Unable to edit SQL database in catalog browser

[rhesusminus]

@PatMurnen_Adsk

I've found that if I add a a manufacturer with a forward slash in the name, the Edit-button in the catalog browser stops working.

Screencast:

I found the problem, and that is that this create a PINLIST-table with a forward slash in it. If I rename this table, everything works fine again:

So, please consider this a bug report, and I posted it here in case someone else should stumble upon this.

[rhesusminus · Accepted solution]

Solved

[PatMurnen_Adsk]

Trond,

I wasn't sure of the exact problem from your video and I wasn't able to reproduce any problem at my end. From the video it looks like each time you click the edit icon it goes into the edit mode. I am sure I am just missing the obvious.

Regards,

Pat

[rhesusminus]

Look at the pencil button. It doesn’t change to «accept/cancel»…
The grid turns yellow as in edit mode, but there is no way to save your changes.

Sent from my Windows 10 phone

[PatMurnen_Adsk]

Ahh, yes I was missing the obvious. I will make sure this is logged if it isn't already. Thanks for reporting it and putting it here in case anyone else runs into this.

Regards,

Pat

[rhesusminus]

While we're at it @PatMurnen_Adsk ....

The content migration utility does NOT migrate the column names from the access database into the SQL-database.

If I rename the USER1-3 columns in table AM, they are still called USER1-3 in the SQL database after migration.

[PatMurnen_Adsk]

Trond, It may be intended as I have been seeing some things where the AutoCAD Electrical team is strongly recommending that people not rename any of the columns. But, I will let you know what I find out.

Regards,

Pat

[PatMurnen_Adsk]

Trond, I did hear back from the team that this is a known issue. So it is logged. Sorry it took me so long to get back on this. I was out of the office for a little while.

Regards,

Pat

[rhesusminus]

Ok, thanks.

What about renaming columns?

This article (dated Feb. 22 2016) says : Prohibitions, Column Labels. Do not change the column labels.

While this article (dated May 2 2016) says : Edit Column Labels, Edit the field names as needed.

So....

[PatMurnen_Adsk]

Trond, 

Over the past few releases the catalog database structure is getting more restrictive for many reasons.

• It is used to insert 2D symbols in AutoCAD Electrical
• It is used to insert 3D symbols in Inventor
• It is used in many reports
• There is an editor for it
• It is used when you do a quick bom
• It is migrated and in migration there are a number of options, MDB, SQL, overwrite, merge, etc.
• and more things I am not thinking of right now

Anyway, my point is that there is a lot of code that touches accessing for read\write of the catalog database. It is probably safe to rename the user columns and the columns that are named differently from table to table. But as we can see there is a problem in the migration of these. Some columns cannot be renamed, such as CATALOG, or many functions fail. So its a little bit of a gray area. So the best practice (and safest) is not to rename any of the columns. 

I believe that the second article you mentioned, To Work With Catalog Database Tables, should be updated to add a note in the Edit Column Labels to list the ones that should never be changed and a caution about this. I will log this.

Regards,

Pat

[Anonymous]

No - (dashes) either.  That is a problem as well.