DocDoku: Using web technologies in a desktop application. OW2con'15, November 17, Paris.
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The document discusses DocDoku's PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) solution, which helps industrial organizations manage product data and CAD files using web technologies. It emphasizes a cross-platform desktop application built with Node.js and Webkit, providing features like 3D previews, file synchronization, and a command-line interface. The presentation covers the pros and cons of their technology choices and outlines future feature enhancements.
DocDoku: Using web technologies in a desktop application. OW2con'15, November 17, Paris.
- 1. DocDokuPLM : Using web technologies in a desktop application Morgan Guimard - 17 nov 2015 - OW2 con' 2015
- 2. We are DocDoku 2 We help industrial organizations digitize their business Based in France ● Toulouse ● Paris Committed to the Open Source, we make DocDokuPLM: ● https://github.com/docdoku/docdoku-plm ● Twitter: @docdoku #PLM #HTML5 #Java #BigData #WebGL #IoT #Industry
- 3. About me 3 Tech experience ● 10 years in Web Technologies ● JavaScript developer ● Java EE developer Morgan Guimard ● DocDokuPLM dev leader ● Technical trainer
- 4. Agenda 4 1 – Introduction to Product Lifecycle Management 2 – Working with CAD files 3 - Our cross-platform solution
- 5. 1 - Introduction to Product Lifecycle Management
- 6. 6 Manages the entire lifecycle of a product from its conception to its disposal. Integrates people, data, processes and business systems and provides a product information backbone. Product Lifecycle Management
- 7. PBS? 7 Product Breakdown Structure A hierarchical listing of assemblies and components, and the quantities there-of, necessary to produce a final product
- 8. Parts 8 Each node of a PBS is a part Stores every information of a component, as its name, custom attributes, and its geometry file. The part number is its identifier. You may find the same part at multiple PBS levels. V54S3434RTX
- 9. Assembly / Leaf 9 ● Assembly nodes stores the structure informations ● Leaves stores the geometry ● Assemblies and leaves are both considered as parts Example: An office desk
- 10. Everything is tracked 10 ● Through Check-in / Check-out mechanism ● Iteration (1, 2, 3...) and Revision (A, B, C...) Example: Part 100 A.3 A is the revision, 3 is the iteration and A.3 is the version ● Iteration = minor changes ● Revision = major ones
- 11. 2 – Working with CAD files
- 12. Working with CAD files 12 ● Our target: CAD designers ● They are editing lot of files / large files Check in / Check out ● Those files need to be synchronized on a server ● Collaborative work is a main topic
- 13. Standard formats ? 13 Some formats are standard ● STEP, IFC, OBJ, … And some other formats are not standard ● SLDPRT, CATPART, … We're trying to convert any format, even if not standard
- 14. CAD files content 14 Depends on the format, can contains ● Geometry only ● Structure only ● Both Managed server side with DocDokuPLM server ● Converting many formats to a WebGL format ● Extracting the structure from CAD files and creating the PBS ● May require proprietary SDK to parse some none standard formats
- 15. Multiple editors 15 Many edition tools / platforms ● Windows - Mac OS X - Linux ● AutoCAD, SolidWorks, CATIA, BIM Editor ... ● Developing a plugin for all of them isn't realistic ● Should also be maintained for every software update
- 16. How can we help every CAD designer ? 16 Editor plugins ? ● Not realistic: too many editors, versions, languages Operating system integration ? ● Would be a great solution, but requires more than a single code base The easiest way for us is a cross platform application
- 17. 3 – Our cross platform solution
- 18. Command line interface 18 Fits for most advanced users... ● Scriptable ● Lightweight ● Easy to use ● Check in / Check out and synchronize files from command line with a single command ● ...but lacks a graphical user interface to easily make bulk operations $ dplm checkin some-part-number
- 19. Choosing a cross-platform technology 19 Native ? Web based ? What do we need ? ● Read and write the user's FileSystem ● Be able to interact with our JSON WebServices ● Interact with our CLI ● Have a responsive design for each display ● 3D preview
- 20. Node Webkit 20 Just a nutshell ... ● Wrapping NodeJS and a Webkit browser ● Let's keep a standard API: HTML5 ● And let's use NodeJS low level API
- 21. NodeJS brings us ... 21 … exactly what we need ● Ability to walk the user's FileSystem to discover CAD files ● Read CAD files contents to display them in a 3D preview ● An API to interact with our CLI (Directly in java or bash) ● FileSystem watchers to detect any change made on a file ● An easy way to work with JSON objects
- 22. Webkit browser 22 Helps us to : ● Create a responsive design ● Keep a single code base for each platform ● Allow HTTP connections and easy JSON parsing ● Load 3D file with WebGL technology for a live preview
- 23. Pros and cons of this choice 23 We like... ● One code base, and code reuse ● Standard API ● Fast development process ● Latest web technologies can be used ● Easy to package We don't like so much… ● App size (must embed Webkit and NodeJs) ● Requires more RAM and CPU ● Hard to mimic the OS look and feel ● May have bugs for NodeWebkit (notification, file system changes)
- 24. Our web based solution 24 DocDokuDPLM ● Built with NodeWebkit ● Using AngularJS as the main framework ● Using NodeJS API
- 25. Architecture 25 User's desktop DocDokuDPLM APP DocDokuCLINodeJS Webkit + AngularJS DocDokuPLM server FSCAD editor
- 26. Remote and local navigation 26 ● Allows the designer to browse remote and local folders
- 27. File change detection 27 ● Allows the designer quickly see which files are out of sync ● Green tick icon means synchronized ● Orange cloud icon means modified
- 28. Recursive download 28 ● Allows the designer to check out / download a whole structure within a single action ● Select existing baseline
- 29. Synchronizing a whole folder 29 ● Allows the designer to check in / upload a whole folder
- 30. 3D preview 30 ● Allows the designers to see their files in 3D before uploading them ● The same 3D engine is used in the DocDokuPLM server
- 31. To come soon 31 We'd like to bring the following features to our solution ● Desktop notifications (synchronization done, etc…) ● Better errors handling ● Shortcuts to open a part in the user's favorite editor from our app ● SMART check-in order when pushing many files in a single operation ● ...
- 32. Questions ?
- 33. Thank you !