Mirroring the PDMW Vault 1

[BsyGrl]

I know I saw a thread on this topic, but I can't find it now...

At my company, we use two outside contract design and drafting services. One is in the U.S., but in a different state from us, and the other is in India. I spend a huge amount of time getting files for them and trying to control what files they can and cannot change.

I would like to somehow mirror our PDMW vault, with the Advanced Server Web Access, and give them access to the files they need. I would need control over what they see, to protect intellectual property rights.

Is this possible? Has anyone done it? How difficult is it? How well does it work?

Thanks,
Valerie

 

[engAlright]

We've tried this using Rsync - an open source byte-level replication tool. It was, as they say, a major disaster. PDMWorks generates too many little files for these types of programs to work - it was crippled trying to index 200,000+ files on our relatively modest 40GB vault.

There's a number of ways to provide them with access to read files, it's another story entirely if they need to modify files. If you mirror, how do you guarantee that they're always looking at the latest version if it's uncontrolled?

We are looking at a PDM solution called Conisio to do this very thing.

Another option, if those other locations don't care too much about high-quality graphics and there's only a few of them is to use Remote Desktop Connection to control a computer that is in your office, then work on the local files from there.

 

[ctopher]

We have a plant elsewhere and we have them use remote desktop to our server. As engAlright write, it can be a desaster.

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP1.1 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site

 

[MElam]

We have the same issue, which is one of the reasons we did not go with PDMWorks (went with DBWorks). PDMW is great for doc control in small companies, but is not an enterprise solution.

 

[J-C]

How is DBWork working out?

Jason Capriotti
Smith & Nephew, Inc.

 

[MElam]

Honestly, still implementing. We got waaay behind in the process due to a lack of our internal resources (but that's a good thing - sales are up and projects needed to get out!). We are now getting back on track. I'm bulk-loading while forum surfing.

The guys at mechworks have been great to work with. Any issues we have had so far have been addressed quickly. Some are even new features in the core product now.

Are you guys still looking?

 

[BsyGrl]

I just had a look at DBWorks. That would have been the way to go had I known about it. MElam, I'm going to try to remember to check in on you in a couple of months to see how it's working for you.

We just implemented PDMWorks about a month ago. It's not feasible to switch gears now, but I'm going to keep my eye on DBWorks. I'll submit a feature request to PDMWorks. Maybe they'll feel like being competitive and save me the trouble of switching.

Thank you, everyone, for some great info.

-Valerie

 

[J-C]

We had a quote for DBWorks but still couldn't get upper management to approve. I've now switched companies and using MatrixOne now . It really blows for cad integration.

My old company is still waiting..........

Jason Capriotti
Smith & Nephew, Inc.

 

[MElam]

BsyGrl,
PDMW may eventually get there. At the time we were evaluating, SWx was pushing SmartTeam as their enterprise solution so they did not seem like they were doing much with PDMW. Now may be different. We don't like to make decisions based on "eventually".

Gildashard,
We did look at MatrixOne, and the complexity was scary! We only have to tie in Swx and ACAD so we didn't need the highly complex, do everything packages like you might need with UG. And it was still lacking in some of our requirements.

 

[J-C]

Complex is right, but's intended to compete at the upper end. There are some cools things about it like viewing the data however you want. Their interface for CAD is horrible and not user friendly.

UG has it's own big PDM called Teamcenter but it's complex as well I believe.

Jason Capriotti
Smith & Nephew, Inc.

 

[PDMAdmin]

Is this possible? Has anyone done it? How difficult is it? How well does it work?

It is possible, and several of us in this forum have done it, including me. It is quite difficult, and you need to work with people who really know what they are doing; otherwise you could end up with a corrupted vault. If done right, it works very well. However, SolidWorks does not support that kind of vault replication; in fact, their official position is that they don't recommend manipulating vault files in any way.

The most reliable setup I have found is to use Unix servers along with the "rsync" command. However, you need to do extensive testing to make sure it will do what you need it to do.

 

[SolidsMaster]

Don't lose site of PDMW's intentions. Many people want PDMW to do what big ERP systems do, and vice-versa. You can have everything. PDMW was design by an engineer for an engineer to control SW docs.

J

 

[J-C]

When I questioned SWX on this I was told it was not possible using replication utilities out there since PDM/works caches metadata information (for speed) in the memory of the server, therefore replicated data at the relpicated site would not be current.

Jason Capriotti
Smith & Nephew, Inc.

 

[engAlright]

To expand on Gildashard's point...

You CAN replicate data between vaults, but it has to be done as a "batch" process. Once the PDMWorks vault has started up and cached everything in to RAM it doesn't pay much attention to what exists in the directory structure anymore. So files could be replicated/modified while the PDMWorks vault service is running BUT it's likely that corruption will result when the service has to go back to the directory to look for certain files and they're not there or they're different.

You therefore can't have real-time replication.

 

[BsyGrl]

Thank you all so much for some very informative posts. Although it would be great if the offsite personnel could collaborate as easily as the onsite folks, I see that it's not in the cards just yet - at least with our current setup and the limited amount of time I can spend on it right now.

Plan B: It would cut down on a lot of hassle if the offsite folks could at least access and download files for themselves.

engAlright said, "There's a number of ways to provide them with access to read files." What are the best options to give them read-only access?

 

[engAlright]

If they just need read access, you have a couple of options to get them the data:

-once a day batch download to the remote server from the vault using the PDMWorks api (if you have advanced server) - you could set this up to download the contents of an entire folder, or maybe documents modified in the last day

-PDMworks webportal - though I would be a little concerned with security

-remote user's can VPN in to your office and access the vault the normal way with the client or...

-remote user's can VPN in and use remote desktop sharing to a local computer to manually copy over what they need, or if your network supports it, work on the documents directly