**FIRST EMAIL**/FIRST Announces PTC Collaboration Software Sponsorship!

[Madison]

I've been looking it over a bit this morning and it seems interesting, if a bit overwhelming at first. It seems to allow online project management in the same sense that Microsoft's Sharepoint does -- the software we've begun using this season -- but it is also tailored specifically for CAD file version management. The installation of Windchill we're being provided includes support for both Inventor and Pro/E, though because my team uses Solidworks, I'm not sure if it'll be helpful for us. For teams that use Inventor, this should become a great resource.

Also included are licenses of Pro/E Schools Edition and MathCAD. I'm not sure if there's a limit to the number of seats available of each per team, but it initially appears as if there is not. This is a nice gesture, certainly, and necessary to get the most out of the Windchill software, I'd guess. I don't know if we want to deal with the headache of trying to adapt to Pro/E, though, and I'm concerned about what'll happen to our data at the end of the season. With our Sharepoint setup, at least we're in control of our data.

[Don Wright]

I did the registration this morning, but haven't received anything yet. How long did it take to get a a reply?

[Madison]

Originally Posted by Don Wright

I did the registration this morning, but haven't received anything yet. How long did it take to get a a reply?

I registered at about 11 PM Pacific last night and received a reply overnight -- it must be automated. It took about three hours.

[Mark McLeod]

No more than a half hour for me for the confirmation email to arrive.

[Don Wright]

I wonder if it cross references the list of leader email addresses, because it has Gail's email address, not mine...

[Madison]

Originally Posted by Don Wright

I wonder if it cross references the list of leader email addresses, because it has Gail's email address, not mine...

I used all of my own information and I'm not our main contact, so I don't think it will be a problem.

[dsmoker]

M. Krass, do I correctly assume from your mantra (Dancing through life . . .) that you, like me, are a musical theater enthusiast as well as a robotics nut?

[Madison]

Originally Posted by dsmoker

M. Krass, do I correctly assume from your mantra (Dancing through life . . .) that you, like me, are a musical theater enthusiast as well as a robotics nut?

Veering off topic for just a moment...

Yep, I love musical theater. With respect to Wicked, I've seen it twice so far. I try not to subject the team to too many cast recordings during the build season, but it's so hard to resist.

[Pat Fairbank]

Originally Posted by Don Wright

I did the registration this morning, but haven't received anything yet. How long did it take to get a a reply?

The main contact for our team sent me the project manager login credentials this morning; seems like the registration didn't take very long. So I logged in and added my e-mail address to the list of members, but I haven't yet gotten a reply in the 12 hours since then. I've tried since then with a couple other e-mail addresses, but nothing has come through (yes, I did check the spam bin). Has anyone been successful at adding other people to their projects? (Or do they maybe have some sort of script that sends out all the queued e-mails in the middle of the night?)

I'm somewhat disappointed that PTC isn't providing support for CAD versioning of Solidworks and other softwares. According to the literature, they produce plug-ins for Inventor and Solidworks (and Unigraphics, Catia, etc.) but are only providing the Inventor one free of charge. I guess it wouldn't be a sound business decision, though, to pass up the opportunity to influence thousands of potential future customers into using Pro/ENGINEER.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by Pat Fairbank

The main contact for our team sent me the project manager login credentials this morning; seems like the registration didn't take very long. So I logged in and added my e-mail address to the list of members, but I haven't yet gotten a reply in the 12 hours since then. I've tried since then with a couple other e-mail addresses, but nothing has come through (yes, I did check the spam bin). Has anyone been successful at adding other people to their projects? (Or do they maybe have some sort of script that sends out all the queued e-mails in the middle of the night?)

I'm somewhat disappointed that PTC isn't providing support for CAD versioning of Solidworks and other softwares. According to the literature, they produce plug-ins for Inventor and Solidworks (and Unigraphics, Catia, etc.) but are only providing the Inventor one free of charge. I guess it wouldn't be a sound business decision, though, to pass up the opportunity to influence thousands of potential future customers into using Pro/ENGINEER.

I was able to invite add'l members to the project this afternoon and they successfully signed up and were able to log in. Did you "start" the project? I recall reading somewhere a step-by-step guide that called for "starting" the project before inviting new members. I don't know what the distinction is, really, but I followed those steps and it worked.

I'm also upset that they haven't yet made a Solidworks plug-in available. I downloaded the provided copy of Pro/E and have been playing around with it a bit and all that's done is remind me how much I despise Pro/E. I think this has a great feature set, but it's not so great that it's going to get me to switch all of my work over to Pro/E -- especially since my job uses Solidworks and that makes it much easier to sneak in other work during the downtime. Pro/E is clearly different and just confuses everyone.

[Pat Fairbank]

Originally Posted by M. Krass

I was able to invite add'l members to the project his afternoon and they successfully signed up and were able to log in. Did you "start" the project? I recall reading somewhere a step-by-step guide that called for "starting" the project before inviting new members. I don't know what the distinction is, really, but I followed those steps and it worked.

Thanks, that did the trick. No sooner did I "start" it than I got three e-mails in my inbox.

[yarb65]

To use ProE must you be hooked up to a network server. I tried to use it at home after using it at school yesterday. It will not work. I live in the woods. Dial up only.

[JBotAlan]

So this entire service is on the Internet? If so, that would make it pretty much useless for us--we're in a GM facility without access to the Web (at least without great difficulty) during a meeting.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by yarb65

To use ProE must you be hooked up to a network server. I tried to use it at home after using it at school yesterday. It will not work. I live in the woods. Dial up only.

I installed Pro/E locally on my laptop -- in fact, the schools edition provided must be installed locally -- and have had no trouble running it at all, even without an internet connection.

Originally Posted by JBotAlan

So this entire service is on the Internet? If so, that would make it pretty much useless for us--we're in a GM facility without access to the Web (at least without great difficulty) during a meeting.

Pro/E itself will be installed and run locally, but Windchill is a hosted content management solution, so in this case, it's hosted out on the internet by PTC. You wouldn't be able to get to it from within your site, it seems.

[yarb65]

I finally got it to work. Needed to tweek my computer a little.