Part Family - Adding columns to already existing Family

[NutAce]

Hi Guys,

I have some already existing Partfamilies where I want to ad a new column to the spreadsheet.
When I add the new expression (column) it will be appended at the end.
I have however my expressions at the begining of the list and my attributes at the end So I would like to have my new expression column before the attributes columns.
Is there any posibility to re-arrange the order of the columns without first removing them?

Ronald van den Broek
Senior Application Engineer
Winterthur Gas & Diesel Ltd
NX8.5.3 / TC9.1.2
HPZ420 Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-1620 0 @ 3.60GHz, 32 Gb Win7 64B
Nvidea Quadro4000 2048MB DDR5

HP Zbook15
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4800MQ
CPU @ 2.70 GHz Win7 64b
Nvidia K1100M 2048 MB DDR5

 

[aluminum2]

I read in the "what's new in NX10" file that they added the feature to re-arrange part family columns. Until then you have to delete your columns and then start adding them back in.

 

[JohnRBaker]

OK, there is a way to do this and aluminum2 alluded to how but I don't think he was explicit enough so that everyone caught the idea. Now before you do this it is CRITICAL that you follow these instructions to the letter.

Open you part file and open the 'Part Families' dialog (but NOT the spreadsheet). Now make sure that you've already created the expression(s) that you wish to 'insert' into the Part Family spreadsheet. You will see a list of all of the columns, in the order in which they appear in the spreadsheet, that you've already defined. Now select the columns, starting from the bottom of the list, up to where you want to insert the column(s) for your new expression(s) and DELETE them. Now BEFORE you do anything else, add you new expression(s) to the list and THEN add back onto the list the columns you just deleted until they're all back in the order that you wish them to be. Now and ONLY now, you can reopen the spreadsheet and you will find that the new expression column(s) have been added to the spreadsheet where you wanted them to be and the other columns will all be just like you left them the last time you opened the spreadsheet only located further to Right on the page. Now the column(s) that you just added, they will be empty except for the first row so you'll now have to go and populate the new column(s) with all of the expression values that you need to enter. Afterwards, you save and exit the spreadsheet as you've done in the past and then make sure that you save your part file.

This workflow has pretty much always worked but you have to be careful that you follow the above instructions carefully. This why we've recently added the ability to insert and reorder the columns from the 'Part Families' dialog since many people were not aware of the above workaround (it has never been documented).

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Engineering Software
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Digital Factory
Cypress, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[NutAce]

Hi John and Aluminum2,

Thanks for your replies!

John, the workaround you described I already knew of and works okay if you just follow the correct sequence.
But thanks for mentioning it anyway Looking forward to the new wow in NX10..

Ronald van den Broek
Senior Application Engineer
Winterthur Gas & Diesel Ltd
NX8.5.3 / TC9.1.2
HPZ420 Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-1620 0 @ 3.60GHz, 32 Gb Win7 64B
Nvidea Quadro4000 2048MB DDR5

HP Zbook15
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4800MQ
CPU @ 2.70 GHz Win7 64b
Nvidia K1100M 2048 MB DDR5