Creating a Numbering Scheme in Autodesk Vault

One of the Administrative tasks to perform on your Vault Workgroup or Vault Professional installation is to determine and to set up a numbering scheme for items and files.  If you don’t already have a numbering scheme previously in effect, you’ll want to determine your scheme strategy before sitting down to set this up.  Don’t take this step lightly, because once your scheme is set up and in use by the vault, it can’t be deleted until you rename all files using this scheme to a different scheme.

First, make sure that you log in to the vault as an administrator.  Next, click on Tools > Administration > Vault Settings.

From the Vault Settings dialog box, select the Behaviors tab, then, under Numbering click Define…

This will bring you to the Numbering Schemes dialog box.  Here, you want to first determine if you are defining a scheme for Files (parts, assemblies, documents, etc..) or for Items.  In this example, you will see instructions for creating a File numbering Scheme.  Next, click the New… button to define a new scheme.

In the New Numbering Scheme dialog box you will define the scheme.  First, give the scheme a name.  Next, define a new field by selecting the New… button.

In my example, I want to show how to use several fields to create a custom scheme, so I’ll start with a Fixed Text field.  In step one, you give the Field Setting a name, and then you input the Fixed Text value.  Then, click OK.

Back in the New Numbering Scheme dialog box, you will see the field you just added.  Click New… again to now add another field.  This time, add a Delimiter.  Type in the Delimiter and then click OK.

From the New Numbering Scheme dialog again, click New… .  This time, click on Free Text.  In the Field Settings boxes, give a Name to the Field, type the Default Value, and then specify the Max Length of the Value.  You also have the option to check the box that would force the user to input the correct length of the Max Length field.

Add another Delimiter field to separate the Free Text field from the next one, which is the Pre-Defined List.  Give the field a Name (You should be getting the hang of this now).  Next, fill in the fields in the Enter Codes List.  You then can re-order the list to appear as you desire, and then select one to be the default.  Click OK.

Add one more Delimiter, and then a final field using the Auto-Generated Sequence.  You know the drill, give the field a name, then the length.  Then you can specify the Range, Step Size and decide whether to pad the zeros.

Finally, you will see your newly created Numbering Scheme with a preview and number length.

Congratulations on creating your new Numbering Scheme.  Now, you can test it out in Inventor.  Simply launch Inventor, create a new file and click Save.  You will be presented with the Generate File Number dialog box so that you can select or input the necessary data for the numbering scheme, and then click OK.  Inventor will prompt you to then Save the file.  Be sure to put it in your Workspace, and click Save and at last, Check In the file.  Whew!