Patent Document

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
         [0001]    This invention relates generally to a management system for manufacturing planning. More particularly, this invention relates to a method and system which manages Bill of Materials “BOM” changes such as adding parts, removing parts, replacing parts, and changing properties such as quantities, sequence numbers, and feature and options.  
           [0002]    Bill of Materials are used extensively in the manufacturing process, to assist with material requirements, and to detail the exact formula or recipe for the finished goods. In order to speedup the pace at which consumer demands for a new or modified product are satisfied, manufacturers utilize Bill of Material systems. The term “Bill of Material” or “BOM”, as generally understood in the art and as used herein, refers to a parts explosion listing. Specifically, a product may have many subassemblies, some or all of which may have further subassemblies. A Bill of Material may be a printed out parts list having indentations where the indentations correspond to a depth of hierarchy of each product in each subassembly. The Bill of Material traditionally has been utilized during the manufacturing process of an assembly to provide a reference for the relationship of each component to other components in the assembly.  
           [0003]    An example of a system for generating a Bill of material is described in Ferriter et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,847,761. In the Ferriter et al. system, a Bill of Material generation process begins by producing a functional model of a product design. In order to generate the functional model, the user must know each part required to meet the design specifications, i.e. the user must formulate and apply rules to determine proper subassemblies. The functional model is in the form of a hierarchy tree structure. The tree structure is assigned an item number and stored in a database. Once a tree structure for a product is established, a user can view the hierarchical tree. From this tree structure, the Ferriter et al. system generates a Bill of Material.  
           [0004]    Once the Bill of Material is created, it can be used by a manufacturing industry to provide a benchmark to which production is compared for exact manufacturing instructions where component quantities and mixtures are critical. In either case, accuracy of the Bill of Material is critical for material requirements planning “MRP” and accurately projecting costings. Some systems extend the Bill of Materials by adding specific manufacturing details, scrap percentages and packaging/labeling methods. Most provide the ability to add routings to the Bill of Materials. Routings are often referred to as work centers or equipment areas. These routings are used to assist with scheduling the manufacturing processes, adding labor and equipment costs, and even adding start-up and overheads to the Bill of Materials.  
           [0005]    Thus, the Bill of Materials is an important part of many manufacturing processes. While systems, such as the Ferriter et al system, for creating a Bill of Materials are known, such systems are limited and very vague in their ability as to how the system is able to make and manage any changes. The schemas of prior systems are designed to store either only the latest revision of the BOM or the all revisions of BOMs. Only for the systems that store the multiple revisions, is it possible to display the changes made to a specific revision of BOM by comparing a revision with the previous revision. But comparing BOMs of two revisions can be slow for a large BOM because it has to go through the entire children parts comparing side by side. Such systems need identifiers to uniquely identify each part because two same parts can be children of the same part in the BOM. Also, such systems are limited in displaying replaced parts. Handling replaced parts require a way to store which part replaced which part in the schema.  
         SUMMARY OF INVENTION  
         [0006]    The above discussed and other drawbacks and deficiencies of the prior art are overcome or alleviated by a method for managing changes in a bill of materials. In an exemplary embodiment of the invention, the method includes providing a first bill of materials, linking a parent part in the first bill of materials with a first child part by a first relationship, revising the first bill of materials by linking the parent part with a second child part by a second relationship, different than the first relationship, and, providing a revised bill of materials listing the first child part, first relationship, second child part, and the second relationship.  
           [0007]    The above discussed and other features and advantages of the present invention will be appreciated and understood by those skilled in the art from the following detailed description and drawings. 
       
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       [0008]    Referring to the exemplary drawings wherein like elements are numbered alike in the several Figures:  
         [0009]    [0009]FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an exemplary portion of the BOM change management schema relating to adding a part;  
         [0010]    [0010]FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an exemplary portion of the BOM change management schema relating to removing a part;  
         [0011]    [0011]FIG. 3 is a block diagram of an exemplary portion of the BOM change management schema relating to replacing a part;  
         [0012]    [0012]FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an exemplary portion of the BOM change management schema relating to changing property of a part;  
         [0013]    [0013]FIG. 5 is an exemplary BOM change report;  
         [0014]    [0014]FIG. 6 is a block diagram of the overall BOM change management schema; and,  
         [0015]    [0015]FIG. 7 is block diagram of a system utilizing the BOM change management schema. 
     
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION  
       [0016]    The Bill of Materials (“BOM”) change management schema  10  manages changes such as revising parts, adding parts, removing parts, replacing parts, creating new parts, makings parts obsolete, reinstating obsolete parts, changing sequence numbers, and changing part quantities. This schema manages the typical BOM changes by storing the exact changes like add, delete, and replace, as well as any other changes, into the new revision of parent part being changed. In particular, the schema involves three relationships called “bomAdd”, “bomRemove” and “bomChangeProperty” which are dedicated to keep track of the changes made to BOM, as will be further described.  
         [0017]    This schema  10  can be used with any type of PDM (Product Data Management) or equivalent software, such as an eengineer PDM system  12 , capable of supporting BOM change management. Also, a user interface such as the user interface described in “User Interface for Bill of Materials”, U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______ (41 EB-9139/GEN-0334), filed concurrently herewith, herein incorporated by reference in its entirety, is preferably presented to a user for interfacing with the schema  10 .  
         [0018]    For exemplary purposes only, and with reference to FIGS.  1 - 4 , a bicycle  14  is shown that is represented by the following information: Part Number  16 : 100100p1, and Part Revision  18 : 05. Thus, the bicycle  14  is given a TNR—Type (Part), Number (100100p1), and Revision (05). The Part 100100p1 revision 05 has the following 4 children parts: Wheel  20  Part 100200p1; Frame  22  Part 100300p1; Seat  24  Part 100400p1; and Handle Bar  26  Part 100500p1. In addition to the TNR of each child part, additional attributes may be associated with each part including Sequence Number (optional, default to blank), Quantity (required, default to 1.0), Feature &amp; Option (“FO”) Code (optional, default to blank, range: “Required”, “Not Required”, “Option”, blank), Feature &amp; Option Number (required if FO Code is not blank, range from 1 to 999), and Effectivity Date (optional, default to blank, format is mm/dd/yyyy).  
         [0019]    Turning now to FIG. 1, again for exemplary purposes only, a bicycle company wants to introduce a revised bicycle  14  by adding a mirror  28 , the Part  16  100100p1 will be revised to Revision 06, represented by item number  30  in FIG. 1, and its children look as the following after adding the mirror  28 : Wheel  20  Part 100200p1; Frame  22  Part 100300p1; Seat  24  Part 100400p1; Handle Bar  26  Part 100500p1; and Mirror  28  Part 100600p1.  
         [0020]    The five bicycle parts  20 ,  22 ,  24 ,  26 , and  28  are linked to the Bicycle  14  by PART PART relationship  32 . The system can display the BOM of revision 6 using PART PART relationships  32 . However, if a user wants to know what the changes were in the revision 6, the conventional method for discovering the changes would be to compare revision 5 with revision 6. The schema  10 , however, utilizes relationships dedicated to keep track of changes. FIG. 1 shows the relationship “bomAdd”  34 . Using this relationship  34  the system  12  quickly finds a Mirror  28  that was added in the revision 6. Storing object ID of the relationship PART PART  32  between a parent and a child as bomID  36  in bomAdd relationship  34  is important when the child part appears more than once in the BOM. The general rules for the Add function include linking PART PART; if bomRemove exists, then unlink bomAdd and don“t link bomRemove; and if bomRemove doesn“t exist, then link bomAdd.  
         [0021]    Turning now to FIG. 2, the bicycle company wants to introduce a revised bicycle  14  by removing a Handle Bar  26 , so that the Part 100100p1 will be revised to Revision 06, represented in FIG. 2 by item number  38 , and its children look as the following after removing the Handle Bar  26 : Wheel  20  Part 100200p1; Frame  22  Part 100300p1; and Seat  24  Part 100400p1.  
         [0022]    The three parts wheel  20 , frame  22 , and seat  24  are linked to the Bicycle  14  by PART PART relationship  32 . The system  12  can display the BOM of revision 6 using PART PART relationships  32 . However, if a user wants to know what the changes were in the revision 6, the conventional method for discovering the changes would be to compare revision 5 with revision 6. The schema  10 , however, has relationships dedicated to keep track of changes. FIG. 2 shows the relationship “bomRemove”  40 . Using this relationship  40  the system  12  quickly finds a Handle Bar  26  that was removed in the revision 6. The general rules for the Remove function include unlinking the PART PART relationship; if bomAdd exists, unlink bomAdd and don“t link bomRemove; and if bomAdd does not exist, then link bomRemove.  
         [0023]    Turning now to FIG. 3, the bicycle company wants to introduce a revised bicycle  14  by replacing a Frame  22  (part number 100300p1) with a Lightweight Frame  44  (part number 200200p1). The bicycle revision 5, represented by item number  18 , will be revised to Revision 06, represented by item number  42 , and its children look as the following after making the replacement: Wheel  20  Part 100200p1; Lightweight Frame  44  Part 200300p1; Seat  24  Part 100400p1; and Handle Bar  26  Part 100500p1.  
         [0024]    The four parts of bicycle  14  after the replacement are linked to the Bicycle  14  by PART PART relationship  32 . The system can display the BOM of revision 6 using PART PART relationships  32 . However if a user wants to know what the changes were in the revision 6, the conventional method for discovering the changes would be to compare revision 5 with revision 6. The schema  10 , however, has relationships dedicated to keep track changes. FIG. 3 shows the relationships “bomAdd”  34  and “bomRemove”  46 . Using these relationships, the system quickly finds out that the Lightweight Frame  44  in the revision 6 replaced the Frame  22 . The bomReplaceID attribute  48  on the relationships  34  and  46  stores the pairing objects ID. Thus, if there is more than one replacement, the system  12  can easily find out which part was replaced by another part by utilizing the identifying attributes  48 . That is, storing object ID of the relationship bomRemove  40  as bomReplaceID  48  in bomAdd relationship  34  is important when a child part was replaced by another child part because it helps to identify the part that was removed for replacement. Likewise, storing object ID of the relationship bomAdd  34  as bomReplaceID  48  in bomRemove relationship  46  is important when a child part was replaced by another child part because it helps to identify the part that was added for replacement.  
         [0025]    Turning now to FIG. 4, the bicycle company wants to introduce a revised bicycle  14  by changing a quantity of wheel  20  from 1 to 2, the bicycle revision 5 will be revised to Revision 06, represented by item number  52 , and its children look as the following: Wheel  20  Part 100200p1; Frame  22  Part 100300p1; Seat  24  Part 100400p1; Handle Bar  26  Part 100500p1. The children are notably identical to those within revision 5. The only change in revision 6 is within the attribute “Quantity”.  
         [0026]    If a user wants to know what the changes were in the revision 6, the convention method for discovering the changes would be to compare not only parts but also attribute values of revision 5 with revision 6. The schema  10 , however, has relationships dedicated to keep track of changes. FIG. 4 shows the relationship “bomChangeProperty”  54 . Using this relationship  54 , the system  12  quickly finds out that the property was changed in the revision 6. The general rules for the Change Property function include change properties on the PART PART relationship; and if bomAdd does not exist, then link bomChangeProperty.  
         [0027]    The examples shown in FIGS.  1 - 4  demonstrate how the BOM changes are handled using the schema  10 . If a system  12  supports effectivity dates and a user wants to display BOM view as of a certain date, the system could do that because the bomRemove relationship has the necessary information about the removed part including the effectivity date. While the example of FIGS.  1 - 4  only included one parent part, it should be understood that a BOM could include many parent parts, and that some children parts could also be parent parts. For example, while Wheel part  20  is a child part of Bicycle  14 , Wheel part  20  could also be a parent part of the children including an inner tube, wheel frame, spokes, and screws. That is, the BOM may include an expandable list of parts, where children parts form a part of the parent part to which it is associated.  
         [0028]    Turning now to FIG. 5, an example of what a BOM change report  80  may look like is shown. This report  80  preferably will display only the changes made to the structure. Basically it should display the added parts  82 , the removed parts  84  and the parts with property change (not shown) only. The BOM change report  80  may include rows which identify parts  86  which have been affected by change in some way. The BOM change report  80  may also include columns which identify any factors detailing the change(s) made to the parts  86 . For example, some of these columns may identify the name of the part, the revision number made to the part, the sequence number, the quantity of affected parts, the Feature and Option code and the Feature and Option number. Although specific examples of a BOM change report  80  have been given, it is within the scope of this invention to provide more or less information within the BOM change report as may be desired by the particular user.  
         [0029]    Referring to FIG. 6, the parts can be found easily by referring to bomAdd  34 , bomRemove  40 , bomPropertyChange S 4  relationships. This BOM change management schema  10  allows for improved performance by displaying the exact changes to user, as opposed to the previous method which compares structures of current revision and previous revision to find the changes. As itemized in FIG. 6 and as previously discussed, the attributes on bomAdd  34  include bomID and bomReplaceID, the attributes on bomRemove  40  include bomReplaceID, quantity, sequence number, feature option code, and feature option number, and the attributes on bomPropertyChange  54  include bomID, bomReplaceID, Quantity, Sequence Number, Feature Option Code, and Feature Option Number.  
         [0030]    Referring to FIG. 7, an exemplary system  100  for incorporating the schema  10  is shown. The system  100  may include a computer  102  or computer like object having a signal processor  104  and memory  106 . The signal processor  104  may be part of a processing circuit including a microcontroller, microprocessor, etc. The computer  102  may include a hard disk, or other fixed, high density media drives, connected using an appropriate device bus, such as a SCSI bus, an Enhanced IDE bus, a PCI bus, etc., a floppy drive, a tape or CD ROM drive with tape or CD media, or other readable media devices, such as magneto-optical media, etc., and a mother board. The motherboard may include, for example, a processor, a RAM, ROM, and I/O ports. The memory  106  may include one or more of a hard disk, floppy disk, CDROM, EEPROM, and the like. Network connectors may communicate with the computer  102  such that programs may run in conjunction with internal networks or the World Wide Web. An entry device  108  may be connected to the computer  102  for data entry, and a screen  110  is further provided for user viewing a display of BOM and the BOM editor, as is further described in “User Interface for Bill of Materials”, U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______ (41 EB-91 39/GEN-0334). Alternatively, the screen  110  may be a touch screen monitor with a touch screen interface such that data entry may be accomplished through the screen  110 . Stored on any one of the above-described storage media, including the World Wide Web, the system and method include programming for controlling both the hardware of the computer and for enabling the computer to interact with a human user. Such programming may include, but is not limited to, software for implementation of device drivers, operating systems, and user applications. Such computer readable media further includes programming or software instructions to direct the general purpose computer  102  to performance in accordance with the system and method.  
         [0031]    Thus, this invention of a schema  10  is designed to store BOM changes so that it does not require comparing two revisions of BOM”s and also handles replaced parts. Also, the dedicated relationships in this schema  10  allow the system  12  to display BOM as effective of a given date because effectivity date can be stored in the dedicated relationship. This schema  10  enables applications to display BOM changes fast and provide a capability to undo the changes easily.  
         [0032]    This BOM change management schema  10  can be embodied in the form of computer-implemented processes and apparatuses for practicing those processes. The BOM change management schema can also be embodied in the form of computer program code containing instructions embodied in tangible media, such as floppy diskettes, CD-ROM”s, hard drives, or any other computer readable storage medium, wherein, when the computer program code is loaded into and executed by a computer, the computer becomes an apparatus for practicing the BOM change management schema. The BOM change management schema can also be embodied in the form of computer program code, for example, whether stored in a storage medium, loaded into and/or executed by a computer, or as a data signal transmitted whether a modulated carrier wave or not, or transmitted over some transmission medium, such as over electrical wiring or cabling, through fiber optics, or via electromagnetic radiation, wherein, when the computer program code is loaded into and executed by a computer, the computer becomes an apparatus for practicing the BOM change management schema. When implemented on a general-purpose microprocessor, the computer program code segments configure the microprocessor to create specific logic circuits.  
         [0033]    While the invention has been described with reference to a preferred embodiment, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes may be made and equivalents may be substituted for elements thereof without departing from the scope of the invention. In addition, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situation or material to the teachings of the invention without departing from the essential scope thereof. Therefore, it is intended that the invention not be limited to the particular embodiment disclosed as the best mode contemplated for carrying out this invention, but that the invention will include all embodiments falling within the scope of the appended claims.

Technology Category: 3