Fundamentals > Navigating the User Interface > Contexts Overview
  
Contexts Overview
A context organizes the database in a manner that is consistent with your company’s functional organization. A context has three critical components:
• Data – The data contained in a context is unique to a product or critical to a process or project.
• People – Each context has a team of users responsible for the creation and management of data.
• Process – A context has a defined set of formal or informal policies and processes surrounding the management of data.
Shared data, responsible people, and common processes intersect to define a context.
Context Types
Windchill provides the following standard context types. You access contexts under the Browse tab of the Navigator.
Icon
Label
Description
Products
Contains information that is unique to a specific product or product family. Teams of users representing the important roles within the organization are defined. Formal access control policies and standard configuration management processes are enforced. Most of the data contained in a product is related to the parts in the product structure. For more information, see About Products.
Projects
Created to facilitate the collaboration of a group of people, inside and outside the company, around a specific task for a limited amount of time. Data from product or library contexts can be shared to the project, manipulated, and returned when the project is complete. A project employs informal review and approval processes. For more information, see About Projects and Programs.
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Appears when Windchill ProjectLink is installed.
Libraries
Contains information that is relevant to many products. For example, fastener parts may be contained in a library so that they can be used in the part structures of all products. Standard parts libraries are actively managed to eliminate redundant parts thereby maximizing the company’s purchasing power and profit. Libraries can also contain documents containing standard company policies and practices. For more information, see About Libraries.
Programs
Provides a central area to link together information, people, and plans for a series of related projects. Outside of program-level documents, the majority of information and activities associated with a program are managed in individual projects. For more information, see About Projects and Programs.
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Appears when Windchill ProjectLink is installed and if programs are enabled. Programs are not available by default.
Organizations
Provides access to organization-level utilities and administrative activities. For more information, see About Organization Administration.
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Appears to organization and site administrators only.
Site
Provides access to site-level utilities and administrative activities. For more information, see Administering the Site.
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The site context is created when your Windchill solution is installed. All other contexts are established when an administrator creates products, libraries, projects, programs, or organizations. When an organization context is created, an organization administrator is defined, and the administrator decides who can create product, library, project, and program contexts.
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In addition to the contexts displayed in the Navigator, the Changes icon also appears; however, changes are not contexts. For more information, see About Change Management.