Here’s your chance to try Inforbix and become personally acquainted with a new way of accessing product data

Here’s all you need to do:

Within a few minutes of submitting your email address, you will receive instructions for accessing Inforbix with live data. You’ll be given access to the same product our customers use. The only difference will be the data-set. We’ve compiled our own data-set for you to give Inforbix a test drive.

What you need to know about the data-set

We have created a small but realistic sample data-set containing a few hundred files. These include, but are not limited to the following file types:

You won’t be able to download data or files from the data-set, but you’ll be able to work with them just as you would your own data with Inforbix. It might take you a few minutes to become acquainted with the unfamiliar data and files in the data-set. Before you dive into the product, we recommend you first try the exercises below to help you get acquainted with Inforbix and the data-set.

Where to start with Inforbix once you login

To help you become familiar with both Inforbix and the demo data-set, we suggest you try the following exercises. We’ve included a short video for each. And BTW, don’t let the written length of some of these exercise intimidate you… they each take no more than a couple minutes. Really.

Exercise 1

This exercise will give you a feel for how Inforbix aggregates information from different file types. This is helpful for data discovery.

Exercise 2

This exercise will show you how to go navigate “deep” into a search result. This is helpful when locating parts you want to re-purpose or re-use and save the results for later use.

Exercise 3

Ever try locating BOM details from within a particular CAD drawing? This exercise will show you how Inforbix extracts useful data from within CAD files.

Exercise 4

This final exercise will show you the basics of using tables to aggregate, organize, and present data in meaningful and helpful ways.

Here’s a short video clip to help you with this exercise:

• Enter “Superman” in the search field and hit “Search” (Superman is the name of a fictitious engineer)
• Narrow down your results by selecting “SolidWorks Drawing” as a file category using the filter tool on the right (this will make sense when using the product)
• Click the “See Also” link that reads AutoCAD File

Here’s a short video clip to help you with this exercise:

• Enter “bolt” in the search field and hit “Search”
• Click the “Located In” link to find more data and files related to this particular bolt result
• Click the “Contains” link on the “drill_press” data snippet (this will be obvious when in the product) to view contents of the “drill_press” directory
• Next, click the “Save” button (it’s on the upper right hand side of the Inforbix screen)
• Enter when prompted on the pop-up window a save name, e.g. “drill_press parts”
• Go back to the home screen (click the Inforbix icon) and click the “drill_press parts” saved search and see what happens

Here’s a short video clip to help you with this exercise:

• Enter “stapler” in the search field and hit “Search”
• Narrow down your results by selecting “Inventor Drawing” as a file category using the filter tool on the right
• Click the “Drawing BOM” link on the “stapler.idw” data snippet (there’s only one data snippet… we’re trying to make this very easy)
• Now click “View Table” link on the right hand side of the drawingBOM_000 data snippet (again, there’s only one snippet)
• You should now be viewing the BOM table extracted from the Inventor CAD file

Think of it as harnessing the power of spreadsheets to help you slice and dice lots of data down to useful and meaningful chunks you can use to make better decisions.

Here’s a short video clip to help you with this exercise:

• Click the “Tables” link on the upper left hand side (you’ll see this when in the product)… doing so brings you to what we call the Inforbix Table app
• Enter “.sldprt” (a SolidWorks Part file extension) in the search field and hit “Search”
• After a few moments, you will see a table containing lots of data; locate and hit the “Choose columns” button on the upper right (you’ll spot it when in the product)
• A window will appear in the middle of the product screen; enter “Last Saved Date” on the column filter in the window – you are going to customize the table columns
• Once “Last Saved Date” is located (you’ll see it easily enough), drag and drop it from the right side of the window to the left side and place it right after the “ID” column attribute (this will make sense when you’re in the product) – and hit the “Ok” button when you’ve dropped it where suggested
• On the table, you’ll now notice a new column next to the “ID” column called “Last Saved Date” – you have just customized this table to suit your needs
• Hit the “Show filters” button on the upper right (next to the “Choose columns” button) to begin narrowing down data at the column level
• Now let’s try one of many possible scenarios: out of the 353 results on your table, you want to know the last saved date of all SolidWork files in the tool vise folder…
• …so you enter “tool vise” in the “File Name” column field, click the little check-mark and voila… you see that there 16 tool vise SolidWorks “tool vise” related files and their respective “Last Saved Date”
• Want to go a bit further? How about saving this particular result as a saved table? Just click the “Save table as” link on the upper right (above the “Show filters” button), and enter “tool vise table” in the pop-up window field to save the table (don’t forget to hit the “save” button)
• On the Table home page (click the Inforbix logo to go “home”) and on the “Saved Tables” section there, you’ll see your saved table, “tool vise table”… click it and see what happens

In case you run into trouble while test driving Inforbix

Don’t panic. You can’t break or hurt anything… and most issues you might run across will be easy to quickly address. We’re here to help you get the most out of your first exposure to Inforbix. Try the following in case you run into trouble:

1. No matter where you are in the product, if you run into difficulties, lose your bearings, or simply want to start over, all you need to do his click the Inforbix icon. That will take you back to the home screen. Start over… chances are, things will go well the second time around.
2. If you encounter an issue that stumps you, hit the “Contact Us” button on the far right of the Inforbix product screen. Fill it in, submit it, and we’ll be with you in a jiffy. We’ll appreciate you providing as much detail as possible to help us quickly trouble shoot the issue for you.
3. If you want to talk to someone live, for any reason, at any time, send us a request on support@inforbix.com. Include your contact information. We’ll contact you and will be happy to help. We’ll also be happy to give you tips and tricks… what ever it takes to help you get the most out of your demo experience.
4. If you do contact us, don’t worry, we’re not going to give you a sales pitch. We appreciate and respect the time you are taking to explore Inforbix.

A final word, or two

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