Welcome to the 14.5 QA Testing Guide, please check with your developer to make sure 14.5 Migration is successfully completed (if any) before testing.
Watch the recording here if you've missed our webinar.
CET 14.5 Migration Workshop Additions
With the 4 weeks recurring migration workshop after the main CET 14.5 QA Testing webinar, QA support and DEV support would put our hands together to answer your queries on migration difficulties, as well as to provide latest updates if there's any. Take a look at our Migration workshop schedule!
Migration Workshop on 16 October 2023
Reconfiguration Tool Related
CET crashes when working on the same drawing that is loaded into Reconfiguration Tool
There's a crash reported where developers made a fix for. CET tends to crash due some missing references/dead objects which led to some information loss when 'Refresh all' is clicked on. It's important to make sure the sole functionality of Reconfiguration Tool works good for you, follow test instructions below:
Reconfiguration tool with FIKA extension.
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In the Reconfiguration Tool, load manufacturer drawings into 'Existing' and 'Proposed'. Ensure:
- Both of the articles are accurate in the Bill of Material preview below, in terms of:
- Part Number
- Quantity
- List Price
- Any manufacturer specific columns with information
- Both of the articles are accurate in the Bill of Material preview below, in terms of:
- With both the drawing loaded into CET and 'Existing' or 'Proposed', verify that by clicking on 'Reload all', verify the drawing in CET still can be worked on, without CET crashing.
Migration Workshop on 9 October 2023
Materials Related
Finish legend fails to populate information
There's a bug fix where 'Finish legend' gets emptied out and does not populate, during snapper placement animation, 'escape' key is clicked to break out of the animation when finish legend is already placed prior. If your manufacturer extension has 'Finish legends', please ensure that it still works within your manufacturer snappers, follow *test instructions below:
Finish legend above taken from FIKA extension.
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In your manufacturer extension component tab, place 'Finish/Material Legend' (if your extension has one), in the drawing space. Then, place your manufacturer snappers in drawing space.
- Verify that the 'Finish/Material Legend' populates information of Finish/Material used.
- Updating the Finish/Material of the snapper, also should update the legend immediately with precise code/description (varies from manufacturer).
Catalogues Related
Variants & Constraints, Product in product, etc.
In CET 14.5, developers made numerous code refactoring, changes to catalogue creator module, which mainly impacts variants & constraints. Thus, it's advisable to run a smoke test with your manufacturer extension catalogues to ensure that all configurations are still valid, specifically manufacturers which have 'Variants & Constraints', 'Product in product' configured.
- For testing guidelines, refer to the smoke test guidelines here, which can be applied on your catalogue products.
- For more technical details, refer to the developer migration guide here.
Bug fixes🪲
As with any other releases, we're trying to rule out as much bugs as possible in order to maintain that awesome CET user experience. Hence, these relevant bugs were handpicked for your information, divided into different CET component areas.
Elevation View Related
Extra Lines generated in Elevation View
There is a reported issue from a manufacturer extension, where extra lines were generated in the rendered elevation output when comparing between different CET versions. Ensuring your manufacturer extension is not affected by this, follow *test instructions below:
Example above taken from FIKA extension.
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In your manufacturer extension component tab, try out 'Elevation View' for different layouts of your manufacturer products. Verify in 2D space that the rendering has no anomalies.
- Going a mile further, verify the precision and accuracy by using dimension tools to ensure the measurements of the rendering is correct, in correspondence to the actual product snapper dimensions.
File Export Related
OBJ file format
Developers made a fix specifically for OBJ file format exports, as previously there were issues with the export having wrong normal and inaccurate vertices. This causes some layers to have inaccurate colors when the OBJ model is worked on in Model Lab, then exported back into CET.
This will benefit mainly catalogue specialists as they work on the import / export of OBJ models using Model Lab. No test instructions will be needed for this section.
Illustration above shows the exported 'OBJ models' before (Left) and after (Right) the fix.
DWG/CAD Related
Unable to change CAD layer's color
There is an intermittent issue that affects some DWG files where the CAD layer colors refuses to change, only affecting DWGs imported as 'Floorplan'. Thus, we highly recommend trying out with your desired DWG files with this fix. Follow *test instructions below:
DWG imported into CET along with the CAD dialog opened.
- Open CAD dialog, Import and Insert your desired CAD file as a 'Floorplan' and make sure it can be inserted into drawing successfully. Verify the correctness of the inserted CAD file against a CAD viewer (AutoCAD, etc).
- Go to 'CAD layers' tab and changing the layer's default color should be effortless. Hide/show layer should retain the layer in the updated color.
- Save and load drawing, ensure the updated DWG layer color is retained and can be changed again in the CAD dialog.
Drawing Tool Related
Advanced selection tool crash
Developers made a fix to the crash when using advanced selection tool. Previously, there was a reported crash when users tried to filter selection by using specific categories in the drawing. On your end, we highly encourage trying out the advanced selection tool again using your manufacturer extension snappers to ensure the fix is in place. Follow *test instructions below:
Example above taken from FIKA extension.
- Open 'Advanced Selection' tool from 'Tools' menu. By using your manufacturer extension snappers, make a conditional selection by:
- Using Selection Criteria, ensure by toggling different categories, *tags, levels creates an accurate advanced selection.
- Using Selection Query, make sure a query can be created by using different conditions, ensure advanced selection created is accurate.
- With any advanced selection that is created, ensure created record in 'Selection History' can be retrieved by simply clicking on it, then cross-checking selection made in drawing space.
If your manufacturer extension come with manufacturer default tags and categories, it's important to ensure these can be used along in the 'Advanced Selection' tool
Save/Load Related
Export PDF/CAD path set to 'Same as Drawing' does not work
Saving installation documents and reports generated in 'PDF/CAD', previously does not work with the option that is set to 'Same as Drawing' in 'Control Panel > Advanced'. Developers made a fix to this issue and it should now always respect the save location as the drawing if set to 'Same as Drawing'.
Ensuring this fix works on your end, Follow *test instructions below.
Advanced settings in Control Panel.
- In Control Panel > Advanced, with the [default/custom] location set for 'Save location for new drawings', ensure:
- 'Save location for exported PDF/CAD files' should follow the same path as the drawings. For further verification, click on the '...' button to cross-check the location paths.
- Changing the path for 'Save location for exported PDF/CAD files' will override hence follows the location path of your choice.
- Clicking on the 'chain' icon will default location path to follow the drawing's path.
- 'Save location for exported PDF/CAD files' should follow the same path as the drawings. For further verification, click on the '...' button to cross-check the location paths.
- Using your CET drawing, try *generating PDF and exporting CAD. Verify that these outputs are saved following the configured location paths in Control Panel > Advanced.
Generate PDF can be done through these locations:
- Print dialog, (Ctrl+P to open), print PDF.
- Paperview, [Tools > Export > Export to PDF]
- File > Import & Export > dwg
- Paperview, [Tools > Export > Export to dwg/dxf]
Paperspace Related
Low precision for detailed drawings.
When working with larger scale drawings that consist of large floorplans, racking systems specifically those with a lot of fine details from 'product tags, dimensions, annotations, markings', it is usually rendered as thick lines or even shown as a black object in a PDF printout especially with the least amount of zoom, in order to fit the entire drawing into a single PDF printout.
In CET 14.5, developers made enhancement to this flaw, as PDF generation will now use floating points instead of integers for better precision when generating PDF printouts. This results in improved line visibility both when zoomed in or out. Ensuring the clarity of PDF printout also applies on your end, follow *test instructions below.
Example of a pallet racking system that is zoomed in for detailed comparison.
- Using your manufacturer extension, create a moderately sized drawing by including Floorplans CADs, preferably those that consist of a fair amount of tags, markings, codes, etc. In paperview, generate a PDF printout and ensure:
- The correctness of details should be accurate and no longer shown in thick lines when *compared to the printout generated in the previous version.
- Verify that the details of the drawing are visible, and did not disappear comparing to the actual in drawing space / viewclip.
Due to the difference in details generated in PDF printouts between CET 14.5 against CET 14.0 or below, there is a high chance that the PDF comparison by using 'PDF Diff' from QA tools will fail as the difference of details detected will be deemed as false errors.
Issue with loading paper (cmppr) into paperspace
Previously, there were an issue where loading papers (cmppr file format) directly by clicking on the 'Load paper from file' button in the paper queue options. As a result, users were unable to load their manufacturer paper templates into paperspace. On your end, we highly encourage to try out this *test instruction below:
Paper queue.
- Using your manufacturer extension paper(s) if your manufacturer extension comes with any, try loading any new/existing drawing with papers into CET. Ensure copying, creating new papers work as it should. Ensure in the viewclips and viewports, the snappers are shown accurately without any issues.
Material Related
Inaccurate texture of COM (Customer Own Materials)
Developers pushed a fix to address a reported issue, where some COM (Customer Own Materials) can be overly shiny in both realtime and render.
Overly shiny fabric material.
COM (Customer Own Materials) dialog.
- Using your manufacturer extension snappers with COM (Customer Own Materials), attempt changing to different materials in the quick properties or scheme manager, make sure they look accurate in terms of color tone and texture, emphasize in 2D/3D.
- Perform a rendering and ensure the materials still look as accurate and don't look overly shiny.
- Save and Load new/existing drawings to make sure no unintended visual changes happen.
Bill of Material Related
Package Count in SIF Export
When using 'Configura SIF' export, it will now export part numbers that have a 'Package Count' of code 'NT' in the exported SIF file. it's good to check if your manufacturer extension is using 'Package Count' feature with your developer.
An example of an exported SIF of FIKA office snappers.
- Using your manufacturer extension snappers, perform 'Order export' of 'Configura SIF' in Bill of Material and verify that the code 'NT' is shown in the exported SIF copy. Comparison can be done by verifying the count, by enabling 'Package Count' column in Article View settings.
- Also good to ensure your manufacture specific tags with information are shown correctly in the exported SIF document. This is when you have the 'Use manufacturer specific export' checkbox ticked.*If you have a specific manufacturer SIF format, you may make comparison to ensure its accuracy.
New features🆕
We're continuously improving in each releases to provide more features that brings more value into CET. Here's what you need to know, divided into different CET component areas.
Measurement Unit Related
Hide/Show Dimension unit in Style Editor
In view of conflicting measurement units for users working within a collaboration environment, the option 'Show (mm) distance for dimension tools' as a drawing-wide setting may be checked/unchecked for many different users. Hence, it will inflict some inconsistency when these different users place 'Dimension strings' which results in some showing the unit and some does not. Besides, this also affects kitchen users as they are very favored towards 'mm' unit. Thus, this feature will be changed to be part of 'Dimension style' and will no longer be a drawing-wide setting, as this will contribute to more uniform experience across a collaboration project.
With this, the feature will be renamed in CET 14.5, and will now only hide/show distance unit for rulers and not dimension strings only (which is now moved to Style Editor > Dimensions).
Comparison of Control Panel > Region between CET 14.0 (Left) and CET 14.5 (Right).
Comparison of Style Editor > Dimensions between CET 14.0 (Left) and CET 14.5 (Right).
With this change in place, *verify test cases below.
- With your new/old drawings with existing and new dimension strings, ensure dimensions are still yields an accurate measure, and to show/hide unit will now be controlled in the Style Editor > Dimensions.
- Ensure with 'Show metric unit' ticked in Style Editor, the metric unit will always be shown with the measure, according to the 'unit' set in Control Panel > Region > Distance unit.
- Ensure 'Show metric distance unit for rulers' no longer affect dimension strings, but instead only for rulers.
Bill of Material Related
New sequence of articles
Previously, when using CET with manufacturer extensions with registered article views, there is no fixed sequence as to how different article views are sorted. This leaves the Bill of Material cluttered as users tries to find for the 'Main' article, wanting to have quick customised views and comparison. For instance, only specific columns to be shown for comparison. In CET 14.5, there is a sorting logic in place which works as follows:
Bill of Material article tabs.
Referring to the illustration above, we see:
- [Main article] - The default CET main article.
- [Manufacturer article] - The article that came with the manufacturer extension. (Referred as Manufacturer A in illustration.）
- [Article View] - Non-manufacturer article that is created new/copied.
- [Create new view] - A button that duplicates the main article, when 'New Article' is clicked on.
- [Copy current view] - A button that duplicates the article along with the customised filtering.
The sorting logic prioritises the Main default CET article, followed by manufacturer articles and custom articles.
Example 1: With the sorting logic applied in CET 14.5 with Manufacturer A installed with no extra articles.
- [Main article] > [Manufacturer A] > [Create new view] > [Copy current view]
Example 2: With the sorting logic applied in CET 14.5 with Manufacturer A, B installed with an extra article created.
- [Main article] > [Manufacturer A] > [Manufacturer B] > [Article View] > [Create new view] > [Copy current view]
Ensuring the sorting logic is in place, *see below.
- Using your manufacturer extension (if there are registered articles), ensure the sorting logic works accordingly following the example above in Bill of Material. In the registered article, verify that the columns are not changed and the (part numbers, part description, pricing are still the same as before.
- Try create new/copy current articles, and ensure they are sorted correctly according to the sorting logic. Ensure that visibility is still customisable by hiding/showing specific columns or custom sorting in Article View settings.
Save/Load Related
Info Page
In CET 14.5, 'Drawing Properties' button has been removed and the sole functionality has been moved to a newly developed 'Info Page'. This page now houses all drawing related information instead of being shown in a separate dialog. It's now the 'all in one' page for the open drawing with summary of information along with convenient access to drawing functionalities with ease.
Below shows the comparison of the old (CET 14.0) and new (CET 14.5) feature in action.
Drawing properties in CET 14.0
There is a new 'Info' button positioned first in the listing. With this new user interface, you may try out some functionalities ensuring *it works on your end.
Info page in CET 14.5
- With your drawing open in CET, ensure these functionalities works in the 'Info Page'.
- Open file location works by opening a separate windows folder with the drawing saved.
- Protect document allows setting a password, which prompts the next time drawing is open.
- Set different states for the drawing opened.
Autosave dialog
In CET 14.5, there will be a new dialog that shows all relevant information on backups and autosaves. This dialog can be opened by clicking on 'View backups and autosaves' which is a new button under 'File' menu. In the new dialog, users can retrieve a collection of autosaves and backups grouped by drawings that have been worked on, as well as getting a 'sneak peek'. Key features include:
- Comprehensive summary of the autosave/backup details, basically the all you need to know!
- A new 'Preview' placeholder which shows a preview of the 2D space of the drawing.
- Collapsible section listing grouped by drawings, that houses both autosave and backup revisions of the drawing.
Brief look of the autosave dialog
- Ensure the new autosave dialog can launch by clicking on 'View backups and autosaves' which is a new button under 'File' menu.
- When working with your drawing in CET, ensure the autosave and backup information can be *retrieved in the dialog.
- Each revision of the autosave and backup should load into CET by clicking on 'Open'.
- Briefly verify the details and preview, ensuring it is accurate and relevant.
Frequency of autosave and backups of your drawing is configured in another menu (Control Panel > Security). Click on 'Data management' button in the dialog brings you to the configuration page.
Core scheme phasing out 🗓️
When?
As you may have heard, we're in the works and discussions of retiring the old core schemes as early in Q4 2024. With this, we're highly encouraging our manufacturers who are still on core schemes to migrate to use propschemes as soon as possible.
Then?
With each completed migration, QA Support is always striving to keep the quality in check. Schemes is one of the core functionality of a manufacturer extension and we're leaving no chances on this. As a result, we strictly encourage visiting PropSchemes testing guide that we've prepared for your convenience.
Performance Testing 📊
Performance is a very important aspect that drives CET's usability experience. As we strive to provide more enhancements and new features in the later CET versions, performance is taken into strict consideration to ensure its consistency and does not introduce an unintended ripple effect throughout. With that said, we would like our manufacturers to run some basic performance tests, to make sure they are not affected.
Basic checklists
- To ensure the best performance possible, please switch off unused extensions, which will contribute to faster CET loading and startup.
- Test for possible memory leak issue using Window's Task Manager (Open using shortcut CTRL + SHIFT + ESC). Look for 'CETDesigner.exe' under 'Processes' tab and make sure overall memory consumption is not maxed out, with CET eating up most of it. Check that CET's memory consumption makes negligible difference between old and new, report if you experience abnormally high memory consumption by 'CETDesigner.exe'.
New Tool in Release Debug
Measure memory usage
A new tool to inspect memory allocation for packages installed in CET. This tool can be used to determine memory leak of certain packages if memory is growing overtime and not being release.
What you can do:
- To be used whenever there is a memory spike or memory maxing out in Windows Task Manager. Or unusual sluggishness or slowdown were felt while using CET.
- Open up Release Debug menu using Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F12. Click on "Measure memory usage". Some users might have clashes with Intel HD Graphics shortcut.
- The traces will be written to CET log file. Send the log file together with relevant information to devsupport@configura.com for investigation.
Response Monitor tests
We highly recommend using 'Response Monitor' under 'QA Tools' to trace the time taken for different actions done in CET. Compare the time taken for the same actions done between the old and new versions of CET. If time taken difference is of a huge margin, you may report to 'devsupport@configura.com' for assistance.
By using your manufacturer extension, we suggest checking time differences for these actions:
- System startup time
- First snapper placement, and subsequent continuous placement
- Stretching (check if its smooth and not jerky)
- Copy and Paste
- Creating Alternatives
- Save and Load drawing
- Material application in [Animation, Quick Properties, Customer Own Material, Scheme Dialog]
That's all we have for you!
The QA Support team would like to wish you all the best in your 14.5 Migration journey. 👍
Have additional questions?
Links that may come handy to you
Release and Migration Best Practices
As always, reach out to us at qasupport@configura.com if you have questions
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