Engineered products generate a slew of technical documentation vital to the product itself and those documents must accompany other product information as it passes through the design, production, and manufacturing process.
But ensuring all these necessary documents—which can include CAD drawings, product specifications, assembly instructions, and regulatory and safety information–stay together and are continually updated as they move through the process has traditionally been difficult. Adding another wrinkle, information created on different systems is hard to find when needed. For instance, product designers have traditionally created documentation, like product catalogs, by pulling data from multiple, disconnected systems, which makes for a slow process with many possibilities for errors.
Both PLM systems and document management systems can help. And they can be combined for further benefit. Here’s an explanation of the differences, with the hope that in defining and delineating the systems we don’t sound too much like a technical document itself.
Many companies rely on their PLM system to collaborate on engineering drawings and ensure everyone is working on the most recent version of a design. PLM can also house and manage all the designs, such as the many needed to create an automobile or other complex system, in the same place. Now, some PLM systems include technical documentation capabilities that allow users to author, visualize, and publish technical documents from the data that already exists within the PLM system.
These solutions help engineers create accurate, up-to-date technical publications like catalogs, maintenance manuals, regulatory filings and training manuals directly from PLM content, which cuts out rewriting and eliminates opportunities for error.
Because the information is housed in the PLM system, it’s already compiled within one location and exists in a format that can populate technical documents.
One recently released solution, the web-based Aras Technical Documentation, from Aras, uses templates that allow many different types of technical publications to share the same source information from the PLM system. The templates ensure technical documents conform to regulatory requirements, industry standards and corporate formatting.
These PLM applications are different from document management systems, which provide a single repository for storing and organizing engineering documents of all types. When files are stored in different tools and multiple places, employees have to search in unfamiliar tools and several locations for documentation, which can waste time. Document management systems alleviate that.
From within the document management systems, engineers and others can create, review, and manage documents. They also include interfaces for many types of CAD systems, so users can collaborate on technical specifications tied to CAD designs. These systems track the trail of document creation, receipt, approval, and revision and also allow various users to collaborate on documents.
So technical documents might be created on a template using information pulled from a company’s PLM system, then stored and managed within that same company’s document management system.
Some systems combine PLM authoring with document management capbilities.
Teamcenter, from Siemens PLM, for instance, includes a document and content management tool. From any PLM application, engineers also use templates to create documents, which are managed in the Teamcenter content system.
The advantages to these types of combined systems include the capability to sign and release documents as they’re approved. Documents can also incorporate product data directly with links to the related data for alerts to product changes. Document revisions and engineering change orders automatically trigger updates to improve content accuracy.
The technical documents related to specific product configuration and revisions can also be retained in a content management system, like Teamcenter, so they can be re-used and referenced for future product development.
