NX - Importing and using PAX files in Teamcenter and NX

NX 6.0.3 introduced the ability to store and access template PAX files in Teamcenter (Refer to the NX
6.0.3 Maintenance Release What’s New documentation). This article provides expanded instructions for
importing the template PAX files into Teamcenter and using them within NX. These instructions assume
the template files have been created and added to the PAX files.
Advantages of having PAX files vaulted within Teamcenter:
• Supports independent authoring, revising, approving and releasing processes (Teamcenter
Workflow).
• If one site wants to share only certain PAX files with other sites, control is simpler if the PAX files
reside in different ItemRevisions.
• New Teamcenter Preference(s) can be set by user, group and site.
• Configure what templates are visible to the users.
• Potentially reduce the number of templates visible to the users.
Procedure:
1. From Teamcenter create a new Item, File => New => Item.
2. Select the ItemRevision just created.
3. From Teamcenter, File => New => Dataset.
4. Create a New Dataset; select the “Text” type.
5. Provide the Name and the Description.
6. Select Import…
7. Find the PAX file on the O/S to import.
8. Apply.
9. Repeat steps 1 through 8 for additional PAX files.
 The New Dataset dialog

Since each Item can have multiple revisions, the system will look for the latest ItemRevision configured by
date (revision rule: Latest by Creation Date). Read access for all users to these ItemRevisions is
mandatory. The ItemRevision must contain a TEXT dataset related by a Specification relation. The
TEXT dataset contains the PAX file as its content. It is recommended that only one text dataset is
present in the ItemRevision. The Teamcenter Revise command is used to modify the PAX file. It is up to
the Teamcenter administrator to block write access to these Items.
With the PAX files imported into Teamcenter, we can now define the variable
TC_NX_FileNewPAXFiles_NX6 to read the PAX files that were imported.
1. From Teamcenter use Edit => Options.
2. Select Index, then New.
a. For the Name, use TC_NX_FileNewPAXFiles_NX6 (for NX6).
b. For the Description, use “This variable is for the PAX files to be used with NX6” (as an
example).
c. Scopes can be defined for User, Role, Group, or Site. For this example Site is
selected.
d. Multiple Values will most likely be set to True (unless only one PAX file will be used).
e. Values will list the PAX files to be used. The syntax is the “ItemID”/”ItemRevision”.
These will be the same as those created during the new dataset creation above.
i. Use the PLUS icon or a carriage return to add the values entered to the Values
box.
3. Select Create.
 The Teamcenter Options dialog

The variable names for the releases of NX are:

• TC_NX_FileNewPAXFiles_NX6 (For all NX6 release series)
• TC_NX_FileNewPAXFiles_NX7 (For all NX7 release series)
• TC_NX_FileNewPAXFiles_NX8 (For all NX8 release series)
These variables are not shipped as part of Teamcenter. The Teamcenter administrator must create the
variable(s) in the Teamcenter database that corresponds to the NX version intended to be used. If the
preference is not used, Teamcenter Integration defaults to the default location of PAX files used in
previous releases of NX, which is %UGII_BASE_DIR%\ugii\templates, or as defined by the environment
variable UGII_TEMPLATE_DIR.
Valid values:
Items or ItemRevisions
For example: Model or Drawing/A
• Item - Model will load the Latest Revision by Creation Date of the Item.
 • ItemRevisions - Drawing/A will specifically load this ItemRevision regardless if there is a newer or
older ItemRevision.
Note:
Typically there are multiple values, such as one for the model PAX file, one for the drawing PAX file, and
so on. If only an Item is listed in the preference, the PAX file in the latest ItemRevision of that Item is
used. This is determined by the Latest by Creation Date revision rule.
Best Practices:
• Store each PAX file in a separate ItemRevision where each ItemRevision has only one TEXT
dataset.
• Each ItemRevision has different revisions of the same PAX file.
• Modify by revising the ItemRevision and changing the PAX files in the TEXT datasets under the
new revision (revise and modify approach).
When NX is launched from the Managed Mode (Teamcenter), the NX File => New dialog will list the PAX
files as tabs and display the template part files defined within the PAX file for that tab.
For additional information regarding the creation of File => New templates and editing PAX files, please
refer to the NX Documentation and the UGSolutions FAQ partition for NX.
Walter Schnurr