Creating BOMs for a Drawing and/or Printer (SAP Library

Creating BOMs for a Drawing and/or Printer

Use

You can use AutoCAD to create summarized BOMs (where identical parts are grouped together into one list item) or itemized BOMs. Both types of BOM can be created by expanding sub-BOMs. A sub-BOM is also referred to as a single-level BOM.

A BOM can be output to the drawing or to the printer. The data of every info point or item number is always stored line-for-line in a file with the extension *.TXT. Each line in this files is made up of individual fields, each separated by inverted commas. Each field contains an attribute value.

If a *.TXT BOM file with the same name already exists, a dialog box appears, asking you if the existing BOM should use the existing TXT file, or the BOM with the current drawing details (change to info point or item number data) should be generated ("Create new BOM from drawing").

A BOM that is to be output to a drawing does not look the same as a BOM to be output on a printer, nor does it fulfill the same function. AutoCAD provides suitable files, depending on the type of BOM (itemized or summarized) and the type of output (drawing or printer). All these files are used to output data from the info point or item number in the appropriate output format. These files are stored in the subdirectory ../GEN/MSK.

Menu path: SAP ® Bill of material tools ® Create bill of material

A single dialog box guides you through the process for creating a BOM for output to the drawing, printer or as an ASCII file.

If you want to insert the BOM in the drawing, you should specify the insertion point for the BOM.

Insertion point:

The BOM hangs on the crosshair cursor, and can be inserted at the appropriate location in the drawing. The base point, and the direction in which the BOM is inserted will depend on the type of BOM template selected (e.g. GENBPOS starts at the bottom, and works up (bottom-up)).

If you want to print out a BOM, the dialog box for selecting a printer appears. Enter your options as required here.

If you want to print out the BOM as an ASCII file, the *.TXD file specified is stored in the current directory.

If you change (frame format), scale, or delete an AutoCAD drawing frame that is linked to one or more drawing BOMs (i.e. the option "Information within drawing frame" was activated during the insertion), you will be prompted to update all the BOMs associated with the frame in question.

The following dialog box will appear:

The following table gives information on what the various fields are called and what they are used for:

Field	Description
BOM file name	BOM file name
BOM block	BOM block (template file)
Type of BOM	You decide here whether you want to create an itemized BOM (where every item is listed), or a summarized BOM (where parts with the same name are grouped together). When a summarized BOM is created, parts where even one letter of the attributes is different are not grouped together.
Create BOM	In drawing For Windows printer As ASCII file
Information source within drawing frame	Information source within drawing frame
Expand sub-BOMs	Expanding sub-BOMs
Filter records	You can specify a filter in this field, so that only specific records are included in the BOM. The filtering criterion must be defined in the "Filter" attribute of the info point or item number. Only records whose attribute values are the same as the filter value are selected (e.g. "SPARE" for spare parts).
Print all groups without query	Printing all groups without querying
Suppress empty line sections	You can specify whether lines that contain no entries should be suppressed in the BOM output.
Output (Windows printers only)	You can specify here that the file should be printed immediately (this is the default), or whether you want to check it first to see if any changes have to be made. In the latter case, a print preview of the BOM will be called up in your default editor.
Save defaults	Saving defaults