CGMs not allowed in PowerPoint

[carlharr]

Hi, apologies for the non-NX problem, but I'm interested in people's thoughts on this.

We tend to put automatically exported CGM files into PowerPoint for:
- marking up and sending to other Engineers internally
- sending to suppliers
- use in Presentations

CGMs are scaleable (never lose resolution on zoom), and we get them automatically in Teamcenter when parts are released.
Placed into Powerpoint, these are great for presentations and markups and also, PP can hold multiple drawing sheets / part drawings in a single file.

But... Microsoft have found a security flaw in CGMs and responded by switching off the ability to import CGMs into PowerPoint :-(

So, I am currently looking for workarounds.

One of our Engineers has found the EMF format available as an NX plot export; this is a manual export so its only really useful for creating presentations. But this format does appear "as good" as CGM, and is acceptable in Powerpoint.

For markups, I'm looking at TC Vis - this could work well if I can find out how to switch off saving data back into Teamcenter, think I may need to ask GTAC for advice on this one. Defnitely don't want Vis data saved back into Teamcenter!

Finally - the issue of sending CGMs to suppliers. PowerPoint is a universal format and holds the vector scaleability, so suppliers can zoom in on large drawings. This is the one I'm struggling with. Does anyone know of an alternative way to share CGMs with suppliers who don't have a CGM viewer?

Or any other thoughts on this?
Anyone a Microsoft insider who knows if they've found a way around the security issue?

Thanks, Carl

http://www.jcb.com

NX 7.5 with TC 8.3

 

[cowski]

Why not pdf's?
[ul]
[li]vector format (doesn't lose resolution)[/li]
[li]reader software is free/common[/li]
[li]possible to mark up/ sign off in file[/li]
[/ul]

www.nxjournaling.com

 

[Toost]

I have not used this tip i real life, but ... The JT2Go Viewer that I have does read CGM files.

Regards,
Tomas

 

[carlharr]

Hi, thank you for the replies.

PDFs are scaleable when viewed in adobe reader, but they do become pixelated when imported into PowerPoint.
So in the "design" phase, we're still looking for a method to produce presentations, and to mark-up drawings.

For mark-ups I'll carry on looking at Vis, which I think should be fine with our CGMs.
For presentations though, we still need a suitable vector format (or MS to find a fix!).
EMF looks ok, but it is a manual export, and a tricky one too - mine keeps hanging up. More testing tomorrow.

Ref. production drawings, I think the existing CGMs will be fine, and we should advise JT2Go for our suppliers.
It's easy to manipulate CGMs in Vis products using pan, zoom etc.
So all we've lost in here is grouping files in a single document, but this was a manual operation anyway.

Regards, Carl

http://www.jcb.com

NX 7.5 with TC 8.3

 

[cowski]

This microsoft kb article explains how to enable the import of cgm files. You may open your computer to an obscure attack vector, but if you are creating all the cgm files that you import, the added risk will be very small...

www.nxjournaling.com

 

[Toost]

An "Attack Vector" !?!
as if quoted from a star wars movie

Regards,
Tomas

 

[cowski]

www.nxjournaling.com

 

[carlharr]

Unfortunately our chief of security won't let us do this, something about lowering the shield on the moon base...

Maybe MS will find a fix instead of disabling the functionality.
Maybe Siemens will change export CGM into export EMF - humm do they work in Vis I wonder.

Or maybe I'll win the lottery and retire to a beach hut and it won't matter any more... I can dream!

http://www.jcb.com

NX 7.5 with TC 8.3

 

[jerry1423]

I know that CGM's can be brought in WORD.
Maybe you after bringing the CGM file into WORD you can figure out a good way to get that picture into PowerPoint.

 

[carlharr]

Hi Jerry,

I'm sure this affects all MS Office products, not just PowerPoint.

In any case, am making some progress with alternatives. The EMF export seems to work fine when I'm linked into Teamcenter NX, it only hangs up in native.
So this would do fine for presentations etc.

And then Vis mark-ups and JT2Go with our existing CGM files should solve the other issues.

Getting there...

http://www.jcb.com

NX 7.5 with TC 8.3