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It is my memory or I am imagining things at this point. I need a sanity check on two points I assumed based on empirical experience (mine and my colleagues as well)

We have lot of custom properties that are mapped to pdm variables.
We used to change some history (version) free variable using explorer datacards without checkIng out the files. modifying the value and saving.
Today I did the same routine operation, via explorer then I opened the 3D part wih SW after modifying the datacard with exploret and the custom property inside the file did not update from the DB. Is this by design?
On the contrary the db value was nowhere and rebuilding did nothing, the OLD value was there. explorer was showing the new one.


Another "strange" thing is the update of the file references in the assemblies after a component rename: I noticed that when you open the assembly with PDM2022 the OLD references are shown until the refresh of the pdm add in or the rebuild of the assembly...

for both cases above I had in my mind that the archive server at some point would update the metadata inside the 3D files as well.
Like file deletion or cold storage is probably a batch operation that runs once a day... or so I thought.

I have also proof that some file editing happens as the pdm would show only the latest transion date instead of the date the physical file has been modified.

Thanks in advance!

On the custom properties, are you modifying the configuration specific properties? The @ tab in PDM and the configuration specific ones sometimes update where you don't expect them to.

that variable should update in all configuration. to be sure I have a dispatch to clear it completely and make it blank, it worked well for years untIl I noticed today that the old values are still around, but not In explorer columns (this is expected as their are pulled directly from the db)

https://www.mlc-cad.com/solidworks-help ... variables/

"Changing version free variables does not change the content of the file itself. Additionally, users can update version free variables in states where they do not have permissions to check out a file."

ok, so could a version free variable linked to a custom property be considered a dangerous setup?
I think the previous admin was misguided from our VAR thinking it was possible to modify a file by editing the datacard.
there is also a dispatch to clear that variable without checking out the selected files...I wonder all the troubles we asked our VAR advice to solve were probably caused by a less than wonderful implementation of PDM.
Basically leaving the files intact and changing the variables inside the DB only...

Another point is the file reference update inside assemblies. I expected that the metadata references inside the 3d assy data would be somehow overwritten when a fIle is renamed or moved inside the vault... but it could be the update is on the DB side only?

I had some assy load the local files with the old file name (before renamIng) instead of the new renamed file from some workstations vault view.

I'm not sure if it was always the case, but currently you cannot have a version free variable linked to a custom property. Checking that box in the admin "Edit Variable" tool causes the attribute mapping section to completely go away.

Version free variables cannot be mapped to file properties and will not update the file when changed. These values are only stored in the PDM database.

When file references are moved or renamed, PDM will use the document manager to write that information into the file so that SolidWorks will know where to find the reference when the parent file is opened. The files should still be rebuilt in SolidWorks after making these kinds of changes so that the SolidWorks UI updates changed filenames.

@AlexB
@Diaval
thank you for your comments its is clear now.