Skyler Crossman さんのグループアクティビティ

After Installation of ARAS I am getting this Blank Screen, How to Resolve It ?

ARAS PLM Learner — Sun, 23 Aug 2020 17:48:32 GMT

CorporateTimeZone Variable is not set.

Duncanwilliamgibbons — Tue, 28 Jul 2020 12:12:48 GMT

When creating a project I get the following error

CorporateTimeZone Variable is not set.

I have tried updating the timezones data but didn't help.

Thanks,

Duncan

Attribute Character limits

Michael Rodriguez — Tue, 12 Oct 2021 17:09:03 GMT

Hello,

Looking for details on attribute character limits, in this case, the character limit for the dropdown list. Did not find it in any student guides, is it 64 character?

Please advise

Technical Documentation Improvements

Skyler Crossman — Fri, 15 Apr 2022 16:36:00 GMT

Creating and maintaining technical documentation is an ongoing process, which means learning tools to make that process more efficient pays off soon. Aras Innovator has a robust set of technical documentation tools as part of a common configuration. Today we’re going to discuss a pair of recent improvements to the process: as of version 17, you can drag and drop sections to rearrange them as well as resize the graphics within the Technical Document editor.

In our examples in this article, we’re using Aras Innovator version 18 and an administrator account. That isn’t necessary- these improvements are in version 17, and can be expected to function in versions released after this article- but if you find what you see differs slightly from what these steps depict, check your version and access credentials.

Sometimes you find you’ve written the right thing, but in the wrong order. It happens to the best of us. Ideally, you want your technical documentation platform to be easy to adjust and change, and Aras Innovator prides itself on being adjustable and keeping pace with your needs! First, open the technical document you want to work on, and click Edit to start making changes.

On the left of the TechDoc editor window, there’s an outline of all the elements of your document. Expand pieces of it until you have the elements that you want to move around. In our example, we’re going to move the whole of the Gantry section to between the Body and the Extruder.

To do this, all that needs done is to is left-click and hold on the Marketing-Doc section for the Gantry until it becomes translucent. From that point, it can be dragged up to where it’s wanted- you’ll see a horizontal bar showing exactly where it’s going to wind up, and the bar will be red if you can’t put it there for some reason. Blue means we’re good to go! Release the mouse button and it’ll drop into place.

Looking at this, perhaps you want to adjust the size of your image. Make sure the TechDoc you want to edit is open for editing. If you find you can’t edit a section in a technical document in Aras Innovator, the reason is usually that you’re in a larger document that has another document linked within it. If that’s the case, you need to open the sub-document. Once you're ready, left click on the image in the editor, and you’ll see a black outline appear around it with four circles at the corners. Simply click on one of the circles and drag it to resize the image. It will scale automatically for you.

Don’t forget to save and hit Done when you’re finished!

Conclusions and Congratulations

If you’ve been using technical documentation tools in Aras Innovator for years, you may have missed these quality of life improvements. If you’ve never written a technical document in our framework, then you can go and write your first document and use these tools from the start. Either way, we hope you keep an eye on the Release Notes from each new version of Aras Innovator to see what we’re bringing you next!

Working With Tree Grid Views and CUI

Skyler Crossman — Mon, 07 Mar 2022 20:18:00 GMT

The configurable user interface (CUI) is a tool in Aras Innovator to alter and customize how you use Aras Innovator without requiring long development cycles, or even to be much in the way of a developer yourself. By making use of configuration changes and reusing low-code tools, you can alter an Aras Innovator instance much quicker and cheaper than conventional PLM solutions. When combined with a developer’s talents, or reuse of method code, you have a lot of power over what your system can do. Make common actions more convenient, bring the right information to where it will be needed, and generally enjoy the power of a flexible environment.

Today, we’re going to take a look at Tree Grid Views (TGVs) and we're going to go over how to add or remove options from a Tree Grid View's toolbar or context menu.

Before we begin, please note that these steps assume you’re logged in as an administrator or other account with sufficient permissions. In our examples, we’ll be using version 12 Service Pack 18. This isn't an article about how to setup a TGV or how to connect it to a query- we're starting with one already configured as detailed in this post.

One Tree Grid View

Tree Grid Views are often set up for a specific context; drawing on a specific, preset query, and intended to be showing in only one place. Under those circumstances, you want your modifications to apply only to the one TGV you have in mind. In the following steps, we'll walk you through removing one of the normal toolbar buttons and adding a new context menu option to a TGV we already made.

In the Table of Contents, go to Administration->Presentation Configurations. If you don't see it, follow sub-steps a-e below. Otherwise continue to step 2.
1. Go to Administration->Itemtypes
2. Search for Presentation Configurations
3. Open it, edit, and in TOC Access add a new row
4. Set the name to Administrators and the category to Administration.
5. Hit done. You should see Presentation Configurations in the table of contents now, though you may need to refresh.
Create a new Presentation Configuration, named Part TGV Example
In the Command Bar Section relationship, add two new rows.
1. The first row will control the Toolbar, the row of UI elements above the TGV itself. Set its properties as follows:
  1. Classification: Data Model
  2. Name: Part TGV Example Toolbar
  3. Location: TGV_Toolbar
  4. Identity: World
2. The second row will control the Context Menu, the menu which appears when you right click on a Tree Grid View. Set its properties as follows:
  1. Classification: Data Model
  2. Name: Part TGV Example ContextMenu
  3. Location: TGV_ContextMenu.
  4. Identity: World
Hit Done
Now we want to make some changes to our toolbar. Most Tree Grid Views can export to excel, but in this case we don’t want that. Open the toolbar by right clicking that row and clicking open.
1. Keep in mind that this will augment the usual TGV Toolbar. You can add new toolbar buttons and remove existing ones from the defaults.
2. Add an existing CommandBarItem as a new row. This will open up a search grid. Search for an item with the name “rb_ExportToExcel” and add it.
3. Set the Action to “Remove”
4. Hit Done.
Now our tool bar won’t have that option in this TGV.
Next we want to add an option to our context menu. Go back to the Part TGtV Example Presentation Configuration. Where before you opened the toolbar, now open the Context Menu by right clicking it and clicking Open.
1. Like the toolbar, this will augment the usual options. Unlike with the toolbar, in most default configurations there aren’t any existing context menu options. In the Command Bar Item view, create a new row. Set its properties as follows:
  1. ItemType: Menu
  2. Name: Example_Menu_Option
  3. Action: Add
  4. Identity: World
Right click the new row, and click Open
Here, we have another set of properties to fill out. Click Edit to change them.
1. The Label is what shows on the menu- set this to “Our Example”
2. The Init Method is a method that runs when the menu opens. Leave this blank for the moment. This is often used for further precise configuration of when the option is visible: a method which ends with “return {'cui_disabled': true};” will not be available.
3. The Click Method is what will happen if we click on it. Set this to a method of your choosing, perhaps a simple alert to confirm that it works.
4. Click Done.
Now our new Tree Grid View has a customized toolbar and a custom context menu.

These changes will only affect this specific Tree Grid View. It allows for targeted custom alterations and this is a useful way to go about making changes since many TGVs are designed for a single context. However, if you want to make a change to every tree grid in your instance, our next section will walk you through that. Making changes to every Tree Grid View in every instance everywhere requires you to work at Aras. We're hiring!

All Tree Grid Views

While the last section assumed you only wanted to change one TGV, it's also possible you have an idea for new functionality that you want to apply to every Tree Grid View in your solution. If that's the case, CUI still has what you need.

Start by going to the table of contents and opening Administration-> Configuration -> Client Presentation
Search the Client Presentation, and click on Global
In the Command Bar Section, look for Location with TGV_ContextMenu and TGV_Toolbar. Right click and then open each of them.
From here, this should look very familiar to steps five and seven from the first section.
To change the toolbar, go to TGV_Toolbar.
1. Add a new CommandBarItem as a new row. When you do, a dialog will open asking what kind of element we want to add.
2. Click Button, then click Okay
3. Set the Action to “Add”
4. Set the name to a name of your choice. We'll call ours "labs_Synchronize"
5. Hit Save.
6. Now, right click our new row and click open.
7. In the CommandBarButton window that results, set the properties as follows:
  1. Label: "Synchronize"
  2. Like with Toolbars, the Init Method can be used to decide whether or not to display our toolbar button. It's fine to leave it blank for now.
  3. Click Method: A method of your choice. In our case, we have one called "labs_Sync_With_External"
  4. Image: Choose an image of your choice.
8. Hit done.
Now if you go to any TGV in your system, you'll see your new icon resting their in the toolbar!
Next we want to add an option to our context menu. Go back to the TGV_ContextMenu.
1. In the Command Bar Item view, create a new row. Set its properties as follows:
  1. ItemType: Menu
  2. Name: Second_Menu_Option
  3. Action: Add
  4. Identity: World
Right click the new row, and click Open
Here, we have another set of properties to fill out. Click Edit to change them.
1. Label is what shows on the menu- set this to “Our Example”
2. Init Method can be left blank for now.
3. Click Method: A method of your choice.
4. Click Done.

There you have it. These changes will be shown on every TGV in your system, to every user. That may not be what you want: it's reasonable to want to only show some options to some users, in which case change the For Identity and Identity fields to suit your needs. If you want more fine grained control- perhaps a toolbar button that only appears when a part is in a particular lifecycle state, or a context menu option that will only be shown when a part has a BOM- first start by applying it to every TGV. Then use an Init Method to control whether it displays. CUI is a powerful, customizable tool!

Conclusions and Congratulations

If you’ve been following along, you now have a functional understanding of how Tree Grid Views and the Configurable User Interface interact. You can add actions to the context menu for a particular TGV or change how the toolbar will look for all TGVs, and what you’ve learned here will only help you when it comes to making other kinds of customizations. Remember, while you can make almost any change to how Aras Innovator operates by changing the underlying code, it’s much easier to use low-code configuration changes. Before you embark on a long development project, ask yourself if you can use the tools you already have at hand.

And, as always, please let us know in the comments below if you have questions or comments regarding this article! What changes have you made to your tree grids?

Relationship tab view according to classification

dkahraman — Tue, 17 Jul 2018 04:48:17 GMT

Hello! We use Innovator 11 SP9 Build No 6549 I've created a new relationship to the part item (Part Harness). We would like to use this tab for only "Component" Classification. I know we can create multiple Part Forms and Views for different classifications but I do not know how to display relationship tab according to these. Can we make this happen by just admin configuration in the Innovator interface? thank you very much for your time.

Multilingual Environments

Skyler Crossman — Fri, 05 Nov 2021 19:45:00 GMT

Amid the recent shift towards remote work, and even before the last few years, many businesses have employees all around the world, with a variety of native languages. While Aras Innovator defaults to English, it’s easy to set it up to support multiple languages, and today we’re going to walk through the process of doing just that!

Before we begin, there are two quick notes. First, our steps and examples in this article are for Aras Innovator version 12, Service Pack 18. They should be mostly accurate for any service pack of 12, but you may need to make slight adjustments. Second, for many commonly used languages there are existing Language Packs for Aras Innovator, which translate much of the default user interface. For more information on Language Packs, see this article.

Setting up for A Multilingual Environment

There’s a few things we need to do to get set up for a new language. Most of them we can do within the Aras Innovator interface, but the first step is actually going to involve the web.config file. It’s a simple change, but as always when making changes to your code tree, be careful and take backups, preferably trying things on a test system first.

In your codetree, look for /Innovator/Server/web.config. Open it.
Search for the line that begins “<globalization requestEncoding”
In the “culture” and “uiCulture” sections, set their value to the culture code that you want to use. Aras Innovator conforms to the standards set by Microsoft here.

In Aras Innovator, just about everything is an item, so it should come as no surprise that there’s a Language item. We’re going to create a new one, as well as make a few other changes we’ll need.

In the Table of Contents, go to Administration-> Localization-> Languages. Right click, and Create New.
Fill out the values as appropriate.
1. The ISO code for the language you want. In this, Aras Innovator conforms to the ISO Standards.
2. Name, which is a simple label.
Suffix, which is typically the ISO language code with a “_” before it.
Direction, which is the direction the language is read in.
In the Table of Contents, go to Administration-> Localization -> Locales. Right click, and Create New.
Fill out the values as appropriate.
1. Code, typically in the format “culture-LANGUAGE” such as “fr-FR” for French.
2. For the Language, select the Language item you previously created.
Now we have a new language, but we still need to tell Aras Innovator to use that language by default. Open the Table of Contents and go to Administration -> Variables.
Search for “DefaultLanguage” and open it.
Change the value to the new language you’ve created.
Go back to Variables, and search for “DefaultLocale” and open it.
Change the value to the new Locale you’ve created.

Now wherever Aras Innovator will use the new language where it can. We will need to give it translations to work with- the actual translation being well outside the scope of this article- but the translations may be added piece by piece.

The Translations Themselves

There are two main places you’ll want to add translations: Labels, and Properties. The labels are the small descriptions of what each field is for, used on forms and elsewhere. The properties have the actual data.

When you have more than one language in your instance, a button will appear next to any Label field. Click it to open a dialogue where you can enter the translated text into the appropriate Language box. When you finish, Aras Innovator will remember your translation and use it in the future.

For properties that store text, we’ll need to use a different data type. When editing an itemtype’s properties, strings can be straightforwardly replaced with Multilingual Strings. When entering data into the string, you will get a small dialogue for Multilingual Entry, allowing you to supply data for all the languages your Aras Innovator instance is configured to make use of.

Conclusions and Congratulations

Now you know how to set up a new language in Aras Innovator. While this information might not be at all helpful to you if you have a small or tightly local organization, where everyone uses the same language, it will eventually become relevant as your organization grows. No matter where the future of your industry takes you, Aras Innovator is ready to grow alongside you, always configurable and always adaptable. Let us know which languages you find yourself needing in your organization! When we haven’t already provided, we hope to provide tools for you to build your own solutions.

Working with Shortcuts and CUI

Skyler Crossman — Fri, 24 Sep 2021 19:00:00 GMT

The Configurable User Interface (CUI) is designed to let you be your own designer. A knowledgeable administrator can alter the way Aras Innovator looks and functions with CUI in dramatically less time than it would take to reprogram the interface. We’ve published a number of articles on this topic, and today we’re going to talk about two CUI features you might not know about. One of them your users will see almost every time they log in, and one of them will be useful even though your users will never see it at all!

Before we get started, a few quick checks. Any screenshots or instructions in this article are for Aras Innovator version 12, service pack 18. We assume that you’re logged in as an administrator- if you aren’t an administrator on your system, feel free to direct your local admin to this article!

The table of contents (TOC) is the major method of moving around Aras Innovator. Any alteration to it should be considered carefully since you don’t want to make it unintuitive for users to navigate around your various items, but by the same token there’s a lot to be gained from making it clear what each part of the table of contents leads to. You should already know how to change the individual items- it’s the Label on the itemtype- so here’s a quick sequence for changing the category labels.

In our example, we’ll change the Design category in the default setup to be Design Center.

In the Table of Contents, go to Administration->Configuration->Client Presentation.
Search Client Presentation, then click the Global property in the result.
In the Command Bar Section grid, right click the com.aras.innovator.cui_default.toc and then click Open.
In the Command Bar Item grid, right click the com.aras.innovator.cui_default.toc_Design and then click Open.
Click Edit.
Change the Label to Design Center.
Click Done.

You may need to log out and back in again, but when you do you’ll see the changed label. Combined with changing the labels on individual items and changing where in the TOC an itemtype shows up, you can freely reorganize the table of contents however you like!

Keyboard Shortcuts

If you work with a computer for your job, you’ve almost undoubtedly learned a number of keyboard shortcuts. CTRL+C is useful in most applications to copy something, for example. It can be surprisingly hard to learn new such shortcuts, since they usually aren’t part of the visual user interface, but once learned they become powerful new tools. Today, we’re going to discuss adding new shortcuts to Aras Innovator.

In the Table of Contents, go to Administration->Configuration-> Client Presentation.
Search Client Presentation, then click the Global property in the result.
In the Command Bar Section grid, right click the com.aras.innovator.cui_default.itemWindowShortcuts and then click Open.
Click Edit.
Click New and then select Shortcut->OK to create a new shortcut. Give it the following properties:
1. Name: New_Item
2. Sort Order: 1024
3. Action: Add
4. For Identity: World
Right click the new row, and click Open.
Set the shortcut property to whatever you want- in this example, we’ll use alt+ctrl+n.
1. A brief digression: you do not want the shortcut to be something that already exists in the browser, like ctrl+c. You also don’t want it to have too many steps, like alt+ctrl+a+p+b. Ideally, the letter should somehow relate to the action you want to perform, the way that the C in ctrl+c means Copy.
Set the Handler property to a custom method. For our example, we’ll use the following code:
1. Var itemtype = window.itemTypeName; if(itemtype){aras.uiNewItemEx(itemtype);}
Click Save and close the Shortcut tab.
Save and close the Command Bar Section tab.

Now if you open an item, you’ll be able to hit ctrl+alt+n and open a new instance of that item. This lets you quickly and conveniently make new Parts or Documents, but the real magic was in step 8a. That’s a method, but it’s just a regular Method. If you’ve been following along any of the Aras Labs blogs, you’ll know that Methods are extraordinarily powerful. There’s nothing particular stopping you from making just about any action you regularly take, sometimes stepping through several menus to get there, a few keypresses away.

Conclusions and Congratulations

You now know how to alter something cosmetic seen by every user in your Aras Innovator system by changing the TOC, and also know how to invisibly control the incredibly flexible power of Methods with keyboard shortcuts. Use your newfound power responsibly; we at Aras Labs do not officially recommend replacing the default Table of Contents with a collection of terrible puns, but we do recommend adding keyboard shortcuts for your most often used actions. Let us know if there are any changes you get inspired to make to your system!

Workflow task not updated in my innovator basket.

diptasubhra10@gmail.com — Sat, 25 Apr 2020 17:56:21 GMT

I have created a workflow map and lifecycle map and linked them together as well as linking them to an item type. Lifecycle map is working fine but workflow map is not working. What could be the possible reason?

Community Spam

AJ Sebastian — Mon, 15 Jun 2020 15:19:57 GMT

Hi Everyone,

In the coming weeks we're going to be testing some new ways to combat spam on these pages. We're going to be adding some automated systems to hopefully catch more of the spam. This could have some unintended consequences, but the good should outweigh the bad.

One way we're hoping to combat spam is by making new users have a window where they can't post without being approved. We'll try and stay on top of the moderation queue, but be aware that your post might not be displayed immediately for new accounts.

Please use this discussion to let us know of any new issues which arise because of the changes.

Thanks,

Item Views with CUI

Skyler Crossman — Fri, 20 Aug 2021 19:00:00 GMT

The Configurable User Interface (CUI) is one of the many ways Aras Innovator continues to make itself adjustable and customizable. You don’t need long development cycles to tweak how things are laid out in your environment, and rearranging things can be done without any coding experience at all. Much of this is done through Aras Innovator’s unique approach to data organization- to whit, everything is an item- and that means you spend a lot of time viewing items. Today, we’re combining those: we’ll walk you through how to use CUI to change the item views.

Screenshots will be taken from Aras Innovator version 12, service pack 18. The steps we give assume that you have an administrator account.

Add a Tab

Open up any item. You’ll see the name of the item up top, the command bar beneath that, and then the majority of the actual data held in two “accordion” views. Generally, the first accordion shows the information of the specific item, and the lower accordion shows the relationships that item has. This is a general rule- some items are arranged differently. How? Follow along to see how to move a relationship tab to the top accordion.

We’ll use Parts as our item and the Part BOM relationship as our relationship to move, but this basic process should work on most items and relationships.

Open the Part ItemType.
Select the Client Style relationship tab.
Right click the entry in the grid and click Open.
Click the Edit button.
Select the cui_PresentConfigWinSection tab.
Click the New button in the toolbar.
1. Set the Classification to Data Model.
2. Set the Name to Accordion1.
3. Set the Location to ItemView.
4. Set the For Identity to World.
Click the Save button
Right click the new window section.
Select Open.
Click Edit
Click the New button in the toolbar.
1. Set the Type to Tab Element Control
2. Set the Name to ACC1_BOM_Tab
3. Set the Label to Part BOM
4. Set the Additional Data to {“relTypeId”: “159C6D88795B4A86864420863466F728”}
5. Set the Parent to ItemView.FormAccordionTabs
6. Set the Sort Order to 1024
7. Set the Action to Add
8. Set the For Identity to World.
Click Save.

Now if you open a Part, you should see the Part BOM tab is showing in the first accordion. This lets you see the Part BOM and relationships at the same time, and makes it easier to find the Part BOM relationship.

Hide a Tab

Of course, now we have the Part BOM tab in two places- the top accordion and the bottom. While there’s nothing inherently wrong with that, and it may actually be useful if you want to be able to compare a relationship against any other tab, it’s usually not how we do things. What we give, we can take away, like so:

In the table of contents, navigate to Administration-> RelationshipTypes
Search for Part BOM and open it.
Click Edit
Check the Hide In All box.
Click Save

Now it won’t show in any relationship accordions. Since that’s the second set of tabs, when you combine these two procedures you’ll have effectively moved the Part BOM from the bottom to the top. Keep in mind that it hasn’t “moved” really- you made a new one, and hid the old one- but that won’t matter in most cases.

Add a Third Accordion

Okay, but why are there two accordions anyway? Since you can collapse an accordion menu easily (just click the arrow in the top right) you could have three or four without impeding access to the information. While we at Aras counsel restraint and simplicity in design, if your heart compels you to more and more, far be it for us to stop you.

To make your dream a reality, follow the following steps:

In the table of contents, navigate to Administration -> ItemType
Search for the Part ItemType and open it.
Select the Client Style relationship tab.
Right click the entry in the grid and select Open.
Click the Edit button.
Select the cui_PresentConfigWinSection tab
Click the New button
1. Set the Classification to Data Model
2. Set the Name to Accordion3
3. Set the Location to ItemView
4. Set the For Identity to World
Click the Save button.
Right click the new window section and click Open
Click the Edit button
Click the New button in the grid toolbar.
1. Set the Type to Accordion Element Control
2. Set the Name to Acc3_Container
3. Set the Additional Data to {"cssClass": "aras-item-view__relationship-accordion"}
4. Set the Sort Order to 2000
5. Set the Action to Add
6. Set the For Identity to World
Click Save
Click the New button in the grid toolbar.
1. Set the Type to Tab Container Control
2. Set the Name to Doc_Tab_Container
3. Set the Additional Data to {"attributes" : {"slot": "header"}}
4. Set the Parent to Acc3_Container
5. Set the Sort Order to 2050
6. Set the Action to Add
7. Set the For identity to World
Click Save
Click the New button in the grid toolbar again.
1. Set the Type to Tab Element Control
2. Set the Name to Document_Tab
3. Set the Label to Documents
4. Set the Additional Data to
5. Set the Parent to Doc_Tab_Container
6. Set the Sort Order to 3000
7. Set the Action to Add
8. Set the For Identity to World.
Click Save

You can repeat step fifteen, adding as many Tab Element Controls as you wish, adding tabs to the third accordion. You can also repeat step seven to add as many accordions as you wish, if you think you need more accordions. Shine on, accordion lover. Don’t let the world take away your dreams.

Now, there are good design reasons not to have every tab in its own accordion. In practice, four is the most we'd generally suggest. If you have a use case for more though, Aras Innovator has your back. Now, what's the collective noun for accordions? Is it an orchestra of accordions, an assemblage of accordions, a cacophony of accordions? Sadly, Aras Labs does not have this answer for you.

Conclusions and Congratulations

Now you know how to add tabs, remove tabs, and add entire new accordion menus. Item views are so easy to adjust once you have the trick of it. Plus, each new piece of CUI you understand makes the entire edifice more adjustable, and makes Aras Innovator ever more tailored to your needs. What changes would you make to your most common Item views? What about the uncommon ones? Let us know in the comments below!

Aras Fundamentals: Working with Files

Skyler Crossman — Thu, 05 Aug 2021 19:00:00 GMT

Aras Innovator is a Product Lifecyle Management tool. That means its job is to make your job- whatever it is your company does- easier. You no doubt use other programs, from making engineering diagrams to writing document, and those programs generate their own data in the form of files. Today, we’re going to look at how the files of almost any program you care to name can be managed in Aras Innovator.

A Brief Note on Definitions

For security reasons, your files are stored in a special vault on the server. In many cases, you won’t need to worry about your vault, as one is created by default during regular installation and then users default to using that vault. For the purpose of a Fundamentals post, we assume you’re always using Default all the time.

You might also see the term “physical file” used both in this article and in the documentation. This refers to the file itself, wherever it is stored: so if the file in question is a .pdf created by scanning a blueprint, the physical file is the pdf. The specification isn’t the physical file, nor is the File item created in Aras Innovator. The original blueprint also isn’t what we mean by “physical file” despite being the one that you can pick up with your hands.

Similarly, “container” has a specific meaning in the context of Aras Innovator. The container of a physical file is an ItemType, organized more in line with the way Aras Innovator treats Parts. It will have properties and can have workflows or lifecycles. Some come with Aras Innovator’s default setup, like Document or CAD Document. These containers are useful for storing or sorting on your information, but aren’t the file itself.

Upload and Download

With that out of the way, let’s get started with doing things in Aras Innovator. First, we want to upload a file, so we can sort or download it later. The basic container is the Document, so follow the following steps:

Open the Table of Contents, then go to Documents->Documents.
Create a new Document item.
Give the Document a name.
Click Save.
Click the Relationship tab below, then click Create Item.
You’ll be prompted to select a file from your local computer. Do so.
Back in Aras Innovator, click Save.
Click Done.

There you go, one container (the Document Item) with its respective File Item. As with many things in Aras Innovator there’s more than one way to do this- we just made a relationship to a File item, but we can have an Item property that’s a File item instead if we prefer. The default CAD Document ItemType does this, and it’s a perfectly serviceable way to do things.

Downloading is much simpler. In many places where you see the file referenced, it will appear as a hyperlink- blue text with an underline. Simply left clicking on it, for instance in the Files relationship tab, will start either a download or a new window in your browser showing the contents of the file. It’s that easy!

Managing your Files

Generally speaking, in Aras Innovator you don’t want to manage the files directly. Instead you make many changes to the relevant container. For instance, when configuring permissions for who in your organization is permitted to see or edit certain documents, you would adjust who was permitted to edit the Document Item. This keeps everything functioning smoothly within Aras Innovator’s particular idiom and framework. As an end user, you don’t need to think about this- it will all work the way you’re familiar with, apart from uploading and downloading.

As an administrator, there are distinctions here that are important. Keep in mind the distinction between Physical Files and the File Items. Deleting the File Item does not remove the Physical File from your vault- instead, it gets reassigned to a container called Orphaned Files Container. It’s worth taking a look in there periodically to clean out things you’re confident you won’t use again. Meanwhile if a Method tries to make a File Item, the container will automatically be the Global Files Container, but if that File Item is later related to another container this will overwrite the automatic container.

Be aware that versioning happens on the Fil's Container, not the file- if a user downloads a .doc document from a Document Item, makes some changes, and reuploads it to the Document Item, this will show up as a change in which File Item the Document Item references. You’ll have two Physical Files in your vault, the old .doc and the new one. File Items, meanwhile, are also never versioned, but here this is for clarity rather than a technical limitation. Each Physical File in the example above will have their own File Item.

Conclusions and Congratulations

Today you learned how to upload and download the files created by other programs, which will be the most common way for you to store and manage the products of these programs in Aras Innovator. You also learned the distinctions between Physical Files and the File ItemType, what containers are in the context of Aras Innovator, and what your Vault is. These lessons let you manage the data that's vital to your company, and open up the use of some of Aras Innovator's more advanced tools such as 3d visualization. Is there a particular file type you or your organization uses especially often? Let us know in the comments below!

Aras Fundamentals: Creating a LifeCycle

Skyler Crossman — Fri, 04 Jun 2021 17:00:00 GMT

This article will cover the basics of Life Cycles, which are a tool you can use to control your items in Aras Innovator. Each item advances through various states or milestones as it evolves: specific stages that organizations need to track in order to ensure adherence to an internal policy, an external compliance requirement, or just good team governance. Once you finish reading this article, you’ll know how to edit and make use of Life Cycles for the items in your organization.

To follow along, you’ll want to be logged in as an Administrator in Aras Innovator. The screenshots in this post were taken on Aras Innovator Version 12 Service Pack 10, and while the steps should be similar if you’re on Version 12, you may notice small differences in what you see if you’re using a different service pack.

An Overview of Life Cycles

First, some Life Cycle basics. Every item has a Starting state, though you can rename what that state is labeled. A new item whose ItemType is assigned to that Life Cycle will always be created in that starting state. From there, the Life Cycle is built of other states and transitions to those states. Each transition is shown as a line from one state to another, and is generally labeled with the identity of who can move the item along that transition. Sometimes it’s the person who created the item, sometimes it’s a member of a specific team, and sometimes it’s a specific user.

It is generally better practice to use general identities rather than specific users, so that your organization can continue to function should someone leave for another role- or just take a vacation!

Create a Life Cycle

Lets make a new Life Cycle and then assign it to the Purchase Orders ItemType we created in a previous Aras Fundamentals article. In your own instances, you may find that many ItemTypes have simple default Life Cycles. Feel free to edit those or to replace them with your own creations!

In the Table of Contents (TOC) navigate to Administration -> Life Cycle Maps and click “Create New.”
Make sure you give your new Life Cycle Map a name. Here, we’re calling ours “Design Request.”
Below, you should see a map on which you can add states and transitions. Right click on an empty space to add a state.
1. You can edit the name of that state by left clicking on it, then changing the State Name on the form above.
2. Remember, you can drag states around by left clicking and holding on a state, then dragging your mouse where you want the state to be.
Once you have a few states, add transitions between those states by right clicking on state and selecting “Add Transition” then left clicking the state you want to connect it to.
1. You can change who can use a transition by left clicking on it, then editing the Role field in the form above.
2. You can also add bends to a transition line by right clicking it and selecting “Add Break.” This won’t affect the function of the transition, but it can help make things visually cleaner.
When you’re ready, click Done to save your Life Cycle map.

We need to do more than just create the map however: we need to assign it.

Assign a Life Cycle

Now, let’s assign this Life Cycle to our Purchase Orders ItemType. Without that assignment, they won’t follow your new Life Cycle. If you’re following along with another ItemType in your system, you may find that it already has a default Life Cycle Map assigned- many ItemTypes in default configurations already have one.

From the TOC, open Administration->ItemTypes. Search for the ItemType you want to use and open it by right clicking it and selecting “Open.”
Click the Edit button above.
In the relationships tabs below, look for Life Cycles. Left click on that tab.
Add a Life Cycle Map by clicking Add. A search menu will pop up- search for your new map by name, select it by left clicking, then click OK.
Click Done above to finish and save your work.

Congrats, any new items of that ItemType you make will slot in to this new Life Cycle map you’ve created. Now, how do we use this? It’s quite simple really. At the top of any item’s form should be a small icon, the Promote button. If you click it, you’ll move your item along its pathway to completion.

Conclusions and Congratulations

Now you know about Life Cycles, and now you understand how to configure them to match how your organization works on the real products and projects that you manage. You don’t have to stop here- in Aras Innovator, you can use Life Cycles to track different versions of an item, and you can promote groups of items together- but now you have the fundamentals. We look forward to hearing about what you do with this tool.

An Overview of CUI Locations

Skyler Crossman — Fri, 14 May 2021 19:31:00 GMT

We have a number of articles on the Configurable User Interface (CUI) available, but each of them is very focused on one particular aspect or use case. This is a good way to teaching how to use the features of CUI, but today we'd like to take a moment to put lots of options on one page to show what's possible. Therefore, this article will endeavor to give a quick overview of all the sections of Aras Innovator you can configure with CUI.

Screenshots are taken from Aras Innovator Version 12 SP15.

While we won't be taking a deep dive into exactly how to configure all of these in this article, keep an eye out for links to other articles that do have that detail. In general, you can find these settings in one of two places. For something that applies to multiple itemtypes, follow the below steps:

From the table of contents, go to Administration-> Configuration -> Client Presentation and search.
Click on "Global" in the results.
Under the Command Bar Section, you should see the current elements set up using CUI.

For something that only applies to one itemtype, follow these steps instead.

Start by opening the relevant itemtype.
Select the Client Style relationship tab.
You’ll see a grid under Present Configuration. Right click the row there, and click Open.
You should see, in the Command Bar Section, any current elements set up with CUI.

Where it makes sense we'll aslo be giving the location name in bold. That's what you'll specify when setting up CUI, but please note that the location names are current as of Aras Innovator 12SP15 as well. For more precise examples or instructions, take a look at many of our other CUI articles. For now, on with the overview!

Headers

Lets start from the top. The main window header bar is the top of most Aras Innovator displays, always available and omnipresent. Tweaks to the header allow you to place buttons that are available anywhere in your Aras Innovator instance, and are best used for new actions that aren’t dependent on where you are. An in-depth overview of how to use CUI with headers can be found here. The location name for this is the MainWindowHeader.

Title Bars

Just below the header in visual prominence is the title bar. Placed under tabs, above the focus of most screens, the title bar is context dependent but easy to find. You should use title bar changes for things you expect your users to need often, but not tied to a specific item. While this area has a lot of visual space, it’s easy to make it crowded. This location is the SearchView.TitleBar.

Generally, buttons here do something to what’s beneath them like claiming an item for use for use, or showing the itemtype description for the itemtype you’re searching on. We recommend keeping to that design language: this is a place for actions, specifically actions that relate to what’s beneath the title bar.

Item Views

Now we get to the options that are only available when you have an item open. The item views show forms or grids full of information that pertain to one item. Here, you can add tabs to the top or bottom sections, or even add a third segment to the item view. There are many locations applicable here, each starting with ItemView. and continuing with the specific example, such as ItemView.RelationshipsCommandBar

The usual design pattern that Aras follows is to have the item form itself visible at the top (and if you want to change the item form, we have another article for that! It's here) and to have relationships in the bottom segment, with each relationship having its own tab. That isn’t a design pattern that you have to stay with however. If there’s a specific relationship that you feel deserves to be broken out into its own segment, this can allow a user to compare information from two places much easier. We do recommend not using too many segments since it requires a user to scroll up and down between them. Two segments is about as many as most users will be able to see simultaneously, though they can minimize and expand segments at a click.

Toolbars

Toolbars are often seen on relationship views, giving options for interacting with what you see. Some change individual relationships, while others act on all the options you see. Of course, Aras Innovator prides itself on being configurable, so you can add buttons that do all sorts of things here, but it’s best to remember what information is close at hand. Nothing stops you from adding interactions to affect the item itself, but it would be unintuitive. For a closer look at how CUI and toolbars work, take a look at our article here. Like ItemViews, toolbars have many formal locations. You can see most of them by searching "*toolbar*" in any locations search.

Toolbars aren’t only seen here of course, and the same approach will work wherever you need to add the toolbar. At its heart, a toolbar is a like a toolbelt, an array of tools for you to make use of. They’re kept close together just like your hammer and your wrench are often close at hand. Make use of separators to keep categories of tools distinct.

Sidebars

Having exhausted the options going straight down, lets look to the side! Sidebars generally appear next to an item, and don’t move when you scroll up and down on that item. Add something to the sidebar when you want to display something a little outside Aras Innovator’s usual approach. Toolbars, item views, and headers are all general purpose tools that you’ll see repeated whether the item is a part or an incident report or a project. Within sidebars, you’ll find attached files viewed right in Aras Innovator, or three dimensional views of CAD parts. By clearing the screen of other information, you can put whatever it is you need to see front and center, and always go back the same way you got there- the sidebar. The location name for this is ItemWindowSidebar.

Of course, a sidebar is ultimately a place to put a button. The common design practice at Aras is to put different displays or pages here, and we suggest you stick to that. If you want to take an action on the item, put it in a toolbar. If you want to show information relating to the item, a sidebar can be a good place. Still, if you want to see some examples of sidebars in CUI please read our previous article here.

Going further to the side, we find the table of contents. Altering the table of contents is generally done for labeling or presentational purposes, and it’s important to remember that, say, adding an item to the table of contents isn’t CUI at all but is done through the relationships of that itemtype. Still, you can change the labels of things in the table of contents through CUI.

Menus

There are lots of menus in Aras Innovator. From search grids to navigation to the big user menu at the top right, the ability to alter menus means the ability to add or gate a lot of capability. It’s hard to give general advice for menus, because they come in so many varieties. Fortunately, menus are where you can give the most detail and description: a menu doesn’t need to be an icon, but can be written words. Further, menu options show up alongside each other, meaning they can give each other context as well as be informed by where the menu shows up. After all, if you right click an item from a search grid, “open” and “promote” obviously refer to the item you clicked on, and a user would similarly understand “share” would work the same way. You can read more about CUI and menus here, and we encourage you to do so: menus are one of the more common places to add functionality to Aras Innovator.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Last stop! CUI adds official support for adding keyboard shortcuts to Aras Innovator. This is the least obvious change, since your users will never see a visual indication that there’s an option for this. It also runs the risk of accidental usage, either because your user happened to hit several nearby keys together or because you made a keyboard shortcut use the same key combination as other programs. (Hint: Do not use ctrl+c. Your users probably have a clear expectation of what that does already.) Keyboard shortcuts are good for power users and actions that are taken very often. It’s also good for looking like a wizard as you speed through your daily process, views appearing and disappearing as if by magic.

It’s always a good day when you can make an onlooker say “wait, how did you do that, that was awesome!” This article is a couple of years old, but here's an example of this from Aras Innovator 11SP7.

Conclusions and Congratulations

You made it to the end! While this was a quick overview of the options CUI provides, we didn’t go into technical detail. There’s just too much to cover to make that practical! However, we’ve linked liberally to other articles with more depth on each topic, and you’re encouraged to look at them in greater depth if there’s a particular approach that you think might be useful at your organization.

As always, we’d love to hear how you’re using CUI in your system. Is there a keyboard shortcut you couldn’t live without? A combination of item views that’s particularly useful? Let us know in the comments below!

Email Configuration

hkhan — Tue, 24 Nov 2020 23:56:23 GMT

Can anyone help me with a sample email notification, with query which has a relationship to the item as well as html with a loop which displays that relationship. A good example can be of ECN to Affected items i.e. documents/

Skyler Crossman さんの グループ アクティビティ

After Installation of ARAS I am getting this Blank Screen, How to Resolve It ?

CorporateTimeZone Variable is not set.

Attribute Character limits

Technical Documentation Improvements

Conclusions and Congratulations

Working With Tree Grid Views and CUI

One Tree Grid View

All Tree Grid Views

Conclusions and Congratulations

Relationship tab view according to classification

Multilingual Environments

Setting up for A Multilingual Environment

The Translations Themselves

Conclusions and Congratulations

Working with Shortcuts and CUI

Table of Contents

Keyboard Shortcuts

Conclusions and Congratulations

Workflow task not updated in my innovator basket.

Community Spam

Item Views with CUI

Add a Tab

Hide a Tab

Add a Third Accordion

Conclusions and Congratulations

Aras Fundamentals: Working with Files

A Brief Note on Definitions

Upload and Download

Managing your Files

Conclusions and Congratulations

Aras Fundamentals: Creating a LifeCycle

An Overview of Life Cycles

Create a Life Cycle

Assign a Life Cycle

Conclusions and Congratulations

An Overview of CUI Locations

Headers

Title Bars

Item Views

Toolbars

Sidebars

Table of Contents

Menus

Keyboard Shortcuts

Conclusions and Congratulations

Email Configuration

Skyler Crossman さんのグループアクティビティ