Parts
Windchill ESI allows you to publish parts created and changed within Windchill PDMLink to a distribution target such as SAP. You can configure the Windchill PDMLink system to publish particular attributes of a part, as well as documents that are associated to the part. The Windchill PDMLink part information is used to create a part in the distribution target.
Windchill ESI passes the following part-associated attributes from Windchill PDMLink to the EAI software components:
• Number
• Whether the part is a phantom part or not
• Default Unit
• Control Characteristics
• Type
• Name
• Source
• Version
• Iteration
• Date Effectivity
• Last Changed By
• Distribution Targets
• Serial Effectivity
• Lot Effectivity
• Lifecycle State
• View
• Storage Location
• Previously Published Part Version
• Extended Data
• Department Data
Once the part data has been sent from Windchill PDMLink, the EAI software components map the Windchill PDMLink part attributes to SAP material master attributes. The following table shows the mapping of Windchill PDMLink part attributes to SAP material master attributes:
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Windchill Part Attribute
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SAP Material Master Attribute
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Number
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Material Number
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Name
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Material Description
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Default Unit
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Base Unit of Measure
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Type
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Material Type
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Source
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Procurement Type
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Version
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Revision Level
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Date Effectivity
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Valid-From Date
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Serial Number Effectivity
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The material’s serial effectivity inside the ECN. The ECN becomes parametric effectivity (serial effectivity) controlled.
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The Windchill PDMLink part iteration is passed to the EAI software components; however, the attribute is not sent to the distribution target. If the distribution target is capable of handling Windchill PDMLink part iterations, the EAI software components can be extended to pass the information to the distribution target; however, the out-of-the-box SAP system does not currently have an attribute that can handle iteration information.
The attribute Distribution Targets (in the elements Destination and TargetID that appear in the ESI response) identifies the distribution target in which the part should be created or changed. The EAI software components use this information to communicate with the correct distribution target and pass plant information to it.
Some attributes that are passed from Windchill PDMLink are passed to the distribution target from the EAI software components without transformation; however, there are a few attributes that contain values that are either modified or cross referenced by the EAI software components.
Windchill PDMLink passes the Part Date Effectivity in the format YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS. The EAI software components remove the time stamp that accompanies the date prior to passing the data to the distribution target.
The attributes Default Unit, Type, Alternate Unit, Description Language Key and Source are cross referenced in the EAI software components. The following tables show the possible available Windchill PDMLink part values and the corresponding SAP material values that are passed from the EAI software components to SAP.
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Windchill Part Default Unit Value (Database Value)
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SAP Material Base Unit of Measure Value (Database Value)
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As Needed (as_needed)
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Without Unit of Measure (NO)
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Each (ea)
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Each (EA)
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Kilogram (kg)
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Kilogram (KG)
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Liter (l)
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Liter (L)
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Meter (m)
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Meter (MET)
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Square Meter (sq_m)
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Square Meter (M2)
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Cubic Meter (cu_m)
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Cubic Meter (M3)
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Windchill PDMLink Part Type Value (Database Value)
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SAP Material Type Value (Database Value)
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|---|---|
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Separable (separable)
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Semi-Finished Product (HALB)
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Inseparable (inseparable)
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Semi-Finished Product (HALB)
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Component (component)
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Raw Material (ROH)
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Windchill PDMLink Part Source Value (Database Value)
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SAP Procurement Type Value (Database Value)
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Make (make)
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In-House Production (E)
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Buy (buy)
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External Procurement (F)
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There are some attributes that SAP requires to create or change material master records that are not provided by Windchill PDMLink. In these instances, Windchill ESI defaults the values in the EAI software components prior to passing the data to SAP. The following table lists the SAP Material Master attributes that are defaulted in Windchill ESI and their default values.
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SAP Material Master Attribute
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Default Value
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Industry Sector
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Mechanical Engineering (M)
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Basic View Indicator
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Enabled (X)
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MRP View Indicator
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Enabled (X)
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Material Description Language Key
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The default value is (EN).
Refer to the section titled Internationalization Considerations in the Planning and Implementing a Windchill ESI Installation chapter of the Windchill Enterprise Systems Integration Installation and Configuration - SAP section.
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MRP Type
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No Planning (ND)
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Procurement Type
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Enabled (X)
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Special Procurement Type
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Enabled (50) for Phantom Parts only
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Windchill PDMLink also supports publishing alternates related to parts; however, because the concept of alternate parts, as it exists in Windchill PDMLink, does not exist in SAP, the EAI software components portion of Windchill ESI does not support publishing alternate parts to SAP. If the SAP distribution target is capable of handling Windchill PDMLink alternates, the EAI software components portion of Windchill ESI can be extended to pass the information to SAP, however, OOTB, alternates are not supported.
Plant Specific Attributes for Parts
Plant-specific attributes for a part can be published using the view-specific capabilities of Windchill MPMLink. To publish plant-specific attributes:
• Ensure that the Publish Plant Data Information preference from the > > category is set to Yes.
• Define a specific view corresponding to each of your plants in Windchill MPMLink.
• Define your plant-specific attributes in the corresponding view attributes tab.
• Use Windchill ESI to publish your part.
Windchill ESI then retrieves the plant-specific attributes for the part from Windchill MPMLink and sends that information to the relevant plant in the distribution target.
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• These attributes must have their mapping defined in the ESI response meta information file. Also, the EAI software components should be extended to map these attributes to SAP as appropriate.
• While publishing department data or plant data for parts or resources using Send to Distribution Target action, Send Material to Distribution Target action, Change Notice, Promotion Request, Set State, or Saved Filter is used from:
◦ BOM Settings on distribution target when publishing part or BOM.
◦ Resource Settings on distribution target when publishing resource or resource structure.
◦ Process Plan Settings on distribution target when publishing process plan structure.
◦ Change Notice Settings on distribution target when publishing using change notice.
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Publish Extended Data
Extended data is a versioned, workable object in Windchill that is used to store data that needs to be published to an ERP system. The extended data can be published in the ESI response to a distribution target using the ERP connector.
To publish the Extended Data, enable the preference Publish Enterprise Data Information by setting it to Yes.
To know more about extended data, see the topic Extended Data.
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• If you want to publish the version information from the part or extended data, set the property com.ptc.windchill.esi.useVersionInfofromPartOrED in the esi.properties file. For example, <Property default="PART" name="com.ptc.windchill.esi.useVersionInfofromPartOrED">. Other values can be PART or COMMON_ENTERPRISE_DATA
Otherwise OOTB, the enterprise data will be published by default.
• The attribute Distribution Targets (in the elements Destination and TargetID that appear in the ESI response) identifies the distribution target in which the part should be created or changed.
• Windchill PDMLink passes the Part Date Effectivity in the format YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS.
• When using the object-centric mode of publishing a part, with the distribution target attribute Publish Related Documents when Publishing a Part set to Yes, documents associated to the part are published as well.
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Department Data
The department data attributes are published along with the part or resource attributes in the ESI response from all the relevant plant-specific data objects associated with the plant data.
For more information, see the topic Department Data Overview.
Ensure that the Publish Plant Data Information preference from the > > category is set to Yes.
For more information about the plant specific functional data, refer to Department Data Overview.
Configuring Data to Publish Automatically with Life Cycle State Change
The extended data or plant specific functional data can be configured to get published automatically in the ESI response if the life cycle state of the plant data is changed. You can configure this by enabling the preference Enterprise data life cycle states to trigger part publication automatically from > > . You can specify multiple life cycle states in a comma-separated list. The default value of the preference is empty. If the preference value is empty, the Part (material) will not be published automatically when life cycle state of enterprise data or plant data is changed.
After enabling this preference, when enterprise data or plant data life cycle state is changed as specified in the preference, ESI will render the relevant part iteration and the department data as per the configuration specification or filter associated with the distribution target to publish the part in the ESI response.
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• The publishing of a part is enabled only if the preference Launch ESI Workflow Automatically is set to Yes.
• If the plant data is released, the plant data and the enterprise data will get published. Whereas, if the enterprise data is released, then the relevant plant data is published.
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The extended data and plant specific functional data can be published in separate buckets in the ESI response. This can be done by customizing the ESI response. Refer the ERP Connector Customizer's Guide on PTC.com to know more about customizing the buckets in the ESI response.