openBOM for Onshape Drawings

oleg_shilovitsky

We are very excited to share an exciting update: the last Onshape production update includes a Drawing feature which allows integration between openBOM and Onshape drawings. Big THANK YOU to Onshape team for collaboration and help!

You can now create a BOM using openBoM and insert a BOM into an Onshape drawing. Onshape and openBoM support associative updates of information as well as BOM drawing view: a way to customize what properties from openBoM will be reflected in the drawing.

Watch the following video to see a short demo of how to add a BOM to a drawing and associative updates in action:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMqpWfVixYI&rel=0

Now let me elaborate a little more with some details.

BOM Types:

We recommend you use two types of BOM with your Onshape drawings:  Part List and Single Level BOM. We are currently working to improve “Multi-level BOM”, which will allow you to create a product structure, navigate and collaboratively edit hierarchical BOM Information. Here’s a screenshot of a BOM created using Part List:

And here’s a screenshot of a BOM created using Single level BOM:

BOM Drawing View

BOM drawing views are configured from within the openBOM Onshape integrated app.  Within openBoM you can configure what properties will be used for a BOM in the drawing and their order.  This is what the BOM drawing view configuration looks like:

Moreover, you can manage the visibility of what Parts appear in the Drawing BOM by using the ‘BOM View’ filter property (it’s the far right most property on the pics herein). The ‘BOM View’ property is a multi-select list. If you want the part to appear in the BOM drawing, it must be selected in the ‘BOM View’ property.

BOM Updates

As you update a BOM in Onshape, the changes will be updated in the Onshape drawing. Here are two typical scenarios:

If you update the geometry in Onshape, you go to the corresponding BOM and run the “Update BOM” command. Doing so triggers an ‘Update’ button in the workspace drawing to become enabled. Note, if you update information in openBoM, please click on the ‘Update Onshape Properties’ button. Doing so will force an update of the workspace in the drawing. Click on the ‘Update BOM’ button to update the drawing BOM after geometry updates:

Click on the update button in the drawing to bring changes in the Onshape drawing BOM:

Conclusion. We are very excited by the next level of integration between Onshape and openBoM. This is just a first version: some functionality can be missed or you might demand some improvements. We are very much interested to discuss them with you. Please try it out and tell me what do you think.

Best, Oleg @ openbom.com

brucebartlett

Looks great Oleg, can't wait to try it out on some of my projects. No more screen shot's of tables and non-associativity.

Can you do linked drawing balloons yet? 

oleg_shilovitsky

@brucebartlett Thank you! Certainly no more screenshots of tables. Look forward to your feedback. 

Balloons will be coming. We discussed it with Onshape dev team. But I'm afraid it is still not there yet. 

mbattistello

@oleg_shilovitsky , Im trying to use this and it seems like the BOM that is pulled into the drawing doesnt match the BOM in your app tab. I have removed many of the unused columns but when I pull this into the drawing it has them again. I tried saving a version on my BOM and it didnt help. Am I doing something wrong?

-Marc

noa

@mbattistello quick sanity check – are you clicking the orange "Update drawing" button? No change is reflected until you hit that button.

oleg_shilovitsky

@mbattistello

openBOM drawing view is controlling what properties (columns) will be pulled into drawing. 

Click on small gear button (top right corner) to bring it up. 



After you change something in this dialog, you need to click on "Update Onshape properties". Properties will be coming in the same order you see them in this dialog. To change it just move columns in openBoM or use Tools --> Property Order menu in openBoM. 

And yes, @noa is right! There is small orange button (update drawing) in Onshape drawing view. 



Please let me know if it helped. 

Oleg @ openbom dot com 

Best, Oleg

robert_morris

I just gave this a try since I've been waiting for an easier way to insert BOM's into drawings.

One problem I'm having is I don't see a way to specify the sorting order for the inserted table. All the rows in the inserted drawing table seem to be in a random order. We prefer to order them by Part Number, and I'm sure other people have there own ordering scheme.

It would be nice to be able to set how the table will be sorted in the drawing and automatically put in or update the item number.

oleg_shilovitsky

@robert_morris

Very good point! we are planning to support the same sorting mechanism as you use in openBoM. So, you will be able to apply sort in openBoM and it will be reflected in the way BOM is inserted in the drawing. 

Good idea about item number. We didn't plan it yet. I assume what you want is to automatically re-number items and change numbers in balloons. Correct? 

robert_morris

@oleg_shilovitsky
That would be ideal, yes.

Even if you can't currently re-number the balloons, I think there still needs to be some kind of auto-numbering of the items. An item number is required to be able to match the line item up to a part in the drawing view, and currently with the ordering coming in somewhat random, it's not easy to add them without flipping back and forth between the drawing openBom. It's almost just as easy to do the table by hand.

oleg_shilovitsky

@robert_morris

Thanks for clarification. It is very helpful. 

Let me check what can we do fast. The short term solution will be probably to make hardcoded sort based on Balloon property in openBoM. Then you will have an full control of the order even without auto-numbering. 

Can you drop me an email to oleg @openbom.com? 

doug_scott

I have just used the cut-list option it all works and updates in the BoM, but the cut-list information dose not show on the drawing BoM, is there some step I'm missing?

oleg_shilovitsky

@doug_scott

Did you configure openBoM Drawing View? (hint - use green gear button in openBOM app screen)

What happens in Onshape drawing when you try to put L, W, T dimensions there?

If you cannot put BOM with L, W, T in the drawing, it is related to Onshape Drawing issue. Onshape supposed to fix it. So, I suggest you to open support ticket in Drawing tab and explain that Drawing crashes when you insert BOM with L,W, T data. 

nick_coppins

I'm also interested in the balloon / item number linking, this would be a great addition to what is already proving a very useful addition to OnShape. It's not always obvious which part is which in a drawing, and the ability to link a balloon to an item number would be good. 

Also, I suspect it's tricky, but some way to total a column (such as mass or cost) would also be useful. 

oleg_shilovitsky

@nick_coppins

Thanks for comment! We are currently working to improve ballooning function. And link ballon and item number is what we have in our mind as well. Cannot say when it will come and how it will work yet, but it is indeed one of our priorities. 

In addition, we released formula support in our latest product update few days ago
https://help.openbom.com/2017/06/07/using-openbom-formulas/

It still cannot do SUM calculations, but we are working on it now and it will be available in the next production update. We will support rollup lines and ability to create formula for total mass, cost, etc. 

I hope it helps. 

Best, Oleg @ openbom.com