Central Catalog on shared drive

riaea · ‎Dec 18, 2014

We have been successful in having outside collaborators share our Central Catalog, however we have noticed a few things.

Using VPN for an outside collaborator, maybe an issue with speed. The Schematics app is seems slow when it accesses the CC and when we drop in a 15pair cable it takes about 30 seconds to a minute to do something.

Is this normal?

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gkoch · ‎Jan 12, 2015

I assume there are not so many people having experience with VPN.

What is your general performance experience via VPN compared to locally running Creo Schematics (doing other things) or other software?

Maybe it is generally the drag and drop via VPN?

rpieters · ‎Mar 09, 2015

When your catalog is on the network, it takes about 30 sec to load, when having the catalog local it will takes seconds to load.

With a VPN connection it takes about 4 minutes to load and when it's loaded it works normal.

I think the great among of little files is the problem, mayby it's better to make a real database with symbols and articles @PTC.

wbowling · ‎Mar 12, 2015

We are just now trying to implement Schematics. I am totally clueless when it comes to setting the tool up. In the Creo Schematics Help Topics Collection (PDF) there is some information on the Central Catalog but I am not getting it. Since you talk about a Central Catalog here, I would very much like to learn from you how you set this up. Is there documentation somewhere that shows how this is done? Does the Central Catalog also provide access to a corporate drawing format?

I am very capable with Creo Parametric and manage its configuration and deployment. Creo Schematics is completely foreign to me but our electrical designers are demanding that it be set up right away. I'm in a bind and would really appreciate some help.

Thanks in advance,

dschenken · ‎Mar 12, 2015

Look for some PTC User convention materials from 2010, I think. Setting this up is like setting up Intralink on a level-of-difficulty basis. Were I in this position I'd try to find a company to set it up and do training. These guys may help. http://www.virtual-interconnect.co.uk

BrianMartin · ‎Mar 18, 2015

Hi David...

If you're looking for training and setup for Schematics, the Virtual Interconnect guys are good... but there are better options. Everyone goes directly to them because of their association with PTC and I don't want to knock them because they are knowledgeable. It's just that they're not necessarily what you'd call "cost effective". I can provide some other information offline if you'd like.

Thanks!

-Brian

dschenken · ‎Mar 18, 2015

You might contact the original poster.

BrianMartin · ‎Mar 18, 2015

Yep, I totally misread your message. This is what happens when I don't lurk on the board for several weeks!

BrianMartin · ‎Mar 18, 2015

Hi William...

Setting up Schematics can be a bit of chore even for Creo savvy people. I can provide you with some help in this regard if you'd like to talk about it. Are you migrating from the use of another tool for schematics (like AutoCAD, VISIO, Mentor Graphics, etc)?

Thanks!

-Brian

aoler · ‎Mar 16, 2015

We have our Central Catalog setup on our network and it is replicated to multiple sites. When I am on our network in the same location as my server it takes about 4 minutes to get the green dot when opening a design. I have been at other sites where the server that contained the Central Catalog was a few miles away and the load time increased by a few minutes. When I have tried to access the Central Catalog over VPN the load time was about an hour.

jstone · ‎Mar 23, 2015

Ray,

It would take me over twenty minutes from a remote site but then I started carrying the catalog on a USB drive. Open the schematic and change the catolog location from the network drive to the USB drive. Unfortunate if you can't use an USB drive at work.

Thanks,

jef

BrianMartin · ‎Mar 23, 2015

Hi Jeff / Ray...

Just to satisfy my curiosity, when you specify your network drive are you using a mapped network drive? For instance, are you setting your catalog location to "F:\Schematics\Central_Catalog" or are you pointing directly to a specific server and folder as in "\\server-01-name.xyz.us\Schematics\Central_Catalog" ?

I've seen this make a noticeable difference during Creo Parametric startup. I was just wondering if anyone had investigated this same issue in Schematics? The mapped drive is about 10 times faster in Creo. Perhaps that's just on our network though - which is why I am posing the question.

Thanks!

-Brian

jstone · ‎Mar 24, 2015

Brian,

At work we are mapped to a drive location and it takes
appx. 25 seconds for the schematic to connect to the catalog.
When working remotely I change the mapping of the network drive location
then map the schematic to the USB drive with a copy of the latest catalog.
If I didn't I would have to wait 20 min. to hr depending on the service.
Last time I checked this was about two years ago and we are still on Creo1
schematic.

Thanks,

jef

BrianMartin · ‎Mar 25, 2015

This is similar to our findings, Jeff. We find this happens with Creo, too. Remote connections to a shared network drive are incredibly painful. We have a large texture library we store on the network share and pulling files from it remotely can take a minute per file. Working through Windows doesn't take nearly this long - but somehow when using the Creo interface, things slow to an unacceptable crawl.

BillF · ‎Mar 23, 2015

We have a design group at a second site. They set up a server that mirrors our central library to their location twice a day. We have an agreement that is there is some emergency editing of the library being done that they need, we will let them know when it is ready so they can update their server instead of waiting for the scheduled update.

Since the central library is not intended to be changing a lot, you could let your collaborators copy yours at an appropriate frequency.