I'm the admin, not a power Solidworks user. A user has asked me to help with trying to resolve this issue: When they change a balloon callout on a drawing to text, it breaks the link to the BOM. Is there a way to not break the link? Can a custom callout (with parenthesis) be made? If so, how? Thank you so much for any help.
By definition, when the user chooses "Text" it will break the link, since the user is manually adding text. In that situation I don't understand why he or she is concerned about it breaking the link.
Perhaps you should encourage your user to choose "Custom Properties" instead, which would allow him or her to choose the desired property from the drop-down.
The user wants to maintain the link to referenced parts in a Drawing because sometimes the parts list will change, particularly during a prototype stage. Having all parts (including referenced) will make changes less error prone - as the item numbers would ALL be linked, thus updated. I hope that helps clarify the need we have for having a referenced part maintain a link to the BOM.
That clarifies the need, at least somewhat, but doesn't change the fact that changing a balloon type to "Text" breaks the link to the Part. Have you asked your user if he or she can reference a custom property instead of using text? That would maintain the link. If they change it to "Text", and the Part changes, the balloon won't change to update. If the balloon was linked to a custom property then it will update (assuming the new Part has the same property).
OK, let's back up a step...
It sounds like your user actually wants a balloon with the item number in parenthesis, but the item number remains linked to the BOM.
Is that the case? Do they just want parenthesis, or do they want to be able to put any arbitrary text along with maintaining the item number link?
This appearance can be obtained by creating a note that contains "( )", positioning it over the balloon, and grouping the two annotations.
Or, while editing a regular note, you can click this button:
to link text to a table cell, and add whatever additional text you want. You can then tweak on the border and leader of the note to make it look like a balloon.
Josh,
They want to be able to identify an item in the BOM with a parenthesis (in the Field of Drawing) and maintain the item number link.
Maybe this will clarify (image attached). We only want to have an item he "hard" callout once, anywhere else it's referenced with only a parenthesis.
Robert Pickeral wrote:
Maybe this will clarify (image attached). We only want to have an item he "hard" callout once, anywhere else it's referenced with only a parenthesis.
Does it have to be parenthesis? Could they change the Balloon style to something other than a circle?
If it no longer calls out the item number from the BOM, it is no longer linked to the BoM.
You are be able to add a component reference to the component item in the assembly and then have it display that reference for that item on the drawing.
RMB the item (or feature manager):