Creating a simple structure

The import utility recognizes specific row headings along with keywords found in those columns. The following is a very simple Microsoft Excel input file that creates a process containing a subprocess.

Header1	Item	Item	Description
Header2	Process	Process
Header3	Process	Process
Title	Root	Root	Description
	Process-Root		New Process
		sub process1	New Sub-process1

Note

You can copy the content of HTML tables and paste them into an Excel file to use them as examples.

The keyword Item results in an item being created with the name listed in the Item column (for example, Process-Root or sub-process1). Because there are two columns with the header Item, the utility creates a nested structure—an item inside an item. The Process entries signify the types and subtypes of the item to be created. This results in the following structure.

A more involved structure is shown in the following example.

Header1	Item	Item	Item	Description
Header2	Process	Process	OP
Header3	Process	Process	NCMachining
Title	Root	Root	Part no.	Description
	Process-Root			New Process
		sub_process1		New Sub-process1
			OP01	Read
			OP02	Get and place cable
			OP03	Record lot control
			OP04	Get from printer and place on carrier
		sub_process2		New Sub-process2
			OP05	Get sign and place on carrier
			OP06	Set model switch
			OP07	Remove beam from cart
		sub_process3		New Sub-process3
			OP08	Lock both sides and latch in place
		sub_process4		New Sub-process4
			OP09	Get wire harness and position

In this file:

• Header1, Header2, and Header3 are mandatory row headings.

• The Item columns designate the number of levels in the structure you import. In the example, the imported structure has three levels, as seen by the three Item columns.

• The strings in the Item columns represent the names that are assigned to the newly created items (for example, sub-process3 or OP08).

• The entries in the columns of the Header2 row represent the types of the objects that you create. The entries in the columns of the Header3 row represent the subtypes. In the example, the third Item column contains an operation of type OP that uses the NCMachining subtype.

• The Description column contains the description for each object you create.

• The utility ignores all entries in the row containing the Title heading.

• The utility looks for the first entry in the row following the Title row and uses this as the name of the root object for your structure. In the example, that is the Process-Root entry. You can insert any number of rows between the row containing Title and the last Header row before it to help organize your data, but they are ignored by the utility.

• If you want to stop the import at a certain point in the Excel file, insert END-OF-PROCESS (case sensitive) at the desired point in the first column of the spreadsheet. The utility stops importing when it hits that row.

Converting these Excel file creates the following structure.

By default the item IDs are assigned automatically. You can also specify item IDs or item revision IDs.

All of this information holds true for other types of structures. The following example shows a product structure that is imported by the utility.

Header1	Item	Item	Item	Description
Header2	Item	Item	Item
Header3	Item	Item	Item
Title	Root	Name	Name.	Description
	Product			New Product
		Sub_Assy1		New_Sub_Assy1
			Part1	Desc of Part1
			Part2	Desc of Part2
			Part3	Desc of Part3
			Part4	Desc of Part4
		Sub_Assy2		New_Sub_Assy2
			Part5	Desc of Part5
			Part6	Desc of Part6
			Part7	Desc of Part7
		Sub_Assy3		New_Sub_Assy3
			Part8	Desc of Part8

This results in the following structure.