First the link: www.cad.de. Click on EDM/PDM/PLM and select the Productstream COMPASS forum. It is in German, but if you post your question in English they will answer you.
Now, for your questions. I suggest you have a chat with your supplier. He should be able to answer your question. I’ve taken a shot at it and I hope this helps you. It has become quite an extensive read.
How do I make a copy design
How do I make a copy design, where a Derived Component is included in several of parts (Skeleton Modelling)
That is a basic command. If you right click an assembly and choose "Copy Engineering document" PSP will make a copy of that assembly and the accompanying IDW. The original and the new assembly have identical components, derived components, sketches for skeleton modelling, etc. Anywhere in the tree of the new assembly you can replace components with the command “replace component by copy”. You can perform this command while you edit the assembly in Inventor or in PSP under the right mouse click menu. If you replace an assembly or part with an attached IDW it will create a copy of that assembly or part and a copy of the accompanying IDW.
How do I get a structured drawing list, when the structure is defined by the 3D assembly?
The complete structure is always visible in PSP. You can see where an assembly or part is used (Usage tab) or what assembly or parts it uses (Uses tab). You can click in either tree al the way up to the top level assembly or all the way down to the bottom part. This information is all stored in the SQL database and can be shown in reports. You can create your own reports.
At the company I currently work for we have customised several reports. Standard you have three types of reports. A BOM, a summarised BOM and a structured BOM. The BOM replaces the parts list that is normally shown on a drawing. It shows the product number, description, material, length, mass, etc. It even shows the document number of accompanying IDW.
The summarised BOM is exactly what is says. Its shows the total amount of each part in one big list (For instance, you can see the total amount of a particular bolt or nut needed for the complete machine).
The structured BOM shows the complete tree of an assembly with all parts used at the different levels.
How do I use projects to handle a large assembly with 1000's of subparts.
The short answer is you can, it all depends on the way you work in your company. The largest assembly I’ve created had 22617 parts of which 2445 where unique. I had no problem managing it. You have to speak with your supplier what is the best method for you to work with PSP. Do you use Items or just Engineering documents? Do you need a coupling with ERP? There is no universal answer for your question.
How do I makes searches within a project with sub projects?... "Find all drawings in given project and sub projects"
Basic report functionality. No problem. We have a special function for assemblies. You right click an assembly and you can print all the underlying documents or export them to PDF or DWF. Just with a few mouse clicks. If you are just looking for a particular document you can also use the very extensive search utility. You can search your document on almost everything. Who created it at what date, file size, title, document type, when it was released or outdated. You name it.
Kind regards,
Martin van den Berg
The Netherlands
Productstream Pro (PSP) was developed separately in Europe (Germany) before Autodesk bought it. It used to be called Compass. As far as I know PSP is not available in the US. Underneath, both programs are completely different, although a lot of features are the same. If I have to place PSP, I would say that PSP is slightly more advanced and more customisable. Fortunately both programs are still being developed. If you are happy with Productstream and it suits your needs, you should stick with it. I don’t think it is bad program.
Kind regards,
Martin van den Berg
Have an old system running with compass 2005 pro and SQL 2005. Now i just put the com[plete system in a virtual box on a new comp.
So far all running fine, also SQL server, but i can't log on to the compass anymore.
Always a message come "Compass pro could not log you on to the system. Check username and password
anyone can help?