Recommended Methodology for Working with ENOVIA V5 VPM  

• Create a product in ENOVIA
• Send your ENOVIA product to CATIA
• Work on your design in CATIA, whether from scratch or modifying an existing design
• Save your CATIA data in ENOVIA.

• You must have both a CATIA V5 and ENOVIA V5 VPM session running.
• In the Product Structure workbench of CATIA V5, click the Connect to ENOVIA V5 VPM icon to establish the connection between CATIA V5 and ENOVIA V5 VPM.

Creating a Product in ENOVIA

At the top level of the ENOVIA product hierarchy is the product class root. This is the highest entity in a product structure and is used to group products. Products can be created directly under this level or under an intermediate level called the product class depending on how you want to structure your data. It is not necessary to create product classes, but the product class root and product must always exist. This is the product that will be sent to CATIA and is mapped to the CATIA document root.

1. In the ENOVIA home page, open the Engineering Life Cycle folder and double-click the Product Classes folder.

2. In the Product Class browser, click the New Product Class Root icon in the topmost toolbar.

3. Enter a meaningful name for your product class root in the Product Class ID field and then click Add.

4. Right-click the product class root you have created and select New > Product.

5. Enter a meaningful name for your product in the Product ID field and then click Add.

6. Don't forget to click the Save icon in the topmost toolbar to save the structure in ENOVIA.

Sending an ENOVIA Product to CATIA

1. In CATIA, click the Connect to ENOVIA V5 VPM icon () to connect your ENOVIA V5 VPM database.

2. In ENOVIA, right-click the ENOVIA product and select Send to > CATIA V5.

This is what you see in CATIA: the ENOVIA product is mapped to the CATIA document root.

Note: You also need to send any existing workpackages you need from ENOVIA. If you send a workpackage, the product is also sent - you do not need to send both.

Saving CATIA Data in ENOVIA

1. In the Product Structure workbench of CATIA V5, click the Save Data in ENOVIA V5 VPM Server... icon in the ENOVIA V5 VPM toolbar.


The Save in ENOVIA V5 dialog box appears showing objects to be saved and set to the correct save mode and save options.

2. Click OK in the dialog box.
   A Save in ENOVIA V5 progress bar lets you monitor the progress of the operation.

If the CATIA Document Root is Not an ENOVIA Product

• Save your work temporarily.
• Create a product class root and product in ENOVIA.
• Send the ENOVIA product to CATIA.
• Insert the components (Insert > Existing Component) containing the work you saved temporarily above.
• Save your work in ENOVIA.