This topic is contained in the PDXpert help file: select Contents from the application's Help menu.
Sequences: Revision
Purpose
Defines the format and assigned revision for documents and parts.
Where used
Documents, parts
Data fields
General tab
- Name
- This is the complete name for the revision sequence.
- Description
- This describes the revision sequence and its function.
- Starting revision
- The value specified here will be assigned to a new item's revision attribute. The Starting revision value does not change as a result of the assignment; instead, subsequent revisions of the item will be incremented according to the sequence rules, such as prefix and invalid characters.
- You specify both the revision sequence's format and the actual next-assigned value. The format is determined by the location and type of character (letter, number or symbol) that you enter. If you enter a numeric digit at a specific location, then all subsequent values will only use a numeric digit at that location. Likewise, a letter at a particular location ensures that only letters will be used when the identifier is incremented. Non-alphanumeric characters (e.g., "/" or "-") will be ignored when the value is incremented.
- If no alphanumeric characters are specified, then the item's initial revision will be assigned the non-alphanumeric value. Any subsequent revision assignments will be alphabetic. For example, if you specify either "-" or " " as the Starting revision, this value will be assigned to the initial item revision, and subsequent revisions will be alphabetic starting with the letter "A".
- Example: If you've specified A.01 as the Starting revision value, then a revised item's revision would be incremented to A.02. The revision immediately following A.99 is B.00.
- Skip characters
- You can also specify which characters are not considered when a Starting revision value is incremented. Since these characters are only examined when the sequence increments, you can (for instance) use a skip character as the initial value for a revision and it will never be used in a subsequent revision.
- Example: If the letters "IOSQZ" are invalid, then an item with a current revision of "AH" will be assigned a new revision of "AJ".
- If your company mixes letters and numbers in the same sequence (not a best practice), then the letters BIOQSZ are good candidates to be skipped since, in some typefaces, they are difficult to distinguish from numbers.
- Active: users can select
- Default member of collection
- Permanent member of collection
- For a description of these checkboxes, see the Collections reference > Common properties & attributes help topic.
Where Used tab
This list enumerates all of the document and part types that are using the current revision sequence.
Setup suggestions
Alphabetic characters have traditionally been used for revisions. Although most items will not require more than 26 revisions, you may want to specify a double-letter revision sequence starting at "AA". This allows almost 700 revisions for those particularly long-lived items, and specifying the number of revision characters up front means your users will never have to worry whether the item is truly at Revision B, instead of an accidentally truncated Revision BG.
Numeric revisions are a more recent, and often superior, practice. They do not require skip characters, and are far more accessible on computer keyboards for all languages. A two-character numeric revision still provides almost 100 revisions, which will be far more than is likely for any item. (If you're concerned about that limit, you can always specify a 3-character revision format.)
Although you can modify a sequence after it's been in use, you should exercise caution as it will affect all new items, as well as all existing items, that rely on that sequence.
2042
Help topics describe the most current PDXpert PLM software release, and may differ from earlier releases.
