When you want to upload a BOM in the BOM importer you have additional options making use of approved part options from any previous BOM import. This is especially helpful if you:
receive inaccurate, unstructured BOMs with information mixed up in cells
reimport the same BOM with changes and want to keep the previous work
want to see suggested part options based on previous decisions you made.
When you import a BOM you will see the option "Reuse part options from previous import" on the left with 3 choices:
Inactive
All columns must match
Select tagged columns manually
1. Inactive means that we won´t consider any approved part options from a previous import and we won´t add nor suggest any of them. We will nevertheless approve part options based on the provided information in the BOM.
2. All columns must match means that we will consider the whole excel line of the BOM regardless of the tags set during column mapping.
If you imported BOM 1 and approved part options for it in the past and now import BOM 2, BOM 10 or even BOM 100, we will recognize this exact same BOM line and can add the same part options after import.
3. Select tagged columns manually means that you can select a specific column (or multiple columns) instead of the whole BOM line. We will then only consider the column or combination of columns and recognize when this column was imported previously with approved part options.
For instance: you imported BOM 1 in the past and approved part options for CPN 19373622 and designator D12. When you import BOM 2 which also contains CPN 19373622 and designator D12 we will ask you whether you want to add the same part options again. For this case we only consider columns with a tag.
❗ We highly recommend to rather select IPN, CPN, MPN or SPN as reference. Thus you can ensure accurate results for added or suggested part options.
In the second and third case a popup will appear after pressing the "Import" button asking you whether you want to add those part options or rather keeping them in suggestions.
If you decide for "No, keep in suggestions" the fitting and previously added part options will remain in suggestions.
If you decide for "Add parts" we approve the previously added part options.
❗ The recognition of previous part options is always customer based. We will never consider part options from customer A for customer B and vice versa.
After selecting to add the part options or keeping them in suggestions you can filter for them and they are marked accordingly with a P or prev tag for "previous".
We remember newly added or removed part options for the next BOM import accordingly. The approval status of a part option will also be remembered: when you set a part option to "pending" in BOM 1 and it was not changed to "approved", we will keep the "pending" status after adding the part options from a previous import unless you change it.
The different options aim to help you processing BOMs way faster finding proper part options but still being able to easily spot and review the approved or suggested parts.