Specialized Administration > Supporting Visualization and Publishing > WVS Publisher > File Synchronization > Introduction to File Synchronization
  
Introduction to File Synchronization
This section provides instructions on how to configure file synchronization-capable workers to assist the Windchill server in publishing a viewable. This configuration allows Windchill Visualization Services to create a viewable by using the worker to download the original native file from Windchill.
File synchronization is the ability to synchronize CAD Document content with Windchill metadata, for instance, attributes or parameters in the CAD files mapped to properties within Windchill. Physical file that is stored in Windchill may be out-of-date because it does not incorporate Windchill metadata changes that have happened since the file was last uploaded or checked in by the WWGM or Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire integration with Windchill.This could occur in conditions such as these:
The Windchill CAD Document life-cycle state attribute was exposed in a text field on a CAD drawing.
The life-cycle state was changed in Windchill after check-in, but the CAD document content still contains the old life-cycle state values.
In cases like these, the CAD Document is published via WVS, the CAD drawing content file is "synchronized" with the Windchill metadata changes during the publishing process. For this, you must have a file synchronization-capable worker compatible with Windchill.
You can use older versions of your authoring applications for designing and engineering; but the worker must be configured to use a higher version of the authoring application for publishing and generating viewables on the Windchill server.