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Leveraging the Power of SOLIDWORKS Manage
SOLIDWORKS Manage is a unique set of advanced data management tools that leverage the file management capabilities of SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional and adds powerful project, process and item management capabilities with interactive dashboards and reports.
SOLIDWORKS Manage is an advanced item or record based data management system that includes, or sits on top of, the global file management and application integrations enabled by SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional. Major functional areas available in SOLIDWORKS Manage include Project Management, Process Management, Item Management and the creation of dashboards and reports.
Client and server requirements are basically the same as they are for SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional. SOLIDWORKS Manage runs on the same SQL Server® instance as SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional and has its own dedicated database that connects to SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional vault databases.
SOLIDWORKS Manage has a dedicated desktop User Interface (UI), but users can also access information and functions in Windows® Explorer, and via a SOLIDWORKS CAD add-in. There is also a browser-based UI that does not require any installation on clients. No matter how it is accessed, SOLIDWORKS Manage has an easy-to-use administration tool with graphical UIs, so companies can easily configure and manage the system without a dedicated IT support team or outside consultants.
Manage vs PDM Comparison Matrix
SOLIDWORKS PDM Standard | SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional | SOLIDWORKS Manage | |
---|---|---|---|
File Management | |||
Manage and control all your product development data. With SOLIDWORKS PDM, you can create and maintain a single data location and vault that can be accessed by users to store and retrieve files. SOLIDWORKS PDM manages all file references and automatically updates them whenever you move a file to a different folder or rename it, eliminating broken references or the time required to locate and fix lost references manually. | |||
Design and Reuse | |||
Quickly locate and reuse existing design data to save time and control costs. You can create a framework for quickly locating and reusing or repurposing existing design data. Instead of spending time trying to find prior designs on shared drives or local workstations—or recreating designs when you can’t find them—you can use SOLIDWORKS PDM tools to locate them quickly. | |||
Revision Management | |||
Track design changes and avoid the errors of manual methods. Track changes and maintain a complete revision history of a design’s evolution. | |||
Secure File Vaulting | |||
Establish a secure file vault to control access to sensitive or proprietary product information. With SOLIDWORKS PDM, you can create and maintain a single data location and vault that can be accessed by users to store and retrieve files. With SOLIDWORKS PDM products, data is kept secure, up-to-date, and accessible. The system eliminates duplicate work and delays, while saving time and development costs. Easily establish and assign individual and/or group user rights. Graphically represent the product development process through an easy-to-use flowchart interface in SOLIDWORKS PDM products. | |||
Revision Control | |||
Ensure you are always working with the “right version” of a design by using the revision and version control capabilities. Customize file naming and revision control schemes, maintain document history, and easily manage document versions to avoid the costly manufacturing errors associated with working with the wrong revision. | |||
Audit Trail | |||
Maintain a complete history of your product design, engineering, and development activities for reporting and auditing purposes. | |||
Integrated Search | |||
Save time and reduce development costs through design reuse by quickly finding needed data across a range of file types using the powerful searching tools PDM offers. You can quickly perform file content searches on multiple data types (such as CAD files, Microsoft Word documents, Excel® spreadsheets, Outlook® emails, and image files) and locate documents using a range of search criteria (including name, date, metadata, and workflow status). | |||
eDrawings Preview | |||
View eDrawings®, SOLIDWORKS, and AutoCAD® documents in eDrawings inside SOLIDWORKS PDM. | |||
Engineering Change Management | |||
Reduce the time to complete your design approval and Engineering Change Order (ECO) processes. Graphically represent the product development process through an easy-to-use flowchart interface. Engineering change documentation and change approvals become completely electronic with SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional. | |||
Bill of Materials Management | |||
Maintain, manipulate, and leverage Bill of Materials (BOM) information to support downstream applications and systems. Create individual BOM objects from existing CAD file structures that automatically update in parallel with the evolution of the CAD model, eliminating the frequent manual updates required when using spreadsheets. Connect your CAD data with your Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) or Manufacturing Resource Planning (MRP) systems, enabling you to easily update BOM information in other businesses enterprise systems. Use customizable templates to display BOM information in multiple formats or to format BOM information to meet the needs of a user or group. | |||
Regulatory Compliance | |||
Facilitate compliance with government regulatory requirements and industry standards. SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional can bolster compliance for several types of regulatory requirements, such as FDA, RoHS, ISO 9001 and 14000, ANSI, and others. | |||
Distributed Collaboration | |||
Collaborate throughout your organization while keeping people connected, current, and working on the same set of data. Create and maintain a single data location and vault that can be accessed by users worldwide to store and retrieve files. Configure the SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional system to automatically notify users when documents have progressed through various states or stages in the electronic workflow you establish. Automatically create many types of neutral file formats from SOLIDWORKS and other file types. | |||
Enterprise Scalability | |||
Connect the design data needs of your entire enterprise. Create and maintain a single data location and vault that can be accessed by users worldwide to store and retrieve files. In addition to preserving a secure backup of product design data, secure file vaulting eliminates multiple “silos” of information, duplicate files, and unsynchronized revisions. SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional software includes tools that enable you to configure and customize many aspects of your PDM system to match the specific needs of organizations of all sizes. | |||
Advanced Search and Favorites | |||
Save and share search criteria as “favorites”, providing you with instant access to common searches. | |||
Multi-Document Preview | |||
View multiple documents in the Preview window. | |||
Scalability | |||
Easily connect the design data needs of your entire enterprise, whether for just a few users in a single location or hundreds of contributors working in multiple locations. SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional provides one convenient, vaulted location where colleagues can store and retrieve data. Efficient file storage and retrieval enables millions of files to be managed. | |||
Automated Neutral File Creation | |||
Save time and effort communicating by configuring SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional to automatically create neutral file formats. | |||
Custom Configuration | |||
Map variables to both predefined properties (such as Title and Author) and custom named properties in SOLIDWORKS files. If a SOLIDWORKS file contains configurations, the configuration names appear as tabs in the datacard. Configuration-specific values are shown in the corresponding tab. | |||
Automated Data Import and Export | |||
SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional can import variable values from an XML file into a vault database. In the vault, existing files or items that match import criteria acquire the values at specified points in the file workflow. Create an export rule to export SOLIDWORKS PDM BOM variables that can be read into ERP systems. | |||
Serial Number Generators | |||
Use serial numbers to assign automatic names to files and folders, to assign unique IDs to items, or to add unique running values to card controls. You can set up any number of serial numbers in each vault. Item Number serial numbers are defined by default to generate unique item IDs. | |||
Distributed Design Teams | |||
SOLIDWORKS PDM Professional provides the tools and capabilities that your enterprise needs to keep people connected, up-todate, and working on the same set of data, regardless of location. This global connectivity supports the distributed collaboration that is essential for compressing engineering cycles and accelerating time-to-market. | |||
Remote Access | |||
Enable staff and partners to contribute through web-enabled portals from various connected devices including smartphones and tablets. | |||
Automated Approval Process | |||
Automatically facilitate multiple required approvers with parallel transitions. | |||
Email Notifications | |||
A SOLIDWORKS PDM Notification can be added from the Local Vault so that the logged-in user will receive an email message when a predefined event occurs in a file or folder. | |||
Project Management | |||
Provide critical information to help teams focus on important tasks, and provide an overview of resource capacity for better planning and utilization. Manage project stages, timelines, and milestones along with resource utilization and capacity. Utilize user tasks and timesheets to automatically track progress. | |||
Process Management | |||
Streamline business processes, automate document creation and bring together all involved stakeholders for new products, from sales and marketing to production and support. Configure states and decision points for all types of business processes such as Engineering Change Requests (ECR), Orders (ECO) and Notices (ECN), transmittals and approvals. | |||
Item Management | |||
Create, edit and compare complete bills of materials (BOM) by associating items, files and free text. Manage product variations for different use cases and applications. Drive SOLIDWORKS drawing bill of materials and item numbers directly from system data. | |||
User Tasks | |||
Provide users with the knowledge they need to work more effectively by utilizing tasks and calendars. | |||
Dashboards and Reports | |||
Create and distribute interactive graphical dashboards to display critical information. Configure reports to company standards and publish automatically or on demand. |
Key Benefits:
- Reduces the time in creating complete Bills of Materials(BOMs) through an easy-to-use editing feature that combines file and record data, and by automatically sharing product data with other business systems.
- Lessens the expense of maintaining multiple data management systems and separate applications by providing access to synchronized data all in one system and by eliminating the need for external resources or consultants.
- Avoids project development time and cost overruns by having all timelines, resources, tasks, and deliverables linked to a common project object and updated in one system.
- Provides project managers with information to make critical product development decisions with the help of interactive dashboards and an overall view of resource capacity.
Management Capabilities
SOLIDWORKS Manage offers powerful dashboard and reporting tools that can pull data, including project progress, resource allocation, and quality performance from every aspect of the system and present it in a very easy-to-consume way. It supports four major functional areas with the following capabilities:
Project Management
- Manage project stages from project inception to completion with start and finish links, Gantt chart, and Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) views.
- View overall timelines, critical path, and milestones.
- Assign resources to each stage of the project and view utilization and capacity.
- Assign user tasks to track stage completion and provide users with an up-to-date to-do list.
- Attach records and files in the form of a BOM, reference documents, and deliverables.
- Enable granulation time tracking through the use of timesheets.
- Track progress by utilizing user tasks completion, timesheets, or manual updates.
Process Management
- Configure states and decision points for all types of engineering and business processes.
- Automatically notify stakeholders via email and/or text messages.
- Attach affected records, files, and other related information.
- Enable ad-hoc approvers and automatically assign user tasks.
- Automatically create processes via SOLIDWORKS PDM workflow state changes.
Item Management
- Create, edit, and compare complete BOMs using records and files.
- Maintain connected but separate BOM variants.
- Automatically or selectively create records for SOLIDWORKS configurations.
- Add virtual configurations for any object type.
- Push BOM data to SOLIDWORKS drawings, including assigned item or find numbers.
Dashboards and Reports
- Create interactive graphical dashboards to display critical information.
- Utilize many different types of controls to display information such as charts, graphs, date selectors, and lists.
- Configure reports to company standards and publish automatically or on demand.
- Send reports via email attachments in various formats including PDF, Excel®, HTML, and TIFF.