Bill of Materials Techniques

This chapter describes simple techniques for editing and sorting bills of materials. The include file provides a means of automatically merging parts information into bills of materials. It is widely believed that simply editing the basic Capture-generated bills of materials is the most effective approach. Even with the use of an include file or user properties to complete the part descriptions, bills of materials need further editing in part because of limitations of the Bill of Materials tool. Capture generates a somewhat disorganized header and does not sort parts by value. Sorting is achieved through a simple sort utility. Standard industry practice is to sort bills of materials by reference designator and part value. The Bill of Materials tool sorts only by reference designator. Microsoft Excel is an excellent tool for managing and printing bills of materials. Other spreadsheet programs can be used for the same purpose. Using a spreadsheet offers easy organization of data in columns and the capability of inserting and totaling cost information.