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BOM Comparison

Views: 8910

Hoss

#41468

BOM Comparison | 10 May, 2006

We are looking for a tool to perform BOM comparisons. I know that Aegis and Valor provide this capability within their CAM offerings. I'm trying to find something that I don't need infrastructure to utilize and won't break the bank.

Anyone who uses or knows of a package for BOM comparison, please let me know.

Thanks.

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#41472

BOM Comparison | 11 May, 2006

Good morning, There are two ways to solve your problem:

1. Use already written software. For instance, Valor BOM manager has BOM comparison function together with powerful postprocessor and many others. In my opinion, Valor BOM manager is the best tool I had ever used. 2. Write your own software.

[edit]

In addition to written above. As a rule BOM manager is always integrated into CAM packets. I never saw this feature alone, and I doubt if such software really exists. BR, Pavel

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#41478

BOM Comparison | 11 May, 2006

While we have no experience with them, a Google of 'BOM conversion' gives several Access based programs.

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#41494

BOM Comparison | 11 May, 2006

Check out RSI's BOM Explorer.

http://www.rsi-inc.com/articles/brochures/bom_explorer.pdf

I can't remember if it does BOM to BOM comparison, though.

I wrote my own BOM 2 BOM comparison tool for my company. If your BOMs are in a consistent format, please feel free to send a few sample BOMs to cuculi54986@yahoo.com. I might be able to adapt my tool to your needs fairly easily.

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JB

#41495

BOM Comparison | 11 May, 2006

You might want to check out http://www.ultraedit.com they have a comparison program that can compare up to 3 files at a time as well as append them and a bunch of other neat stuff. You can get it bundled with some other great text editors etc. for about $59.00. Good luck

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AR

#41496

BOM Comparison | 12 May, 2006

If you are not talking about a large number of BOMs, the cheapest way would probably be to do a CSV export of the BOMs and write an Excel macro in VBA to do the actual comparison.

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jh0n

#41604

BOM Comparison | 17 May, 2006

I've been using an Excel plugin called Synkronizer with a LOT of success. I export a BOM from Orcad, 1 part/ref per line (2 columns), for each product I want to compare. Synkronizer does the rest - highlighting in different colors for deletions, value changes, and additions. We've got it down to about a 2 minute process per comparison.

Good luck. :)

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#41607

BOM Comparison | 17 May, 2006

The majority of commercial software available in today's market does not have the data conversion capabilities to ACCURATELY do a BOM compare. My suggestion is to hire a consultant to leverage synergy in acheiving this mission critical goal.

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#41644

BOM Comparison | 18 May, 2006

WML ??

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jh0n

#41767

| 24 May, 2006

In two years of exporting bills of material from Orcad into the Synkronizer plugin in Excel, I have never seen an issue related to the software.

Sure, some custom-written piece of software might incorporate an extra feature or two, but looking at it from a cost/benefit standpoint, the Synkronizer solution is more than acceptable.

I suggest you give it a shot.

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AR

#41771

| 25 May, 2006

Synkronizer sounds like a great idea, but what do you do if your BOMs incorporate more than one component ref per line (as in our case), often with different kinds of notation for a sequence of components. You need some kind of parser in order to split the line in individual component/ref pairs. That's where VBA provides a great help.

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#41969

Re: Synkronizer | 4 June, 2006

Hi John,

Where can I buy the Excel plugin Synkronizer? Thanks in advance for your help. David

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#41970

BOM Comparison | 4 June, 2006

AR,

What is VBA if I may ask?

David

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#41971

BOM Comparison | 4 June, 2006

I got it! Visual Basic Application. Thanks, David

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#42172

Re: Synkronizer | 13 June, 2006

Google => Synkronizer Excel

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Hoss

#42186

Re: Synkronizer | 14 June, 2006

To wrap this up - I ended up selecting Ultra Compare from IDM Solutions. Provided your BOM formats are the same and have been sorted, it works great. Only $29. You can also use it for comparing Word docs.

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