<!DOCTYPE html
  PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">

<!--
Copyright (c) 2006 UGS Corp.

All Rights Reserved.

This software and related documentation are proprietary to UGS Corp.
-->
<html>
   <head>
      <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
      <title>External references</title>
      <script language="javaScript">
        abridged="false";
        displayConditions=new Array();
      </script>
      <link type="text/css" href="../css/main_styles.css" rel="stylesheet">
   </head>
   <body class="bodydocs" onload="top.pageLoader()" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
      <div class="title_topic2" id="xps10_pagetitle">External references</div>
      <hr noshade="true">
      <p class="para_topic"><b class="uiTerm">External References</b> is a new functionality added to the <b class="uiTerm">STEP Advanced Settings</b> tab page. When you check the <b class="uiTerm">Export Assembly as External References</b> option the <b class="uiTerm">Export Component as</b> title appears with a menu listing showing <b class="uiTerm">STEP</b> and <b class="uiTerm">NX</b> as the option selections.
      </p>
      <div class="title_division">Export components as &ndash; STEP | NX</div>
      <p class="para_division">Bi-directional basic STEP external references support (top-level assembly STEP file with component references to STEP files or CAD model files instead of one big assembly STEP file) has been added to the NX 5 STEP AP203 and STEP AP214 translators. This includes bi-directional support of a top-level assembly STEP file which contains all of the assembly structure with the leaf node components in the top-level assembly STEP file represented by external references to:</p>
      <ul>
         <li>
            <p class="para_item">STEP: other STEP files (NX data converted to STEP as part of the translation); and </p>
         </li>
         <li>
            <p class="para_item">NX: NX part files.</p>
         </li>
      </ul>
      <p class="para_division">On export, any non-leaf node component geometry that actually lives in any of the intermediate (non-leaf) node component parts or in the top-level assembly part would end up as geometry in the top-level assembly STEP file just as it does when the entire assembly is all in a single STEP file. If you turn on the <b class="uiTerm">Product Structure Only</b> option, then this intermediate geometry will not be exported. In the case of importing STEP external references, the NX STEP translators will have to continue properly importing non-leaf node geometry as it currently does, without regression.
      </p>
   </body>
</html>