Tips & Tricks: Reviewing and Editing References
By Aaron Shaw
Say you’re finalizing the model that you spent months designing. Just as you are wrapping up the model, a notification pops up about an urgent last-minute change request. The change means that a handful of the features need to be moved from one side of the model, to the other.
Luckily, with recent enhancements (in Creo 3.0) to the Edit References workflow, you can review and change those references with just a few clicks. Here’s how it works:
Image: In this post, we’re going to replace the reference of the attach boss (1 – green surface) with a new reference (2 – front surface) in order to re-define the location of it.
Reviewing a feature’s references
To view the list of original references for a given feature, follow these steps:
- Right-click a feature on your model and select the icon that looks like a chain link to open the Edit References dialog box. The dialog shows a list of dependency references.
- Click items on the Original reference list to view each reference on the model, as shown below.
Image: References can be highlighted when they are selected, and then they can be replaced by new references. As you work, you can even preview the results of your change.
Moving a feature by editing a placement reference
By editing a feature’s placement reference, you can quickly move that feature. To edit a feature’s reference, follow these steps:
- Right-click a feature on your model and select the icon that looks like a chain link to open the Edit References dialog box.
- Select the Reference that you want to edit.
- Click Roll To in the Child handling section of the dialog box to update the reference for all or selected downstream children.
- Select the new reference.
- Click Preview to see how the new reference will impact the feature, or click OK to apply the changes.
Image: When you compare it to the model above, notice how the location changed of the leftmost extruded boss.
The Edit References utility highlights missing references in red. Best of all, it gives you a great level of control to apply the reference replacement to all or selected dependent (child) features as you make your changes.
>Image: Features that have missing references are highlighted in red. This allows you to easily identify the right replacement reference.
See it now
For more about Edit References capabilities, watch the video.
There’s even more information at the Creo Help Center page About Editing and Replacing the References of Features.
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