Working with drawings in CAD applications

The ProjectForce CAD application links provide document management commands in the following applications:

• AutoCAD (BC ProjectForce panel of the Ribbon)
• Autodesk Inventor (BC ProjectForce panel of the Ribbon)
• SolidWorks (BC ProjectForce menu until a file is opened, then in the BC ProjectForce panel of the Ribbon)

Note    After installation, the SolidWorks application link is enabled automatically on 32-bit computers but must be enabled manually on 64-bit computers:

1. In SolidWorks on the Tools menu, select Add-ins. The Add-Ins dialog box appears.
2. In the Other Add-ins group, select BCLinkSolidWorks in the Active Add-ins column and in the Start Up column.

• MicroStation (BC ProjectForce tool box)

The links provide the same functionality in each CAD application:

• Drawing check-in and check-out, ProjectForce property editing, and library access commands for opening, importing, and inserting library files.
• Title block (attribute) and file property synchronization, including custom properties
• Detection, import, and tracking of external references

Title block and property synchronization between ProjectForce and the CAD applications is configured with a mapping between ProjectForce properties and the drawing properties (attributes in the case of AutoCAD). If your drawing title blocks use properties for the title block text, that text can be synchronized with properties in a ProjectForce library. Normal drawing text cannot be linked with ProjectForce. ProjectForce can support multiple title block standards simultaneously. Title block data and property synchronization is configured by a system administrator as described in the BlueCielo ProjectForce Administrator's Guide.

Any file created or used by a CAD application can be managed in a ProjectForce library. Conversely, CAD application commands that request a file can access ProjectForce libraries for document selection.

Tip    The relationships between drawings and their external references can be viewed on the References and Where Used tabs of the Properties dialog of each drawing.

Note    OLE objects inserted into AutoCAD drawings (for example, Excel spreadsheets) are shown by the BlueCielo viewer but a reference is not created to linked files.

The following topics describe each command provided by the ProjectForce CAD application links.