Data Migration to 3DEXPERIENCE POWER’BY (UPS): A Roadmap to a Successful Transition

• What UPS — the Unified Product Structure — is, and its benefits: a unified data model across brands, support for multiple CAD systems, no need to migrate to CATIA V6, and viewer capabilities.
• The UPS migration road map and how to plan it, including the migration readiness checklist and how effort divides across the definition, test and validation, execution and reporting phases.
• The migration strategy decisions: direct data migration or upgrade followed by migration; big bang, incremental or on-demand; top-down or bottom-up loading; and the capabilities your migration tool or platform needs to have.
• The challenges that come up during UPS data migration, and the licence roles required for it.
• SteepGraph’s ETL PLM Migration Platform, including multi-node data loading and node configuration.

PLM managers, CAD administrators, PDM and PLM system administrators, engineering IT leads, design and engineering managers, migration project managers and PLM architects.

• HZ

  Himanshu Zalavadiya

  CEO, Founder & Chairman · SteepGraph Systems

  LinkedIn
• KZ

  Kalpesh Zalavadia

  COO, Founder · SteepGraph Systems

  LinkedIn

What if my EBOM and CAD-BOM are not in sync? How do I go to UPS?

This is a very common scenario. In such a situation, we can analyse both CAD-BOM and EBOM data to explore the possibility of merging them.

We can define merging rules based on the analysis and consider some common factors. In this typical migration scenario, your migration tool must be smart enough to facilitate easy rule definition for data transformation, and should be capable of creating a physical product without a CAD file.

How much downtime is needed, and how should we plan the cutover?

Downtime depends on multiple factors, such as:

• Which migration strategy you are using

• How much data you want to migrate

• Which projects are targeted at the time of go-live

• Hardware considerations

A few guidelines for reducing and planning downtime:

• Enough dry runs — change the environment set-up and configuration to achieve better performance.

• Plan a week-by-week loading plan according to active project needs after go-live.

• Ensure that your tool has the capacity to load data on demand.

What happens to my custom code (User Exits) in Designer Central?

The following major features are not available in UPS compared to DSC:

• Versioning is not allowed in UPS; only revisions can be created.

• GCO configuration is not supported in UPS as it is in DSC.

• User Exits custom code is not supported.

• Get latest structure on checkout is not supported; it always gets the As Is structure.

Since XPDMXML is relatively slow and time-consuming, is it feasible to conduct the data migration using the Public API instead?

Data migration using Public APIs is not recommended; Dassault Systèmes recommends the XPDMXML approach.

• It ensures all the unexposed links are created during the migration, through the CAD inspector component of the XPDMXML technology.

• During the migration, XPDMXML stores additional information that helps identify migrated data.

We strongly recommend the XPDMXML approach even though it is a little slower: it ensures data integrity, and performance can be improved with parallel processing.

Can the source and destination database be the same, since you can have the shared schema mentioned earlier?

Yes, this is possible. If you are on Designer Central and migrating to UPS, your source and destination are the same database.

Is your ETL framework easy to configure between traditional BOM and DEC data and UPS? Roughly how long does it take to configure?

Yes. Our ETL tool can map EBOM and DEC data to the UPS data model, provided the customer has a clear definition of how to map it. This is achieved by defining and configuring business rules. The time depends on how complex your merging definitions for EBOM and DEC naming and structure are.

If I have data in the Designer Central model, do I need to use the ETL way of migration, or are there converters to change the data model after upgrading to the latest 3DEXPERIENCE platform?

There is no direct converter from DSC to UPS after an upgrade. You have two choices:

• If you have only DSC data in the old 3DEXPERIENCE version, you can choose Route 1: migrate DSC data to UPS directly using the ETL tool.

• If you have other data that must be updated to the latest version of 3DEXPERIENCE, first upgrade from the old version to the new one, then migrate DSC data to UPS using the ETL tool. This is Route 2.

Will you use EXALEAD, Netvibes or OnePart Dassault tools to perform analytics?

No, we do not use EXALEAD, Netvibes or OnePart for reporting. SteepGraph’s ETL tool provides a reporting mechanism that can be configured to generate different types of reports based on RDBMS.

If a product is active, should its projects be migrated to UPS as a priority?

Active projects should be prioritised for migration to UPS, since the business relies on them. It keeps downtime lower and ensures business continuity.

How are non-migrated DSC data and UPS data made visible in a common environment?

Designer Central data and UPS data have different data models, so after migrating DSC data to UPS, the DSC data still exists in the system. To see DSC data you need DSC integration licences; to see UPS data you need UPS integration licences. Changing DSC data after migration is not recommended, but it can be used to view and download files.

What challenges are typically encountered during UPS data migration?

1. Data loading takes longer and may not fit in the cutover period.

• XPDMXML technology needs time to load data into 3DEXPERIENCE.

• UPS migration cannot be completed within a short long weekend.

• Plan a phase-wise go-live: active projects first, older projects loaded in subsequent go-lives.

2. Plan more effort and time if CAD data quality is not great: unstructured data, very old data, unsupported CAD versions, inconsistent data (for example missing links), duplicate data, non-consistent revision sequences, bad file naming (for example special characters). The migration team can isolate the bad data, but as the data owner you should plan the effort and time to correct it as the migration progresses.

3. No effective tracking of error logs.

4. No transparency of data migration status.

5. No validation mechanism in the tool.

6. Hardware performance issues.

How long does the UPS data migration process typically take?

The duration varies with factors such as the size and complexity of the data, system compatibility, and the chosen migration approach.

Can UPS data migration be performed incrementally, or is it a one-time process?

Depending on the system and project requirements, UPS data migration can be carried out incrementally or as a one-time bulk transfer.