Teamcenter Active Workspace: Shifting the focus from the Application to the Content

With Teamcenter Active Workspace, Siemens PLM purposely chose to focus on specific use case/role support versus just duplicating every functionality of the Teamcenter Rich client.  The initial emphasis has been to provide a zero install client to the broader, and often less frequent users, in the enterprise.  These users require a zero install client that is easy to learn.

With every release of Active Workspace, Siemens PLM continues to broaden the use cases and roles supported in it.  The graphic from left to right shows the usecases/roles already delivered with complete use case support to the ones which are under the works to enable richer application exposure for authoring capabilities. Siemens has also exposed some administration capabilities in Active Workspace such as for user management and a new XRT editor, right inside of the Active Workspace user interface.  Again all with no client install.

Active Workspace User Experience
It’s all about the content .  Active Workspace shifts the focus from the Application to the Content – the User’s data is the most important thing.  The User Interface (UI) is simple, clean, light, and fast. Subdued colors let the user’s creation be the star of the show.

There is a simple top-down, left-to-right flow of information: Who I am and my role is first .What I’m working on is clear and obvious . Data brings with it the right capability for the context – Viewer, Where Used, Attachments, History etc.  One need not know how to open tools – just read the tabs to figure out what’s available. Each tab of content brings the right capability

This part has 3D content and so it has a viewer tab. That tab brings the right viewing commands to work with it. The user focuses on “What” he needs to work on, not the “Tools” to do work. Commands and tabs are smart – they don’t appear when they don’t work or don’t have content. This eliminates the visual clutter .

Active Workspace Framework
The Active Workspace Framework enables consistency and efficiency, both for the end user and the developer. It has established patterns that control where content and features go in the UI. Common elements and modules keep the UI consistent and simplify development. Users learn interaction patterns and see them behave consistently in new areas. 

The display is data driven – what you open to work on controls what information is presented. A jet engine has a 3D Viewer and Trace Links, but a Shampoo bottle has Trade Items and Vendors. The underlying data may be technically the same, but is always presented in terms appropriate for that industry, data, and even the user.

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