[thelist] Item Description Field
Luther, Ron
Ron.Luther at hp.com
Wed Jul 23 08:16:49 CDT 2008
Marc Cantwell asked about BOM database structures:
>>I am trying to figure out how to design a database that has items that contain other items
Hi Marc,
Bill Of Material designs can be hard to work with. (Personally, I find them to be a PITA. I generally have better luck writing my own recursion logic in a procedural language than in trying to use the 'native' tree commands (if they even exist) in whatever database you will be using.)
The data structures aren't too bad:
BOM STRUCTURE TABLE
Part_No --- Parent_Part_No -- Qty_Per
-------------------------------------
111 null null
222 111 1
333 111 2
444 333 2
PART NUMBER REFERENCE DESCRIPTION TABLE
Part_No --- Desc
-------------------------
111 Wagon Bed
222 Handle
333 Axle
444 Funky Sprewell-esque 'Spinner' Wheels
That's the easy part. Taking that information and figuring out that you need 4 wheels in stock in order to build your wagon is the tricky part.
[Well okay, at least until you get into the joys of optional subassembly features, flexible configurations, substitute parts, calling out MFG step instructions specific to the selected config, completion time estimates, force & capacity planning, pegging, ...] Welcome to manufacturing Marc! ;-)
Good Luck!
RonL.
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