Adapters and indexing
External documents created by third-party systems and applications might contain references to objects in the 3D model. For example, a text label in a drawing in a project document might contain the unique position ID of an object. These references can be turned into actual links that the user can click to open the object in the 3D view. This automatic linking can be enabled by configuring document type settings, as described in Document handling.
CADMATIC eShare also has an indexing function that can make the linking bidirectional; indexing allows the user to open a document from the 3D view—from the properties of the 3D object being examined.
Indexing is disabled by default. An administrator can enable indexing for PDF documents that are accessed using the following adapters:
- CMIS Adapter
- Database Adapter with Document Data Source
- File System Document Adapter
- REST API Adapter
When indexing is enabled, the system periodically looks for object links in the documents provided by the data source, and if it finds such links it saves the document path and the object link in the document index of the project database.
Modifying a document does not trigger full reindexing but indexing continues in the background without interruptions.
Once documents are indexed, users can access documents from the 3D view as well as search for documents using the search function of CADMATIC eShare.
Before enabling indexing in data source settings, project administrator must define a suitable document type in the Document Handling view, as described in Defining a document type. Links defined in Document Types must refer to a key attribute, a group defining attribute, or be unique to be shown in the model.
Links that exist in documents published by a CADMATIC design tool are bidirectional by default, but links that CADMATIC eShare adds to such documents are not indexed and can only be used to jump from a document to a 3D object.