What's New in Vault Data Standard 2017

MARCO MIRANDOLA: So good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us in this session. For the next 90 minutes, we're going to talk about data standard. Before we get started, just raise your hand quickly. Who has never seen data standard-- is new to data standard? All right. OK, good.

Actually, the topic is about what's new about data standard. Which, I suppose you know what is data standard, but I thought that we're going to see a lot of people here, so I have a little introduction about data standard to give an overview first. So sorry for the others, but I will try to make it short and still hopefully can provide all the information for you. And then we're going to go into the topic about what's new in 2017.

My name is Marco, Marco Mirandola. I'm co-founder and CEO of coolOrange. We have a long history with data standard. Data standard is a product that we developed years ago under the name MyView. And then three years ago got acquired by AutoDesk. And now it's part of Vault.

So let's go and cover quickly again. So as I mentioned before, we're going to have a very brief introduction about data standard, so I'm not willing to bore anyone, but just to bring all the people on the same level. We're then going to see what is really new in the data standard 2017. And we're also going to see what's changed in that data standard 2017.

Now with data standard, one of the topic-- and I will emphasize this a little bit later-- is about the compatibility. So the ability to update the configuration of customization that you made in the context of data standard, hopefully without effort. With 2017, there have been some changes that affect the compatibility. It's not too dangerous, not too complex. I'm going to cover that. So that you know when you move from 2015, 2016, to 2017, what you have to do and what you have to pay attention for. and I can also explain why these changes have been introduced.

The session is about 90 minutes. Therefore, we will definitely have enough time for Q&A, which for the other sessions the other years were a little bit short. In the presentation, I have actually a lot of little animations, this sort of video-- it's actually animated gif-- which are going in loops, so don't be surprised if you missed one point, you just have to wait another 10-15 seconds, and then it's coming over again. And you can see the word flow again.

This is just intended to save a little bit of time during the presentation. I have a life environment here, so during the Q&A we can also go on the life environment, and then check the topics again in more depth. Last point is then, I summarize a little bit the sources where you can get more information. After this session where you can get help. On the AutoDesk pages, on the forum, and so on and so forth. And by that, I hope that we covered basically all the topics.

So let's go into a brief introduction about data standard. So data standard is actually a product. What it means, it has a setup, you can download it. Actually, you can download, so it's been around since 2014. I think the 2014 version can be downloaded just under the subscription center-- subscription portal. I'm not sure about 2015, but I think the 2016 and 2017 are available publicly if you just Google Vault Data Standard 2017, you probably find quickly the link where you can download the thing.

It's a free AutoDesk Vault extension. So it's no cost, but it's not coming with the Vault setup, and you have to install it separately. I will talk to this even later, but basically you have three setups. One for Vault, one for AutoCAD, and one for Inventor. I'll explain why, but you basically have these three setups, and you have to install them separately. Or basically, you can install that piece of data standard that you're looking for. I will show you why in a few seconds.

It works with Vault Workgroup and Vault Professional. So no Vault Basic. You need a Vault Workgroup and a Vault Professional. And from 2014 onward.

The basic purpose of data standard is to help you enter data in vaults of metadata in a more standardized way and help you maintain the data. An example, you have in Vault set up a couple of properties. You can configure the properties to be obligatory. So that before you're going to release a file, the engineer has to fill these properties. But there is not much support in entering these properties. You have in Vault the Property Editor, that's fine. But, for instance, within Inventor, there is not much of this stuff. Vault Data Standard provides a set of dialogues that you will see in a few seconds. It helps you, basically, enter in a more comfortable, standard way, the data. And the database that you will see, so what you will see is basically the out-of-the-box, the standard 2017 dialogue. But it can also be configured and customized. And I will talk about this in a few minutes.

So this is, for instance, the dialogue for creating a new folder. So if you go into Vault, you can create a new folder. You have usually this little dialogue where you can basically just enter the folder name. You can select the category and enter the folder name. That's nothing more. But if you install Data Standard, this is the dialogue that you get. Now in this dialogue, you can select the category, the [? numerance ?] key, you can set the data. But more important, on the right-hand side-- you will see it again, it's going into loop-- on the right-hand side of this dialogue, you see these sets of properties. And if you pay attention, as soon as I switch to category, here to product, you see some properties on the right-hand side. If you go, for instance, to market, you see auto properties.

So this is an important concept because what data standard does is reflecting the configuration of your Vault. There is nothing you have to do. You install data standard-- so this is just really setup, installed, and you get this dialogue. And immediately, it recognizes, basically, which categories you have configured-- in this case folder, folder. We will see it for the fun in a minute. It recognizes which categories you have, and it recognizes which user-defined properties you have configured for this category.

So by selecting the correct category, you get immediately the properties that belongs to that category, and you can fill them up. Here we have also all the concepts of Vault, so if a property is obligatory, you have to fill it up. Otherwise, you cannot move on. With the OK button, you will see it in the next little animation. So this is the concept.

So with the dialogues of data standard, you can create form, and you can't create it even without data standard. But with the data standard you have this dialogue for creating a little bit more comfortable way to folders. And, of course, even the editing is using the same dialogue. So you can say Edit Folder, and you get this dialogue again, with all the properties at once that belongs to you One topic about configuration-- the sequence of the properties that you see here, so the order, is configurable as well.

So there is a bunch of stuff you can configure, and I'm emphasizing the word configure, not customize. It's really just about setting up, maybe, a little bit some XML files, and so on, and you're set. But again, this data comes immediately without additional effort.

Now, on the far side, this is brand new because usually you can not create a file from within Vault. So if you want to create a file in Vault, you have to go through the application. You have to fire up AutoCAD, Inventor, Word, you name it. And then you created the file with the [INAUDIBLE] tool, and then you check in the [INAUDIBLE] into Vault.

Now, with data standard, you get this ability to create files from within Vault natively. Now, for the CAD site, you can create CAD files as well, but it doesn't really make a lot of sense. So I don't think that people are going to create the AutoCAD file or the Inventor file from within Vault and then starting from Vault. But especially for the Office document, that might be interesting. If you pay attention on this dialogue, you have, again, a category. But the more important thing is the template. The third from the top. You can basically select a template, and as soon as the dialogue closes-- we'll just have to wait a few seconds-- you will notice here on the left-hand side a folder called Templates.

Let's just wait a second. Do you see here the templates folder? So in the templates folder, you can basically place all your Word, Excel, PowerPoint, AutoCAD, Inventor templates. You name it. And then from within the dialogue, by selecting the document type-- so out of Office document, Inventor, AutoCAD, and so on-- you can then pick the template that belongs to that type of templates.

Now even this part, this is actually something that has been changed a little bit in 2017, so we'll talk about it. But there is a configuration file behind that allows you to define even where the templates should be. So by default, you need this folder called Templates, but it doesn't have to be called Templates, and it doesn't have to be there. It could be somewhere else inside in Vault. It's configurable. I'm going to show you later where you can configure this stuff.

Otherwise, the concept is the same. So you select the category. You select the numbering scheme if you have one. You select then the template that we want to use. You're going to fill up the properties that you need. And maybe you have seen here that the title here had a red border. If you open up the dialogue again. You see that this red border, which indicates that this property is obligatory, and if you see the OK button is disabled until you're going to enter the valid data.

So again, data standard is about helping the people to enter the data in a little bit more comfortable way. And also, make sure that all the data that has to be entered are going to be entered right away. And it supports you with combo boxes, selection lists, all the things.

Even properties on the right-hand side, as usual, to find properties. If you have them configured as a date in Vault, then you get a date picker. If you have configured them as a selection list, then you get the selection list. So there is nothing more you have to do. Really just configure your Vault-- and this is really the key thing-- configure your Vault, create the category, define the properties, and data standard goes along with those configurations without additional effort.

Now let's move on with the custom object. How many of you are actually using custom objects? Just a few. Not that many. OK. But you know what-- who doesn't know what custom object is? OK, just a few. So custom object is basically an additional custom object. No, it's an additional object that you can configure inside in Vault. Where you can basically store information, which are not item, files, folder, change order, and so on.

So let's say you want to manage transmittals. I think we have-- yeah, we have here, for instance, this example with transmittals. You have to collect a bunch of files and send them out to someone, and you want to track when the file has been sent out, and which file has been sent out, and so on. You can handle it with your Excel file if you want, or you can just configure inside in Vault a new custom object called Transmittal, and it just becomes an additional table-- an additional list where you can basically store information, linked them with our stuff, and so on.

And you can create a bunch of it. You can manage tasks if you want. you can manage birthdays of your colleagues, whatever makes sense to you. It's basically an additional placeholder, or bucket, or table, where you can basically store specific information. In this example, we have this example with this custom object. And here, again, we have-- so if you work with custom object when you create one, by default, you get, again, a little dialogue that looks like the dialogue for the folder creation. So it's really just one line where you can just enter the name or the idea of the customer object. And then you have to go through the Property panel of Vault for filling up additional properties.

As soon as you install data standard, you get this additional dialogue, which collects all the properties that belongs, in this case, to the category transmittal. So it's way easier to create custom objects, edit custom objects, and so on. And again, it comes for free. It's an AutoDesk tool. You can install it without additional cost. It's developed by AutoDesk, supported by AutoDesk. So it's really a Vault product. It's a Vault add-on that you have a free, and I think it's worth giving a try. So you have this addition, even on custom objects.

Now, additionally, what you get with the stand-up of data standard are additional taps. So for instance, if you click on a folder, you get this additional data sheet tap, which summarizes, basically again, like the dialogue, all the information at once. Yeah, even this is configurable, and so on. You can define which properties should go up and which should go down. So you can configure it the way that it's more appropriate for you.

So everywhere you have this data sheet, you have it for folder, for file, for items, for change order for custom object. This data sheet comes with all of the types of elements. On the file, you see this data sheet here, the last one, the data sheet tab. But additionally, you also have this CAD BOM sheet. And this one, is showing you, basically, the BOM that is inside the CAD file. So it works with AutoCAD, Mechanical, Inventor, and all the other applications. Actually, I'm not sure. AutoCAD Electrical? No, I'm not sure.

So the point is this, When you check in a file, a CAD file with the add-in-- could be AutoCAD Mechanical, Inventor, I think SolidWorks ProE and Solids it's the same-- when you check in that file, then with the checking process, the CAD BOM of the file is also checked in. So behind the record, in this case, the blue line here-- the record of this assembly-- we don't have just the file. The BOM of the file is also stored already in Vault.

And for those that are using Vault Professional, when you do an Assign Item, when you say right-click Assign Item, then this dialogue basically reads out the BOM from the CAD file. It gives you a preview in order to create the items. Well actually, it's not reading the BOM from the CAD file. But it's reading the BOM that during the last check-in has been stored already. In Vault. So the CAD BOM is already in the Vault database. And we took, basically, this advantage to say, well, if the CAD BOM is there, why not showing it? This works with Vault Workgroup as well. So even if you don't work with items, even with Vault Professional. So if you don't work with items, either with Vault Professional, Vault Workgroup, you still have this dialogue which shows you-- which give you a preview about the BOM.

AUDIENCE: You can modify the item number?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: No, so this is read-only. This is read-only. The only way to change the content here is to open up the file in AutoCAD in Inventor or make the change and recheck it in. Yes, so this is really just read-only. It's for previewing only.

It's an interesting thing because if you think about, you have this information, so faking that this is the standard, with a little bit of customization-- not too much, a couple of lines of code-- you could, for instance exports this bill of material as an Excel file or a CSV, and hand it over to the [INAUDIBLE] system. So the fact that you have this information already involved, it's a cool thing, and it can be useful for other scenarios.

So the next one is, with the items, again you have the data sheets tabbed, the last one, and additionally have this associated file. We have to list all of all the files associated to this item. And, again, even on the custom object, you have this additional tab that summarizes all information, and so on. So these are the things that basically comes out of the box without effort, just install data standard, and you have them. You don't have to do anything. You just configure correctly your Vault, categories, numbering schemes, properties, and so on. If you do that-- and it's something you should do anyway-- but if you do that correctly, the data standard will basically just follow the rules and help you even more to enforce the rules and the configurations that you have applied in Vault.

Now, we have also data standard inside in CAD. In this case, you see AutoCAD Mechanical. Well actually, it's also AutoCAD Vanilla, so it's AutoCAD and Inventor. And in both, the very first time that you're going to save the file, instead of becoming the usual save dialogue of AutoCAD and Inventor, you basically get this additional dialogue here. It's the same logic. You select the category based on the category you get. A bunch of properties that you can fill up right here from within AutoCAD and Inventor. You can select the numbering scheme. One additional thing is, if you give a look on the top of this dialogue, you have the ability to select the folder where this file should go in. And this is one of the additional concepts that you can take away from data standard. so without data standard, it's anarchy. Everyone can check-in a file where he thinks it's appropriate. And by just creating, locally, a folder-- I can create, locally, a folder called Marco. Save the file there. And the check-in dialogue says, hey, a new folder. It creates the new folder inside in Vault.

Now, for some cultures this is OK. For all the cultures, especially so the German ones, this is very, very bad. You need to have a rule, and it has to be an ISO 9000, whatever. But anyway, no, it's not a joke. I mean, the idea behind these, for instance this older picker, it's actually not the folders that you have locally. It's the folders that you have inside in Vault. So that means, that if you want to create a new folder, you have first to create the folder inside in Vault. Not everyone is allowed to do it. And so you can, and then you can use it right away.

Now again, this is also configurable and customizable, so it could be a mix. It could be a mix between Vault folders and local folders. We have seen some companies doing-- at the root of the folder is, for instance, set by the company rules. So you can just pick folders up to this level from Vault. But then underneath that folder, you have the ability to create your own stuff. So in order to keep a little bit of structure in the folder tree and still provide the freedom to the engineers to create their own stuff underneath that. So it's really highly flexible. You can set it up as you think it's appropriate.

But again, the idea is to make sure that all of people in the companies are working toward one system, and instead of creating chaos inside in the system just because it's Friday morning or Monday morning whatever, the data remains consistent and becomes easily more manageable. Even for the future.

So both Inventor and AutoCAD. Now in the case of AutoCAD, it's pretty simple. It's one file. And it basically has this one dialogue. By the way, here in this case, in the CAD, of course, everything you do here is connected to the title block. And in the case of AutoCAD, the data standard wins. Yes.

AUDIENCE: How does this work with frame generator where, say, you might have 1,500 components?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: Right. So the question is how does this works with frame generator. It's a good point. So this is why. So on the AutoCAD side, one file, pretty simple. You have a title block. Whatever you enter here is going into the title block. That's it. You just have to name the title block and that's it. If you make changes on the title block in AutoCAD via double clicking the title block, everything you do is going to be lost the next time you save because data standard wins.

Therefore, in the data standard menu, you see that there is a top-- on the top there is somewhere data standard just ribbon. You have the ability to read-- to edit again. And so, go again into this dialogue, make the changes. And again, the changes that reflected. Now the question is about frame generator, design accelerator, every sort of additional Inventor tool that generates a bunch of files at once. So in the case of Inventor, for these kind of things, you don't see it here. But there is another dialogue, which looks similar, and you basically have to list of all involved files on the left-hand side, and then on the right-hand side you have the properties. So that case, if you use design accelerator, frame generator or whatever, the moment that you generate the thing-- you basically generate at once a bunch of files-- and then when you save it, it's handled as one-save process. And you basically see the phantom components underneath the real components. You can make a difference between phantom and the other components but within one dialogue, you basically handle all the files at once. So that's supported.

I think that's it for the usage. Now, I mentioned that data standard is a product, but in reality, it's also a customization framework. So the idea behind is this, since, I think, Vault 2010, or whatever, they introduced an API, and with the API, you could do a lot of stuff with Vault. So adding additional tabs, create dialogues. You had the ability to do really a lot of interesting things. However, visibility was limited to developers. So raise your hand. How many of you are .net developers here? OK, a handful.

How many of you have ever made any sort of script files in the past? Lisp, or PowerShell, or VBA, or iLogic or this kind of stuff. So the half of the room. And this is the difference. So when Microsoft introduced .net, everything becomes easier. Yes, for developers. Those of you that were able, in the past, to do a little bit of cool thing-- and you were proud of it, right? When it was working-- got completely lost, thanks to Microsoft. Well, no. It's not really true. I mean, they actually went back because they introduced PowerShell a couple of years ago for the IT folks. And PowerShell is the new batch-scripting, if you want. But in reality, it's built on top of the .net, so it's super powerful. You can do basically everything you do with .net, but it's a script language. It's way easier to consume. It has been developed for IT people, not for developers.

And actually recently, Microsoft made it open source, and now PowerShell is even available for Auto platforms, like Mac, and Unix, and so on, and so forth. So it's pretty interesting what they're doing now. Anyway, so why is PowerShell relevant here because data standard is built on top of PowerShell. So creating additional tabs, modifying the dialogues, creating additional menu items-- and I will show you a little bit of this-- is basically all done with PowerShell. And maybe, if you meanwhile don't feel comfortable, again, to create your own script, I bet that if you read one of these you can follow. You can understand the flow and at least understand this is the line that is responsible for creating the folder, or doing the property mapping, or whatever it is. So the idea of data standard is to lower the complexity bar for the non-developers and allow them-- those that want to do the stuff themselves, or at least give them the ability to follow what the heck is going on. And maybe make a little bit of tweaks and changes, and so on and so forth.

So the idea is basically to make customization simpler, more accessible even to non-developers, and compatible. Compatibility is a big word because compatibility requires a lot of rules before and after. So I would say 99%-- give me 1% of excuse when something is not going to be 100% compatible-- but it works quite well.

Now, let's give a look. So let's suppose you want to create a new menu item inside in Vault. There is this configuration file, it's called many definition of XML, and this is actually new in 2017. We'll talk about it later in the section What's New. But within this XML file you can define new menu item. It's called menu items, so I think it's pretty intuitive. You're going to set the label and description a hint, and you point to a PS of PowerShell file, so this has PS1 in this case, and in that file you will have the logic. But just configure in this file and basically defining where this menu item should look like, where it should show up-- in this case on the file context-- which is the right click on a file. That just by doing this couple of things, when we switch back to Vault in a second, there you go. You have the menu item.

Well, you actually have to restart Vault. In the video, I just cut it out in a few seconds, but basically just by configuring the XML file, you just restart Vault and you have your menu item. This could be done since Vault 2010, 2011 with .net. But it was a mess. You had to start up-- fire up your Visual Studio, register the DLLs, implementing to phase, do all this. And by the way, I take a bet with any skilled developer. I'm faster doing it this. So the time it takes to start a visual studio, I'm done with creation of the menu item.

So this is just to give you a feel of where, or who, is data standard addressing. It's basically you, here in this room. Not every one of you has to do it, but it's important. It's possible to do it. So when the developer comes back and say, I don't know. Maybe it's too complex. And I have to look. You can say, I have seen a fancy Italian talking about this stuff in Las Vegas. So it's doable, and just go ahead and do it.

So this is about menu items. Let's give a look to dialogues. Here, for instance, a little customization I made for the creation of the folder, I want to select a template. So when I'm going to create a new folder, I actually want to create a folder based on another selected folder, so that all the subfolders underneath get carried over. Let's suppose you have different type of projects, five, four, six, seven, typical projects in your company. You created a template folder somewhere. You sketched up all your sub folders, the way you want with the categories and [INAUDIBLE] and so on. You're going to create a new project. You don't want to do it again. You want to pick one of the existing ones, and start it over. It's kind of a copy designed for folders, if you want.

So in this case, the simple solution was, let's create a new folder. So we're going to create a new folder. We're going to pick here one of the existing folders. And I could filter and so it just made it very simple. I put in a name. And when I save it, you will see that this new folder has immediately also this subfolder components. If my folder would have contained even more folders, then all of the folders would have been recreated. These are the little things that can be done very easily, and very simple.

Actually, this is something that I have posted on our coolOrange blog, so if you are interested in this stuff, you can just go there and read in more detail how this has been done, and so on. I'll give you, then, the source at the end. But this is the kind of things that drove us, back in the days, to develop MyView, and I think this was one of the reasons why AutoDesk decided to purchase this stuff. Because it's one of the typical scenarios-- I see a lot of heads here nodding, and so I say yes, we need this, or we know this, or whatever. So it does have to be easy to be done. And I don't want to invest here three weeks of work for doing this. It should be fairly simple.

So ability to customize, not configure. In this case, it's no longer a configuration. It's a customization. But it's fairly compatible. So, for instance, this example here has been done, I think, with Vault 2015. So on the block, this is the thing we did in the past with 2015. Just last week, as I prepared here the stuff, I just did exactly the same thing like I did three years ago, and it worked. There is no change here.

So let's talk about tabs. Under the data standard extension, data standard configuration, there are soft folders for file items, and so on and so forth. Again, it's a loop, so it will come up again in a few seconds. And windows folders, you can basically create new XAML files. So here configuration, you see a lot of folders for SEO folders, items, files, and so on. In the file, we have an additional XAML, and you see the CAD BOM on the data sheet. And just by creating an XAML file in that folder, If you restart Vault, you get an additional tab. The file could be even empty. I don't know what happened if it's empty, but still, the tab would be created. Of course there will be nothing in.

Now in this case, for instance, we used it for doing an integration to [INAUDIBLE] This is also interesting. The data that you see here are not coming from Vault, they're coming from the ERP system. So I'm in Vault. I clicked on a file, and based on the part number, I can basically connect to my ERP system and see stuff that comes from the ERP system. Life. And I can write it back, and so on.

So think about this tab as a possibility for you to summarize information that may be related to Vault. As an example, you're working with items. You click on a file. You may want to see the item information of that file. As a tab. You don't want to switch from the file to the item to see more information. You could show this information directly underneath in a tab like this.

In this case, we went even beyond. Instead of showing data that is within Vault, we show data that is outside of Vault. It could be data that comes from SharePoint. Or even other systems. If you're having a company-wide data management system, Team SANTORIN, ENOVIA, MATRIX ONE, SharePoint, whatever. It could be an idea to say, OK. Instead of switching between two applications, I could basically extend Vault to show me that information is relevant to me as a designer within Vault, in a tab, for instance. And it's bi-directional. I can read data, but I can also write it back.

So creation of the tab, pretty simple. Go in a folder. Just create an XAML file. And I can show later how this XAML file if can be also configured.

So, creation of new tabs. So, in summary, the purpose of data standard is, as a product, to simplify standardized data entry, you see the [INAUDIBLE] before. Nothing to do, configure your Vault, install data standard. You're good to go. But of course, and this-- and the dialogues reflects and respects the Vault configuration. So not tired, to stress this enough, configure your Vault. Making sure that the Vault is configured properly. The rest will go along the way.

Then the other thing is to think about-- so it's every version of data standard-- the focus is really to think about more configuration of router customization. To make it always simpler for you to tweak a little bit to dialogues without getting your hands dirty. But on the other hand is, if it comes to configuration, then try to make it as simple as possible. Now, the definition of simple is different for every person, whether you are a developer or not. But again, I bet that all of you that are not developers, if you spend a little bit of time and give a look to the scripts and the PowerShell files, you at least can read them. At least you can follow the structure.

So finally, let's come to the real topic. What's new in data standard 2017. So a new feature that has been introduced is the-- so is this Save Copy As. This is a pure inventor feature. And what it does, it gives you the ability for drawings and for assembly, to export a different format directly into Vault. So if you look on the top right side, you see this little picture. It's a screenshot from in Inventor. You haven't the ribbon, this additional function called Save Copy As. And by pushing that function, you basically get this dialogue. And if you are in a drawing, then you have the ability to export the file as a DWG, DXF, and PDF. These are the three formats that are supported. If you are in an IPT or an AIM, you have step NJT as a format.

By doing this and selecting the folder of Vault, you basically immediately saved this export file directly into Vault. Now, the file that you're going to export is not linked in any way to the original file. It's just there, so you can save it where you want, it's up to you. You can name it if you want. It can have two properties that you want. And by doing so, it takes over the properties that you have already in the file, so you don't have to retype everything. So it suggests you the same properties, if you want, but you can change them. You can pick a different category. It's a really independent file, and it has no relation to the original one.

So that means that let's suppose you're going to create a PDF of a drawing. So you select the folder, select the name, save the PDF in Vault. A week later, you change the drawing. You want to re-export this drawing as a PDF. You have to do the operation again. And if you're going to select the same folder and the same file, then the dialogue will tell you there is a ready one. Would you like to overwrite it? And you can say yes. But if you select a different name, he doesn't have any memory. He doesn't have any history. So every export is independent from the previous one. It's up to you to save it in the right place, and the right way.

This is the standard. Of course, knowing that we can customize this thing, of course this can be even customized to the specific work [INAUDIBLE] that you have. Question?

AUDIENCE: The options still work the same way as the Copy As?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: Right. Good point. Yes, the option dialogue. Right. On the dialogue here, you see basically this option dialogue, and it opens up the original Inventor option dialogue. So it's--

AUDIENCE: So you want to do one-to-one?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: It's really the same. It's the same function like the original Save Copy As function in Inventor. And if you click on the option dialog, you really get the Inventor option dialog. So the settings that you have-- and by the way, if you don't open up the dialogue, it takes the settings of the last of the previous configuration. So you wanted to save a DWG format in AutoCAD 2000 format because you want to give it out, whatever. If you did it before, it still keeps this configuration.

Sir, one thing. I noticed-- I don't know if it's just a problem of my [INAUDIBLE] machine, I noticed that this dialogue is showing behind the data standard dialogue. So if you try it and you don't see it immediately, try just to move away the data standard dialogue. The data standard dialog is always on top of everything. And my feeling is that it's also on top of this option dialogue. So just moved windows aside and then you should see it.

AUDIENCE: Can you put the option to attach it to the [INAUDIBLE]?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: Sorry, the question is?

AUDIENCE: Can you have it attached to the [INAUDIBLE]. So like it becomes part of the parent file.--

MARCO MIRANDOLA: So the question is, basically, can I make an attachment--

AUDIENCE: Like a step-file.

MARCO MIRANDOLA: Right, can I attach, basically, the exported file to the original file. Technically, yes. There is just a but. And there is one logistical problem. I'm here on a file in Inventor, which is checked out from Vault. And while it's checked out, I can do nothing within Vault. So the problem is that I have the file checked out. I created the STEP file of the PDF, or whatever. That file is checked in. And in order to create the attachment, even the original file would have to be checked in, which is not. It's currently checked out. So this is why at the moment, this does not supported.

Now this is something that in the case should happen than later. So when the original file gets checked in, then technically, we have the ability to say, oh a file gets checked in. Let's see whether there is a dependent file, whatever. And create the [INAUDIBLE] connection. So I would say, yes, it's possible. But you have to take it from another side because the file is checked out.

AUDIENCE: Would it have to be post-processed?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: Right. It would have to be post-processed. Question?

AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE]?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: That's correct. You can. So the question is, does it only work when it's checked out? No, it does also work when it's checked in. So you can keep the file checked in, and just do a get and open it up. And you can still do a Save Copy As. That's right. But this is the point. So I remember we had this conversation with the product management team, and it was-- the thing is this. How can you do something without confusing the people. And in this case, the decision was to say, OK, let's do nothing because we are then consistent. Otherwise, we would have somehow to either not permit to do the Save Copy As while it's checked out, or bring [INAUDIBLE] and say, hey, you can do this, but be aware that because the file is checked out, you cannot create the link and so on and so forth.

So yes, I can do this even when a file is checked in , and if this is the rule, then it's pretty simple to customize this and make the attachment. but there are some things that need to be just thought about it and then take the decision.

AUDIENCE: So [INAUDIBLE] fully customizable?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: The dialogue, yes. Yes, so the dialogue is basically this XAML file-- I can show it to you later. So you can configure the data the way you want. Not only this, every data standard dialogue. It is configurable and customizable. And of course, all the functions behind like, OK, cancel, and so on and so forth, are also customizable. So you could basically connect to the OK button and say, well, if the is checked in, then check in the file and do the connection, and all that stuff. So yes. Yep?

AUDIENCE: Is there a way to keep the PDF file from automatically go into Vault to do this. Because I don't want my users to put a PDF of a drawing in the stack in this update. Only PDFs allowed [INAUDIBLE].

MARCO MIRANDOLA: So the question is basically, can I do this automatically with every check in. So can I generate a PDF automatically--

AUDIENCE: No. I don't want anything-- any PDF files that are generated from [? inventors ?] in my Vault.

MARCO MIRANDOLA: So your question is, can I do disable this function.

AUDIENCE: Yeah.

MARCO MIRANDOLA: OK, yes. Well, the easiest way is just to remove the bottom from the ribbon. There is in Inventor-- there is a configuration file where you basically can configure which buttons should be visible and not. The simplest thing would be really-- it's the cheapest one. Go into configuration file, remove the button, then you're good to go.

AUDIENCE: It would still be nice [INAUDIBLE]

MARCO MIRANDOLA: Oh, well that's the other thing. If you want to do it, be more selective, than I'm not sure if this can be done by just removing the file for certain time, but another thing that could be easily done is, in the PowerShell script that is behind this dialogue, just make it very stupid if. If File Extension equals IPT, go ahead. If File Extension is not IPTA, stop there. And this is, again, the type of logic that I bet that most of the old-fashioned script guys-- maybe you cannot do it, but you can read it. So it's-- by saying this, I see people nodding heads, so I think you can.

AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] is there a way to set a [INAUDIBLE] mode so if we did?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: Sorry, say it again.

AUDIENCE: Is there a way to attach [INAUDIBLE]?

MARCO MIRANDOLA: So the question is, can I customize the PDF, or can attach paint table or this kind of stuff to the PDF. Well, I am not sure. Well, I will answer the question this way. Whatever Inventor can do-- so this is the native Save As PDF function-- then this dialogue can do the same. Not more, not less. So I'm not sure what Inventor can--

AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE]

MARCO MIRANDOLA: This is just Inventor. All right. Another thing that has been changed, and actually, this change came in with the update 1 of data standard 2017. This is something that we waited for a long time. In the Inventor Vault options of the Inventor add-in, you have this ability to define whether the numbering scheme with the number generators should be used for drawing or not.

So, typical example, you have a component, which has the number one, two, three, four. You want to have the drawing with the same file name. You want to have also the drawing to be called one, two, three, four. That ID [INAUDIBLE]. So this is something that you could always have been configured inside the regular Vault add-in. And now it's also supported by data standard. If you look into this video, it's just looping. It's set in this option. Say yes, generate me a number for the drawing. Once I save it, I do have the ability to select the numbering scheme I prefer. And so generate a new number, a different number for the drawing. If I switch these off, as is usually the case, if I do this, then I can't select a numbering scheme, and the drawing gets the same number like the model that you have inserted. Right

This was something that in the past was always possible with data standard, but it had-- It was connected with some coding, with some customization. We have an example on our blog that explains how to solve this problem. And, now basically, it's part of the standard. You don't have to think about. But it's update one. So data standard 2017 update one supports this-- finally this option.