Support of materials data Version Control Enhanced handling of units Additional report and data output flexibility Individual debug log files Ability to ensure full traceability of materials information used in CAD and CAE Ability to ensure relevant stakeholders are informed of materials updates, preventing risk of using out-of-date information Enhanced user experience, and productivity Better insights including version, and version of CAE material model, if applicable - into the materials assigned to design and simulation models Ability to ensure full traceability of materials information used in CAD and CAE Ability to ensure relevant stakeholders are informed of materials updates, preventing risk of using out-of-date information Greater flexibility in configuration, enabling more extensive templating and minimizing of repetitive operations for users Quicker and more informed analysis of connection and authentication problems Installing MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA There are three aspects to installing MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA: ensuring that your company has the appropriate server components installed, installing the MI:Materials Gateway clients, and postinstallation configuration of the CATIA toolbar. Server installation Check with your GRANTA MI system administrator that your company s MI:Server installation includes the correct versions (see Table 2 below) of the MI:Service Layer and reporting package, and any appropriate Granta reference data modules. Client installation on the host CAD machines Follow the installation instructions available with the download. Note that, especially for installations on multiple machines, it is likely that your 2014 Granta Design Ltd page 4 of 7

5 deployment may be required to follow procedures relating to deployment and support of the host CAD system. CATIA toolbar configuration The additional instructions that need to be followed to complete the Gateway installation are provided in the section Post-installation instructions on page 6 below. On completion of the software installation, make sure that the MI:Materials Gateway configuration settings have been updated, as applicable. For comprehensive instructions on installing and configuring this software, see the document Installing and Configuring GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway, included in your MI:Materials Gateway installer package. If you have any problems, questions or feedback, please contact us: Prerequisites and supported platforms Table 2 MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA Version 2.0 software prerequisites Host system versions: Client operating systems: Client web browser: Other 3 rd party software: Granta software versions: CATIA V5R18, V5R19, or V5R20 Windows 7, 64-bit Windows Vista, 64-bit Windows XP, 64-bit As per GRANTA MI support policy Windows Vista, 32-bit Windows XP, 32-bit Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) MI:Materials Gateway installer version MI:Server version (min) MI:Service Layer version (min) Custom reporting package version (min) Important notes: This MI:Materials Gateway may require an MI:Service Layer version more recent than that supplied with your original GRANTA MI installation please check the specified versions above. In particular, if you are running GRANTA MI Version 6, you must ensure that you have obtained and installed the minimum Service Layer version specified above. MI:Materials Gateway requires Gateway-ready versions of GRANTA MI databases. This is a straightforward configuration, which is done already for Granta-supplied reference data modules. If you are accessing Granta reference data modules and wish to take advantage of the latest data and features, you should also ensure that you have installed the latest version of these data modules that are compatible with your GRANTA MI version Granta Design Ltd page 5 of 7

6 Post-installation instructions After MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA has been installed, a toolbar and shortcut must be created in CATIA V5 to provide access to MI:Materials Gateway functionality. There are two ways of doing this: Manual configuration: Each user modifies the CATIA configuration to add the toolbar. This has the advantage of simplicity, but the disadvantage that every CATIA user must complete the steps detailed below. Centrally automated configuration: The administrator manually modifies the CATIA configuration to add the toolbar, saves the resulting settings file, and distributes this for each CATIA user to install locally. If an organization works with CATIA using standardized settings files that are held centrally, this has the advantage that the manual configuration step needs to be performed only once, and there is no loss of pre-existing customizations. Manual configuration In CATIA V5, modify the CATIA configuration to add a new MI:Materials Gateway toolbar as follows: 1. Load the GRANTA_CATIAV5_GATEWAY.catvba macro: a. On the Tools menu, point to Macro and then click Macros. b. Click Select and open the file GRANTA_CATIAV5_GATEWAY.catvba in <install_directory>\macro, where <install_directory> is the installation location of the MI:Materials Gateway application. By default, this is C:\Program Files\Granta\Granta MI Materials Gateway for CATIA V5\ Change the extension type to MS VBA Files (*.catvba) to help you locate this file. Note: If the *.catvba file extension is not available, VBA is probably not installed. It comes as part of Microsoft Office. To enable it, see Enabling VBA below. c. Close the Macros window. 2. Create a new toolbar: a. On the Tools menu, click Customize, then click the Toolbars tab. b. Click New, and in the New Toolbar dialog box, enter the name GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA V5, and then click OK. An empty toolbar is created. 3. Add the macro to the toolbar, and choose an icon for it: a. In the Customize dialog box, click the Commands tab. b. In the Categories list, select Macros and select the toolbar you added in Step 2.b above (GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway for CATIA V5). c. Click Show Properties. d. Click Browse and locate the icon that will appear on the toolbar: For a 32-bit installation: <install_directory>\intel_a\resources\graphic\icons\normal\granta_gateway.lc.bmp For a 64-bit installation: <install_directory>\win_b64\resources\graphic\icons\normal\granta_gateway.lc.bmp 2014 Granta Design Ltd page 6 of 7

7 e. In the Title box, change the command title to Launch GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway. f. Drag the Launch GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway command from the Commands list and drop it onto the empty toolbar you created in Step 2 above. 4. Close the Customize dialog, and ensure that you dock the new toolbar so that it is visible when CATIA is closed and re-opened. 5. Close and restart CATIA for these changes to take effect. You can now use the new toolbar button to launch the GRANTA MI:Materials Gateway application. Enabling VBA If MS VBA Files (*.catvba) is not available as a file extension, VBA is probably not installed. It comes as part of Microsoft Office. To enable it: 1. Open Control Panel 2. Click Programs > Programs and Features (Windows 7/Windows Vista) or click Add or Remove Programs (Windows XP). 3. In the list of installed programs, select your Microsoft Office program and click Change. 4. Select Add or Remove Features and then click Continue. 5. Expand the Office Shared Features entry. 6. Click the icon beside Visual Basic for Applications, and then select Run from My Computer from the drop-down list. 7. Continue through the installation. Centrally automated configuration If your organization customarily works using standardized settings in CATIA, and these settings files are held centrally on a server, the manual configuration can be performed on each settings configuration, and the modified settings files containing the Granta MI:Materials Gateway toolbar saved for distribution as normal Granta Design Ltd page 7 of 7