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The PTC/USER Technical Committees have been busy since the June conference. Many committees have conducted one or more webcasts to review planned product enhancements with PTC. There has also been a concerted effort to expand the role of TCs within the European user community. The Windchill TCs are gaining new members and importance as PTC relies more and more on these groups for product direction. The goal of all these activities is to ensure the needs of the PTC/USER community are well communicated to PTC and result in products that meet our business requirements.
Here are updates on other noteworthy TC events.
The Product Development System Technical Committee (PDSTC) was formed in September to focus on the business processes associated with product development. Most members of this new group are being drawn from existing product-focused MCAD and Windchill committees.
As its name implies, the PDSTC will concentrate on the areas addressed by PTC’s Product Development System. The objective is to provide input to PTC on topics such as top-down design and change management from a business process perspective, rather than a feature function perspective. Since the PDSTC will cover topics that span the interests of multiple TCs, the new committee will provide a forum to coalesce these diverse needs into a unified vision.
One of the PDSTC’s key goals is to ensure that the user requirements it identifies reflect both the MCAD and Windchill communities. This is increasingly important as Pro/ENGINEER and Windchill become more tightly integrated. Since the specific topics under consideration will vary over time, members of other TCs may be asked to participate to leverage their expertise in specific areas.
Bruce Rotolo from NACCO Industries has accepted the role of chairperson for the PDSTC. Bruce has been actively involved in a number of technical committees for several years and brings a wide-ranging perspective to this new role.
Bill Haraden from Volvo Truck is turning over the chairperson duties for the Windchill Infrastructure Technical Committee to Dominic Hand from Thermo King. As the committee’s first chair, Bill has been instrumental in guiding the group through its earliest days and we greatly appreciate his many contributions to the TC process. Bill will continue to play an active role on the committee.
In October, nearly 60 members attended a TC webcast where our featured speaker was Mike Campbell, Vice President Product Management, Pro/ENGINEER. Mike provided an overview of the key enhancements planned for Wildfire 2.0, many of which are the direct result of TC input. The sharing of this information will enable the TC members to focus their testing on the new capabilities contained in the upcoming pre-production release of the software.
This is one of many benefits that members realize through their participation on PTC/USER Technical Committees. If you want to help guide the enhancement of PTC products, please contact me or the TC chairperson related to your area of interest. For more information, visit www.ptcuser.org/tc . 
Evan Caille can be reached by e-mail at evan@ptcuser.org.
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