Combining Multiple Properties

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During the last couple of days I have been attending a SolidWorks workshop for Enterprise PDM implementation. The workshop has been very interesting and I’m sure all who attended have gained many ideas and and new concepts to use in future data management implementations.

During lunch one of the attendees (Simon Turner) got a phone call from one of his colleagues asking if custom properties can be combined?

First of all if you don’t know Simon let me fill you in… Simon is Technical Director of Solid Solutions Management, amongst his many roles he is a major part of the API team at Solid Solutions. We believe he played a part in programming the Matrix that we live in.

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Back to the Question… It took a couple of minutes but Simon and SolidWorks stepped up to the plate and worked out a great and simple solution.

Example: You are doing design work for a client and you want a “Client Code” that comprises of part number (SW-Part Number), client name (Customer) and location (Location).

1. Add a Custom Property to your Part template

With the properties: “SW-Part Number”, “Customer” and “Location” already added to the template. Add another property called “Client Code”. For the value add the following:

$PRP:”SW-Part Number”–“$PRP:”Customer”–$PRP:”Location”

This works for any property and any number of properties with whatever separator you like!!

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2. Add this to you Property Tab

Using the same properties and syntax as above you can create a new or add to an existing property tab.

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If you haven’t used the new property tab and property tab builder, make sure you check out the SolidWorks 2009 What’s New Manual (found under the SolidWorks help menu)

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SOLIDWORKS

Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corp. offers complete 3D software tools that let you create, simulate, publish, and manage your data. SolidWorks products are easy to learn and use, and work together to help you design products better, faster, and more cost-effectively. The SolidWorks focus on ease-of-use allows more engineers, designers and other technology professionals than ever before to take advantage of 3D in bringing their designs to life.
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