Automation from a 2D Layout

This Pro Engineer Automation Tutorial demonstrates how to Declare a 2D Layout and automate the configuration of an assembly from that layout.

A 2D Layout within Pro Engineer is similar in appearance to a detail drawing. However, a Layout is designed to control the “big picture” where a drawing is usually concerned about the details. Think of a Layout as an engineering notebook. In this notebook, you can sketch, make notes, setup some initial space claims, and even drive the entire Pro Engineer Automation assembly from it. Individual part geometry can also be controlled from a 2D layout.

For the purpose of this Pro Engineer Automation training guide, we will be creating a Layout to control the configuration of an assembly. If you went through the previous FroTime Pro Engineer Automation tutorial, you should be familiar with the assembly we automated. It was a work area where the user could configure the number of monitors, type of monitors, etc. We will take this Pro Engineer Automation example a step further and use a Layout to drive the assembly configuration.

The advantage of using a Layout for this example is that we can specify some global parameters and place them in a simple 2D format. In doing so, we can even allow non-Pro Engineer users to configure assemblies. The layout is simple and does not require the knowledge needed to operate typical Pro Engineer Automation functions.

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