Cad to SMM? No Problem!
E.J.E. Industries, Inc., established in 1980, is internationally recognized as the maker of Structural Material Manager, a software system that aids steel fabricators in managing material lists. Structural Material Manager is currently installed in well over 1,100 locations throughout North America.
One of the most powerful features of our software is the External Data Interface (EDI), a module that allows material lists stored in other software systems, such as a CAD program, to be read into the Structural Material Manager. Once this data has been imported, Structural Material Manager can then nest both lineal items and plates, perform job estimates, keep an inventory, and fulfill all of your production-control needs. EDI thus performs in seconds what used to take hours to type, and it's mistake-free.
No programming is required for most CAD applications! P2 Programs and SoftSteel are two firms that each carry a ready-made product for exporting bills of material to Structural Material Manager's EDI format! Contact P2 Programs at 800/563-6737 or SoftSteel at 909/863-9191 if you would like to obtain an interface for any of these popular CAD systems:
CAD systems by the following companies support Structural Material Manager's EDI format directly; bills of material from these systems can thus be read into Structural Material Manager's EDI without need for a conversion program from P2 Programs or SoftSteel:
In addition to their CAD interface programs, P2 Programs also carries a utility that allows Structural Material Manager to read material lists stored in ASCII-delimited files. You should contact P2 Programs at 800/563-6737 for information on this utility if you need to interface to a program such as a spreadsheet or database that has the ability to export its data to ASCII-delimited files.
Only if you wish to interface Structural Material Manager to some program other than one of the CAD systems mentioned above, or from a system that cannot export its bill of material to an ASCII-delimited file, will any programming be needed. To do so, a programmer is required to write a conversion utility in the programming language of his or her choice. The utility builds the ASCII text file that the External Data Interface is expecting as the intermediate file to read. This task is not a terribly difficult one, but it does require an individual with more than "end user" skills. Once the conversion utility has been written, however, no programming skills are needed on the part of the user to import data into the system; the completed system can be put to daily use by personnel with no technical background. If you do need to write a custom program to build the intermediate file, please click here for details on the required ASCII file format.
Although importing bills of material is the most common use of the EDI option, this module also provides the capability to export Structural Material Manager jobs to ASCII-delimited files. Such files can then be read into a host of other applications such as spreadsheets and databases.
Call or fax us today, and we'll send you a FREE, no-obligation, fully-functional demo disk. The demo includes all Structural Material Manager modules and the complete system's user's guide. We'll also include a sample file for importing so you get to see first-hand the power of the EDI!
Structural Material Manager home page
Copyright © 2006
E.J.E. Industries, Inc.
P.O. Box 268
Washington, PA 15301
Ph: (724) 228-8841 Fax: (724) 228-7668