About Catalog Items
Catalog items are used to create other items or instances of objects in the design. These items include parameters, such as name, description, and current rating. They represent logical data including the artifact's parameters and connectivity. This data is exported to Cabling or Piping.
After a catalog is populated with artifacts, you can access and manage the artifacts through the Catalog Explorer. Artifacts are used to create shapes or graphic representations that can then be placed as an instance into a diagram. Each artifact can be represented by one or more shapes according to diagram type.
Artifact types in the catalog include:
• Blocks—Objects that can include multiple ports. A block can represent electrical or fluid components, locations, functions, subsystems, and so on.
• Ports—Terminals or pins that can be connected to zero or more ports. Each port must have a parent, which can be a block, group, or fiber. Ports can be:
◦ Rigid—Remains the same size when the parent is scaled.
◦ Scalable—Scales when the parent is scaled.
• Groups—Several components or members that can be blocks, ports, groups or fibers. A group can be of two kinds:
◦ Fixed—Consists of all required components and remains as is when it is used as an instance.
◦ Variable—Consists of all possible components. When an instance is placed on a sheet, one or more instances of each member are designated for use.
• Fibers—Objects that can be routed, such as wires, signal networks, or pipelines. A fiber can represent electrical power or signals, fluid flow, a flow of information, and so on. A fiber can exist as one continuous entity, or it can consist of segments joined by two ports. Fibers are also grouped together as a bundle to create cables.