Best Collaborative Approach?

kevin_french584

Hi All! I have a project in onshape that I am managing. It is complicated with over 100 models, ~10 assemblies, and hopefully at least one drawing for each of those parts. This has a been a group project among me and 6 other people and I cannot find a good way to do the drawings. Ideally we would be able to collaborate on the same drawing but just work on separate pages, instead of the ENTIRE drawing being exclusive to one person. To work around this I looked for a way to move sheets from one drawing to another which would allow us to collaborate, however it seems as I cannot do this. The reason I want to combine sheets eventually is to maintain the automatic sheet numbering, ease of use and access, and export as one large PDF (to be used as a packet). From what I have gathered the only way to collaboratively complete this would be to: 

1.) Create a different drawing for each person
2.) Maintain standards and drawing numbers manually across drawings
3.) Export drawings separately then "stitch" together with some PDF tool

Is there any better way to do this? All thoughts are appreciated!

philip_7

@kevin_french584 - it might help to know what industry or kind of project this is. But for performance reasons, I would be hesitant to put 100+ pages in a single Onshape drawing. From what I've seen (regardless of using Onshape or not) large drawing packages are typically broken up into many individual drawings and then assembled separately:

• Machine design typically assigns part numbers to all components and sub-assemblies with individual drawings for each. Then the complete print package is assembled from the individually exported PDFs, starting with a cover-sheet with BOM or top-level assembly drawing with included parts list
  
• In architecture and construction, each discipline does its own drawings and uses a prefix: typically A for Architecture, M for Mechanical (HVAC), E for Electrical, etc.. Within each discipline a sheet type may also precede the sheet number (more detail here:  https://www.archtoolbox.com/construction-document-sheet-numbers/). The lead firm assembles the various discipline's drawings and adds a cover page with index. I've made drawings like this in Onshape where each prefix is its own drawing in Onshape and that way the auto-page numbering works within each discipline. You might be able to do something similar.
  

adrian_vlzkz

kevin_french584 said:

Hi All! I have a project in Onshape that I am managing. It is complicated with over 100 models, ~10 assemblies, and hopefully at least one drawing for each of those parts. This has a been a group project among me and 6 other people and I cannot find a good way to do the drawings. Ideally we would be able to collaborate on the same drawing but just work on separate pages, instead of the ENTIRE drawing being exclusive to one person. To work around this I looked for a way to move sheets from one drawing to another which would allow us to collaborate, however it seems as I cannot do this. The reason I want to combine sheets eventually is to maintain the automatic sheet numbering, ease of use and access, and export as one large PDF (to be used as a packet). From what I have gathered the only way to collaboratively complete this would be to: 

1.) Create a different drawing for each person
2.) Maintain standards and drawing numbers manually across drawings
3.) Export drawings separately then "stitch" together with some PDF tool

Is there any better way to do this? All thoughts are appreciated!

A systematically structured Drawing package would typically be setup where each part, sub-assembly and the top-level assembly, should have their own number (and drawing).

Bundling drawings into a single master document just for the purpose of page numbers and or PDF exporting is not best practice. The purpose of drawings should mainly be to communicate the design.

In Onshape you can create drawings in separate Documents, the create a Publication to "combine" or package the entire project.

dirk_van_der_vaart

I allways thought that the end-goal of collaborating with Onshape was to not using drawings

martin_kopplow

1.) contradicts all single source of truth concepts, creates workload (Work, as a rule of thumb, should to be avoided wherever possible ;0))

2.) contradicts all concepts of process automatisation

3.) is a PIA, but probably the least invasive method

For Collaboration within the team, drawings should not be important or even nessecary. They might still be a means of communcation with external partners or for mandatory documentation. So, have you considered whether creating publications containing curated sets of drawings might help here? Publications in Onshape may contain deliberate drawings and all kind of stuff that lives in a tab, through different documents. Publications can be shared, so the printing of drawings can be elegantly outsourced to those who actually still need them on paper.

philip_7

@kevin_french584 - it might help to know what industry or kind of project this is. But for performance reasons, I would be hesitant to put 100+ pages in a single Onshape drawing. From what I've seen (regardless of using Onshape or not) large drawing packages are typically broken up into many individual drawings and then assembled separately:

• Machine design typically assigns part numbers to all components and sub-assemblies with individual drawings for each. Then the complete print package is assembled from the individually exported PDFs, starting with a cover-sheet with BOM or top-level assembly drawing with included parts list
  
• In architecture and construction, each discipline does its own drawings and uses a prefix: typically A for Architecture, M for Mechanical (HVAC), E for Electrical, etc.. Within each discipline a sheet type may also precede the sheet number (more detail here:  https://www.archtoolbox.com/construction-document-sheet-numbers/). The lead firm assembles the various discipline's drawings and adds a cover page with index. I've made drawings like this in Onshape where each prefix is its own drawing in Onshape and that way the auto-page numbering works within each discipline. You might be able to do something similar.
  

adrian_vlzkz

kevin_french584 said:

Hi All! I have a project in Onshape that I am managing. It is complicated with over 100 models, ~10 assemblies, and hopefully at least one drawing for each of those parts. This has a been a group project among me and 6 other people and I cannot find a good way to do the drawings. Ideally we would be able to collaborate on the same drawing but just work on separate pages, instead of the ENTIRE drawing being exclusive to one person. To work around this I looked for a way to move sheets from one drawing to another which would allow us to collaborate, however it seems as I cannot do this. The reason I want to combine sheets eventually is to maintain the automatic sheet numbering, ease of use and access, and export as one large PDF (to be used as a packet). From what I have gathered the only way to collaboratively complete this would be to: 

1.) Create a different drawing for each person
2.) Maintain standards and drawing numbers manually across drawings
3.) Export drawings separately then "stitch" together with some PDF tool

Is there any better way to do this? All thoughts are appreciated!

A systematically structured Drawing package would typically be setup where each part, sub-assembly and the top-level assembly, should have their own number (and drawing).

Bundling drawings into a single master document just for the purpose of page numbers and or PDF exporting is not best practice. The purpose of drawings should mainly be to communicate the design.

In Onshape you can create drawings in separate Documents, the create a Publication to "combine" or package the entire project.

nick_papageorge073

Agree with others. Each part gets a unique PN and drawing. Each subasm get a unique PN and drawing, with a BOM table included. That's how all of industry works. No one uses one PN for hundreds of parts and hundreds of sheets.

As a bonus, If you do it like this, there is no workload distribution issue.

kevin_french584

nick_papageorge073 said:

Agree with others. Each part gets a unique PN and drawing. Each subasm get a unique PN and drawing, with a BOM table included. That's how all of industry works. No one uses one PN for hundreds of parts and hundreds of sheets.

As a bonus, If you do it like this, there is no workload distribution issue.

This makes a lot more sense. This is my first time doing something like this and as a Student its been a great insight as to how this might be approached in a commercial setting. Thanks for the advice!