Professionalize Your Workgroup: Vault

ALLEN GAGER: Hello. Welcome to Professionalize Your Workgroup. My name is Allen Gager. I am a Territory Solution Engineer with Autodesk. And I focus on our connected data and process products.

So take a moment for our safe harbor statement. Now that you've got that, why this class?

Well, we've stopped selling Vault Workgroup. And with the end of the sale, we've given you Vault Professional. So we're going to highlight some of the features that Vault Professional has to help you get your data managed even better than you have it today.

So what we're going to cover, we're going to talk a little bit about the end of sale and a little bit about the migration process. The things I like to call game changers, these are features that you can use on top of the way you use Workgroup today. So you don't really have to change your workflow, you're just getting more. So we're going to go through some of my favorites there.

And then we'll talk about some third party CADs, some additional features you get with Professional, talk about Vault for MAKE, which is an addition. It doesn't come out of the box. But I think it's important.

We'll cover change orders and items, a little bit of administrator stuff like multi-site replication, back up, and talk about connecting now to third party data. So that's the overview there.

What we're not going to cover. I'm going to make some assumptions that you're a Workgroup user, that you're already using Lifecycle Management, you're using categories, rules, numbering, maybe use data standard, you're using some of the reporting in Vault Workgroup, you're using the plotting feature, and copy design.

So I'm assuming that you've already done this with Vault Workgroup. If you're not using these features, get a hold of your reseller or your partner and get connected. Because there's an awful lot of power in the capability there.

So what I'm not going to do is really cover these features on the left. There's a lot of material around on all of the things in the left block there. And again, you've got your partner reseller to help you if you're not fully leveraging your Workgroup.

And I'm also not going to do a deep technical dive on everything that I cover today. What I really want to do is expose you to the new features that you get with Pro that build right on top of the Workgroup features that you have.

So a little bit about me. I have been around for about 30 years in design manufacturing. I joined Autodesk in 2016. I have been a longtime user of Workgroup. Fact, at the time the company I worked for was the seventh in the world to put Workgroup into production before it was even a product.

So there's a soft spot in my heart for Workgroup. I love it. I've loved it for a long time. I'm sad to see it go. But I'm really excited about the additional features that we're giving you in your Pro entitlement.

I've done a lot of work for our friends over at CAD Learning as well, wrote a lot of training videos for the Inventor product. And then I've done a few Autodesk Universities in the past back even when we had Collaboration as a product.

So it's not the first time that we've retired a product. We always seemed to do a really nice job of giving you more features, and functionality, and value out of your investment with us. And that's what we really hope to do today.

So let's talk about the end of sale. On July 6, we stopped selling Vault Workgroup New. And on July 7 you were entitled to get a Vault Professional. So what that means is you now, from an administrative perspective, you can download Professional and use it alongside of your Workgroup as you migrate over.

So Workgroup is going away. And you do need to replace it with Professional. But you can really do that in your own timeline. '23 is the last version of Workgroup that is going to be built. So keep that in mind when you start planning your migration strategy.

So questions that get asked. These are some of the common ones. Does it automatically migrate? Unfortunately, no, it doesn't. But we're going to talk about what that looks like.

And then, from an upgrade perspective, what is it that you need to do? Well, we really need you to get moved over to Professional before your subscription to Workgroup ends and then you don't have accessibility.

So the last day to buy a three-year subscription for Workgroup was on July 6 of '22. You have until July 6 of '23, if we go down here, to renew that single-year subscription.

So those of you that are using one-year subscriptions, you do have till the July 6 of '23 to renew that Vault Workgroup. However, my recommendation is that you just go ahead and move over to Pro, as it's in the box now.

And then, we're going to continue to support '23 in our standard life cycle process, which is three years. So there'll be service enhancements as far as technical fixes that are needed if there's an issue. But other than that, there is no more production of '23.

So let's talk a little bit about the migration. Migrating from Workgroup to Professional is very similar to doing a version to version migration. So when you run the Vault server installation, the installer is going to recognize that Workgroup is there.

It's going to ask you if you want to use that installation. And you say, yes, please. And it will remove Workgroup. And it will put Professional in its place, and then install the server updates, and open up the ADMS Console, and migrate the database, you should be good to go.

Now, a recommendation that I do have is it's handy if you do the same version, makes it a little bit easier. So I would recommend upgrading to Workgroup '23 and then moving Workgroup '23 over to Pro '23.

And then, of course, I'm going to back up here and take just a moment. Make sure that you have a valid backup and you've tested it. This is just good practice, whether it's a version migration or migrating from Workgroup to Pro, make sure your backup is valid. We don't want to go through a major shift like this without a valid backup.

Now, if all of that doesn't work, step two would be go ahead and uninstall Vault Workgroup on the server, install Professional, but don't use that existing database. Just go ahead and finish your installation, update the server, and then restore that backup that you made. Again, we want to make sure that that backup is tested and valid.

And I've got some hot links here. I will put these all in the class handout. All the information that you need from a hot link perspective will go through. And I'll put those in the handout to be downloaded as well.

And then, of course, work with your partner and your reseller. That's what they're there for. They do this day in and day out. They can make sure that it goes smoothly for you.

So all in all, the migration's not a big deal. Once it's migrated, you can continue using your Vault just like you were in Workgroup. You don't really have to make any changes. But there's no fun in that. So let's get into some of the new features that you'll have in your toolbox.

Oh, and yeah, well, let's not forget this. Let's install your Vault client as well. So get rid of the Workgroup client and then go ahead and put your Professional client.

So on to the fun stuff. This one I'm really excited about. This is Vault Gateway. And this feature allows you to connect to Vault from outside your network.

So if we think about all the things that have happened to us over the last few years, where all of a sudden we found ourselves remote and having to have IT to set up a VPN, and then all the bottlenecks and hassles and work that come with VPNs, we thought there has to be a better way. And it turns out there is. We created Vault Gateway.

This allows you to connect to your Vault very simply going through our Forge cloud layer, our security layer. And it makes it feel just like you're there in the office.

And it is fast. Everything I'm hearing from customers in the field from our value-added resellers, they love it. It's fast.

So I have a short little video here to play to capture all the data around Vault Gateway.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- Collaboration is easier than ever with the introduction of Vault Gateway. New in Vault Professional 2023, we deliver on the promise of more easily accessing your data from anywhere on any device.

How does it work? It provides a secure connection to users who are outside your network's firewall but who need to access vaulted data, all without requiring the need to create domain accounts for these users and without the need to give them VPN access. We all know how challenging and time-consuming this effort would have been in the past.

Setup is simple with a configuration done on the server side with no additional configurations required on the Vault client. By providing an easy way for remote workers and collaborators to connect, you can provide your product development teams with the same experience as if they were in the office, allowing them to create and manage design data in Vault.

Why is this important? In the new era of remote work, we all need faster and better ways to connect our data with an even greater number of suppliers and third party collaborators, making this feature a welcome capability to your organization.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: The next feature up is the Thin Client. So for my Workgroup friends, today you have a subscription for engineering to access the Vault. And then you may also have additional subscriptions for folks outside of engineering that access the Vault. So maybe it's a production schedule or purchasing agent, things like that.

Well, with Vault Professional you get a Thin Client. And first, it's free. You can run as many instances of the Thin Client in your organization as you choose. Thin Client is browser-based and it runs nearly on any browser. It runs nearly on any device. And there's no need to install any additional software.

So the Thin Client is for those downstream consumers that need to search, find, and print for access and even download vaulted data. And there's no need to purchase a subscription for those users to do that.

I love this tool for the viewability to be out on the shop floor for somebody to be able to get that 3D model. And the richness that the Thin Client provides is fantastic. So again, I have a little video here just to walk you through the features of the Thin Client.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- Data is the backbone of your design, engineering, and manufacturing process. Autodesk Vault Professional 2022 makes it easier than ever for your colleagues outside of engineering to work with your engineering data and change orders.

With our Vault 2022 release, there's an improved browser experience available. Using the browser-based Thin Client, there's no need to install software to your desktop. You only need your Vault's URL and your login information.

The Vault browser experience provides a convenient way to collaborate with your colleagues using only your familiar web browser. The browser interface makes finding and viewing your vaulted data quick and easy. You can navigate workspaces like folders, items, and change orders, and open file previews in the viewer with just a few clicks.

The left side navigation pane allows you to search the folder structure to find files. From the top bar, select View for File Viewing. Each selected file opens in its own tab. You can search across all properties for files, items, and change orders, use multiple tabs so that you can view further details of a component without losing context.

The new Thin Client integrates the Autodesk Forge Viewer directly into the interface. This allows you to view and navigate through complex assemblies by displaying 2D and 3D views of your designs. You can also collaborate on PDF and Office files for supporting documentation that's often needed to get product development done right.

It's easy to share the files by sending links to others to open in either a browser or Vault. With the correct permissions, you can also download files to your local drive in order to review them in native software or pass them to your collaborators who don't have permission to access your Vault.

The full audit trail for each item is tracked inside Vault Professional's change order system, and it is available in the browser experience to help you understand why decisions were made and by whom.

Access and view design data, bill of materials, and engineering change orders using only your web browser and Vault credentials. Collaboration is easier than ever with Autodesk Vault Professional 2022.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: And just to recap. So the Thin Client is for consumers. So there is no adding files to the Vault from the Thin Client. There's no checking in or checking out. It really is just for consumption. No authoring on the Thin Client.

The next one is Vault Mobile. So Vault Mobile is an application that will run on your iOS or Android device. And it's very similar in the Thin Client as you get all of the access, but you can also author content as well and participate in workflows that we're going to talk about later.

The other thing is that down here in the bold, it works with Vault Gateway. So I can take my iPhone, or my Android, or my tablet and get the special URL from IT, and I can access my Vault with Vault Gateway using my Vault Mobile. And let's take a look at Vault Mobile here real quick.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- Autodesk Vault makes it easy to manage your design and engineering data. The power of a centralized data management system is having access to the right data at the right time.

Vault Mobile app brings your data to you rather than you having to go to your data. Log in to Vault while you're away from your workstation using your phone or tablet computer.

Search and navigate your Vaulted data to find the relevant files and then browse the file structure right inside the Vault app to find out which files this document preferences and which files reference this document. View previous versions of your files and read the associated property information.

Vault Professional provides a great way to manage change on your projects through its integrated engineering change orders. Vault Mobile app helps you to create a new change order from wherever you are directly from your mobile device, check in documents from your mobile device, and add them to the change order, add comments to the change order, and submit it into your system.

Vault mobile app will automatically sync the change order to Vault. And the new information will be visible to anyone with access to your Vault immediately. Speed up the design process and manage change effectively whilst maintaining a full audit trail by participating in your change order process from the Vault Mobile app.

As soon as you've completed your interaction, your colleague will receive the change order and you can action the change. The change is automatically tracked in Vault and the audit trail is maintained. Once the change to the design is complete, the change order can be updated and the status is progressed.

The updated change order can be opened directly in the Vault Mobile app. Comments added to the change order sync between Vault Desktop and the Vault Mobile app in real-time, aiding communication while you're working remotely. Changes requested in the change order can be reviewed.

And on satisfactory completion of the work, the change order status can be progressed, the change order is approved, closed, and the file is released for use by your colleagues all from the mobile app.

Free yourself and your data from your workstation with the Autodesk Vault Mobile app.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: So we'll talk a little bit more about change orders in a moment. The takeaway here is the Vault Mobile app is full-featured and again can participate in workflows as well as the ability to check files in and out of the Vault.

The Vault Mobile app is an entitlement to the Pro subscription, that named user subscription. So if you are a Pro named user, then you get that use of Vault Mobile as well.

My next favorite is Duplicate Search. So Duplicate Search allows you to find duplicates based on geometry. So it works with Inventor model data. And what we're basically doing is we're looking at the Inventor model and finding like geometry within the Vault.

So thinking of a use case in a prior life, a company I worked for years ago, if you did a search in our ERP system for something like a shaft, you would find 5,000 items called shaft.

There was no length, or diameter, end treatments, anything like that. So what would happen is when we couldn't find the shaft we needed, we would go make another shaft and exasperate the problem of duplicates within our data store.

So Duplicate Search is focused on finding the geometry that you need so that you can reuse it. And there's a couple of settings that are to be done here, administrator, Vault settings, you can go up, configure Duplicate Search tab. And then we can choose the folders in the Vault of the data that we want to be indexed that we can search against. So take a look at how this works.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- Like an image search but for your 3D components, Vault Duplicate Search smartly compares 3D shapes within the thousands of CAD files that you have within your database.

You know you can reduce design and development time by reusing existing parts. But finding an appropriate part in your database can be challenging when you only have a file name or some metadata to search on.

Duplicate parts in your engineering supply chain can cost your company thousands of dollars in redundant design, documentation, approval, release, and data management rework. Duplicate Search in Autodesk Vault Professional is a new subscription feature that helps you to reveal where duplicate parts exist in your designs to save you time and money and increase standardization across your company.

In this example, we can see a new design that's not yet been checked into Vault. As we run a Duplicate Search Vault is queried for components that match the geometry of our existing design.

If we see a part that looks like a good match, we can replace the part within our designs with an existing file from Vault. When we're confident that we're not introducing new duplicates to Vault, we can check the design in. As we check in the design, Vault will scan the new parts we've introduced and add them to the duplicate index.

But how can we detect existing duplicates in Vault? The new Duplicates Dashboard gives us an overview of the number of potential duplicates we have in our Vault. We can now create a duplicate report and begin assessing how we can add value to our business by removing duplicates from the database.

Duplicate Search in Autodesk Vault Professional helps you to reduce design time and downstream part management cost your company by allowing you to search your Vault for matching 3D shapes.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: So Duplicate Search, again, very powerful. We're actually looking at the part geometry. Doesn't really have anything to do with the file name or description of the metadata. It's all about the geometry itself.

And of course, we can filter on metadata as well. But goes a long way to help cleaning up all of that data that has been created and recreated throughout time.

Next favorite, Project Synchronization. So Project Sync allows you to share data from your Vault into Autodesk cloud drives. So we support Fusion Team, and Autodesk Docs, and BIM Docs.

And what this does is all your files are safe and happy behind your firewall. But maybe you want to share it with folks outside. And trying to send a big heavy Inventor file via email maybe not the best way to go. Sending it out to a FTP site, that has some challenges as well.

What Project Sync does is allow you to share the data that you want to share with these outside folks. So we can do this a couple of different ways. First of all, Fusion Team is an entitlement to your product design subscription. So you get access to Fusion Team. There's no cost for that.

There is a subscription tied to Autodesk Docs. That's a separate subscription. But the technology works the same whether you're sending it to Team or Docs.

So if I want to share data from Vault in to maybe a machine shop, and they want to make some changes, or it's a third party contractor, if I give them permission to do so they can make changes. It gets checked into Teams.

And then we synchronize it back into Vault. And Vault will make sure that we're not stepping on each other's versions. Let's take a look at what that looks like.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- Autodesk Vault 2020 continues to improve design collaboration with Project Sync in Vault Professional, directly in response to your feedback through the Autodesk community. Working with our Vault customers in construction, infrastructure, and civil engineering around the globe, we see more and more projects that require design collaboration outside your company's firewall.

New in Vault Professional is Project Sync, a secure way to share just the data that you choose between Vault and BIM 360. Autodesk Vault is purpose-built to help our customers efficiently manage their engineering data, improve collaboration within their teams, and take control of the design development process.

BIM 306 is an online platform connecting your project teams and data in real-time from design through construction, supporting informed decision-making throughout the project lifecycle. Eliminate file-sharing by email, eliminate the need to download or upload files from an FTP site, and reduce the opportunities for errors in transmission.

Now, your relevant design data is synced between Vault and BIM 360. Upload from Vault to BIM 360, download from BIM 360 to Vault, or set up specific folders to sync in both directions without the need for user interaction.

As the project administrator, you can control on a project by project basis, which data should be pulled from BIM 360 to Vault, pushed from Vault to BIM 360, or synced in both directions. To be clear, it's not all your data. Just the data that you choose will be synced with full permission control.

Streamline collaboration by securely syncing selective data to your extended project teams with Autodesk Vault Professional and Project Sync. Autodesk Vault 2020 continues to build on your feedback from Autodesk ideas, forums, and beta community with these usability improvements.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: And just to recapture. So in the video it does say BIM 360. But it is also Autodesk Docs and Fusion Team. And again, with your product design subscription you do get access to Fusion Team at no additional cost.

Let's talk about third party CAD. So Vault Professional allows the use of third party CAD tools. So if we think about the way that Vault works. And so, let's talk about Inventor or AutoCAD, and actually any of the supported CADs.

There's an added-- in Vault, in Canvas experience, there's a Vault ribbon. So if we think about Inventor, there's a Vault ribbon in Inventor. And when you check the files in from Inventor, Inventor is actually informing Vault of what those relationships are.

And then, once Vault has those relationships, it'll manage it from there. So if you do a move or rename or a Copy Design, Vault will take care of managing those file references, those paths.

So when we think about third party and then direct support for third parties, such as SolidWorks, and Creo, and MicroStation, you get the same experience using those third party tools. So there will be a ribbon in-- an in-Canvas experience in SolidWorks, so you don't have to leave SolidWorks to check your data into Vault.

And these SolidWorks, Creo, MicroStation come with Vault Professional. There's no additional fees, no additional cost. You just simply download them from the Vault app store and you're good to go. At an added cost-- and we'll talk about these in a little bit-- PowerMILL and FeatureCAM, extending the capability of Vault.

And then there is another one. There's a third [AUDIO OUT] for Catia. It's made by a third party company. And there's some fees associated with that as well. But if you have Catia data that you need to manage in your Vault with full Inventor-like Vault functionality, it is available for Catia.

And also, the third party CAD supports the bill of materials. We'll talk about those in a little bit as well. But we get that full support for SolidWorks, and Creo, and then Catia as well if you're using items and you want the CAD support.

So I have a screenshot here of SolidWorks. We can see that I have a Vault ribbon right built in to SolidWorks. And I even have a Show Details tab here on the bottom, just like I do in Inventor and AutoCAD. So really tight integration into those third party applications.

I'll talk a little bit about Vault for MAKE. So Vault for MAKE, and I'm not here to sell you anything, but I want to make you aware. Because when you have Professional, you have a lot more capability available that can be connected to Professional.

So Autodesk has a tool called Vault Enterprise Add On. And it is a collection of tools that was developed by our consulting group over years working with our large enterprise customers.

And I'm not going to go through a Vault Enterprise Add On feature tree here today. That's not what this is about. But I did want to draw your attention to the fact that PowerMILL, an add in for PowerMILL and an add in for FeatureCAM are part of the Vault Enterprise collection.

So what this will allow you to do is, it will allow you, if you're using PowerMILL or FeatureCAM to connect all of that data and manage it together with Inventor or your other third party tools that Vault supports.

So let's take a look at what the feature CAM looks like and brings to the table, the Add In for that, the Vault for MAKE.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

[MUSIC PLAYING]

- Welcome to an introduction for Vault for MAKE for Autodesk PowerMILL and FeatureCAM, looking at how Autodesk continue to enable a digital thread from design through to production.

Too often we see customers whose manufacturing departments work in data silos with two main issues. Although CAD data is well controlled, the same is not true for CAM projects and NC files. Vault for MAKE allows revision control directly within PowerMILL and FeatureCAM, ensuring that only known versions of tool parts and NC are released to the shop floor.

Using a standalone application, Vault for MAKE allows NC files to be delivered to machine controllers directly from Vault. This demonstration is in PowerMILL but the functionality is exactly the same for FeatureCAM.

Once a designer has released the CAD for manufacture, the CAM programmer is able to use the plugin to import the CAD directly from Vault. The CAM programmer uses the plugin to check the project into Vault, which automatically creates the traceability links from CAD to the CAM project, and from the CAM project to the NC files.

Traceability is also created to the option file used during post-processing. The plugin enables customers to drastically reduce wasted time from working on out-of-date CAD revisions by automatically notifying the programmer about updates to that CAD. The plugin replaces the old CAD with the new revision, and tool paths can easily be recalculated and NC posted.

Vault for MAKE completes the digital thread all the way to the machine tool. A standalone floor application allows the machine operator to deliver the release NC file from within Vault directly to the machine controller.

The operator is notified if they're running out of data NC files by comparing the Vault status with the files on the controller. If the operator makes modifications to NC files on the machine or the PC, the shop floor application allows you to synchronize back to Vault so these important changes are properly configured and controlled.

Vault for MAKE is delivered to customers via Autodesk Consulting. Please contact your local representative or partner for more information. Thank you.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: So again, we get that closed loop capability there from design all the way through the MAKE process.

So next is ECN's and Items. So engineering change orders, engineering change notices. I mentioned at the beginning of this that the first couple features is capability on top of your Workgroup.

So everything that I showed you prior-- well, prior to the Vault for MAKE, is just use Workgroup as you use it today, and then you get the Thin Client, the access, the Vault Mobile, additional access. Now we start getting into where you can change workflows and bring even more functionality to your Vault.

So change orders and items need to be enabled. So if you turn them on, then these workspaces and these tools become available in Vault. If you don't turn them on, the users will never see them, and it will look and feel essentially just like your Workgroup did.

So in the Vault settings under change orders and items, there's an opportunity to turn these on and expose the features and functionality in the Vault.

So let's talk about the change notice or change order first, depending on what you call them. Some people call them change requests. But essentially, the workflows are all the same.

And what we're doing with a change order is we are capturing all of the intent and the reason for the changes. And then we're attaching that to the files in the Vault. So essentially, this is a workflow that will guide you through a proper engineering change order.

And with that, let's take a look at what change orders have to offer.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

- Autodesk Vault provides effective and efficient management and tracking of engineering change orders. A change order number is assigned automatically by Vault. You provide a change order title, description, and due date.

During the change order process, the design documentation is referenced and additional documents can be attached. Comments can be added and progress is captured automatically.

Participants in the change order are assigned responsibility for processing a change order based upon Vault's configurable routings. These routings also assign appropriate authority for the user's role.

Once saved, the change order process is initiated and progress is tracked and reported. Notifications are provided to the responsible participants via email. And open change orders can be seen in your Vault work list.

Decision-makers and stakeholders have authority to process change orders through the workflow in the most appropriate and efficient way. Comments are made, progress is monitored, and notifications are sent, automatically creating an audit trail as the work moves along.

Once a change order is accepted and processed to the point that the design needs to be changed, designers have the authority to edit the impacted documents by moving them into a work in progress state. At this point, Vault can automatically trigger a revision.

Once design documents are edited to reflect the required changes, the change order is processed to the appropriate state. And once changes are verified complete, a final approval is given and the change order can be closed.

This commits the revision and releases the new design documents with the changes. Vault will make the revised and released design documents available to the designated people.

Design teams can choose standard or configurable processes for release and engineering change order management, helping communicate to avoid costly mistakes and remove process bottlenecks.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: So one of the things that I love about the change order is that it follows the file. So you can click on the file in Vault and see the associated change order and all the history and reasons with it.

The next is items. So we think of an item as a container. And within that container we can put any type of object. And the item really is the vehicle of conveyance to communicate with outside applications. And then, also, we can create a bill of materials of items.

And today, so your Workgroup is what we consider file-centric. All of the actions are happening on the file. So lifecycle states, et cetera, and there is no bill of materials involved. So there's no way in Workgroup to get a collection of an assembly or bill of materials.

What an item-centric workflow does, basically it's preparing the data to move it off to an ERP or MRP system. Lifecycle states affect the item, but you can also have lifecycle states on your files as well.

So if we're in a Workgroup, we have a file-centric environment, and you're using lifecycle state management, we can move you into using items. And file states and item states are different. And they can work together. And then, if we involve change orders as well, change orders can happen on items or files, or items and files.

And then, items, as I mentioned, can do bills of materials. So supported CAD applications like Inventor, AutoCAD Mechanical. If you're using the bill of material feature in Mechanical, we can pull an item master from there as well. AutoCAD Electrical, we can get the bill of materials from Electrical. SolidWorks, Creo, again, any of those supported CAD items.

AnyCAD also honors items. So if we're using Inventor and referencing in an NX file or a Catia file as an AnyCAD item in Inventor, we check that into Vault. Vault understands that those are items too, and we can collect them as well. And a quick little video on the items.

[VIDEO PLAYBACK]

- Autodesk Vault can create and maintain a complete manufacturing bill of materials for your designs. A BOM summarizes the information needed for manufacturing a part or product. Information, such as part number, material, description, unit of measure, or quantity.

Your BOM consists of items that can be easily synced with your business systems, such as ERP or PLM. Your CAD files are assigned to items and the Vault BOM master generates a complete list of items for the given design. Using Vault items, you can quantify objects that aren't represented by a CAD file, such as grease, adhesive, product packaging, or documentation.

Vault can automatically assign numbers for items using numbering schemes which are customizable by you. Alternatively, item numbers can be assigned using existing document properties or manually. Item numbers can be edited at any time without losing their links to the BOM or their CAD files.

Items in BOMs are managed using revisions and lifecycle states such as work in progress or released. For example, when a design moves out of a release state to work in progress, Vault responds by automatically bumping the revision in preparation for editing and rerelease.

An entire product design can be managed using lifecycle states. Once released, the design, BOM, and associated documents are locked, preventing an uncontrolled change.

Product BOMs can be edited separately to your CAD files, including adding custom items, removing duplicate items, changing quantities, or reordering of the BOM. Vault's BOM revisions are flexible. And designs can be rolled back to a previous revision if change management requires it.

It's also easy to compare one BOM revision with another to see what changed between revisions. Select the desired BOM and revision to be compared, and visual feedback in the form of colors and annotations will provide the detail of any differences. Vault's BOMs can be linked to your existing business management solutions or simply exported for use outside of Vault.

Vault makes it easy to create and maintain an accurate and complete bill of materials directly from your Vaulted data.

[END PLAYBACK]

ALLEN GAGER: Next thing we have for the admins is replication. So Vault Professional is an enterprise level application. So today in Workgroup, you're probably a single site. Or if you have multiple sites join, you're probably using a VPN to connect those users into the Vault. What replication allows us to do is spread the Vault throughout the globe so all the users are working on the same data.

The other thing that is important is that if we think about Vault, Vault subscription is a client-side subscription. And what that means is you as a user logging into the client, and that's what your subscription is tied to your named user.

From a Vault Professional perspective and a replication perspective, as we start moving or adding file stores to the Vault, there's no fees from Autodesk for the number of file stores that you have or the number of vaults that you have. Vault is entirely client-side licensed. If you use your Vault Professional and you put Vault across the globe with hundreds of replications, that's fine. We don't charge you any money for that-- those file stores.

So what you most likely have today would be a single site deployment for your Vault Workgroup. So either everything is sitting on one server, the ADMS Console, the File Store. And then, or you likely have it separated so you've got the ADMS Console, the SQL database, and then a separate File Store.

So these folks are in the office. They're happy. They're outside of IT. And they've got a speedy up and down experience as they're checking files in and out of Vault. But our friends that might be in other locations, we can now give them that speedy experience too so they feel like they're sitting right outside IT as well.

So there's two different scenarios that we have. One is where we leave the SQL database in the main office and then we just replicate that file store out into the other offices, the other geographies. This is, again, all comes in the box with Pro.

The other one that we have is maybe you need to replicate the SQL database as well. So we have a publisher and a subscriber model. So if you have a need, if you are spanning the globe and you need to break up into multiple geographies, again, this all comes in the box. And all of these folks can feel like they are essentially sitting in the home office as well.

So replication comes with Vault Professional. You now have access to it. And if you have the need for replication, I would encourage you to work with your value-added reseller, your partner to help you get it figured out and get it set up for the best method for you.

Next one is Hot Backup. Which means you can now run your Vault backups with all users or having users connected. It's that simple. You don't have to boot people out of Vault to run your backups.

Let's talk about third party connected data. So a moment ago, we heard in the items video about connecting Vault to other applications. So we can take an item bill of material that's created and managed in Vault.

And built into Vault, we can manually import or export those bills of material. And again, this is typically an item-centric environment. So from the Items tab, we can go and export that bill of material and transfer it over into our ERP system so we don't have to type everything over.

Vault Professional comes-- actually, all Vaults come with a software development kit or an API. Again, it's free. It's part of Vault Pro. And we can automate some of that push pull so you don't have to manually do it.

There's typically a little bit of services around it, again, something you'd probably want to talk to your value-added reseller or your partner about if you want to automate exchanging data with another application like an ERP or an MRP.

And then, the third tier is Middleware. And that is where we can now start having bidirectional conversations with third parties.

It usually takes a little piece of Middleware. Middleware is a software that basically takes care of what one application is asking for and interpolates it, asks correctly to the other application, and then it translates it back and hands it over so that the application that was asking for the information gets what it expected.

So in this case, if we're connecting Vault to a third party system like an MRP or an ERP, and we want to hand that bill of materials over, everything is configured correctly, and it goes smoothly.

So there's generally some additional costs and services. There's going to be a little cost for the Middleware. And then, again, working with a partner to get everything wired up correctly, there'll be some services around that. But now, Vault really can connect and be a part of the full conversation with the rest of the business.

Which is going to take me to Vault PLM. So again, this is not meant to be a sales pitch Vault PLM is our bundled solution of Vault Professional and our Fusion 360 Manage PLM product. And I want to take a moment to just talk about this. Because with Vault and having the item capability in Vault, and the ability to talk to other utilities, I think it's important to point this out.

So if we think of Vault Professional in that product data management, that engineering-centric focus of Vault, it's really good at that. And we have a little bit of process which I introduced to you today, which is the change order process. So it's a workflow. And then items are a bit of a process too. But really, that changeover workflow is engineering-centric.

What we can do is, when we start thinking about enterprise-level process, so things like new product introduction, supply chain collaboration, or enterprise-level change management that maybe involves a customer or an outside third party, now we really start talking in the enterprise process realm of product lifecycle management.

So because Vault has the ability, as we talked about a moment ago, to connect, we can actually tie these together and have a closed loop data management and process management functionality.

So now I get the best of both worlds between PDM and Vault and everything that Fusion 360 Manage and Product Lifecycle Management has to offer. And then, we can connect that into our ERP, and then really tie the whole business together from an enterprise level.