The New VISIO Methodology

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Working with the New Visio Methodology

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Table of Contents:

• Page 3 – Download Materials • Page 4 – Before You Start • Page 5 – Updating Stencils • Page 6 to 7 - Working with the Drawing Format • Page 8 – Managing File Size • Page 9 thru 17 – Building a Drawing • Page18 to 19 – Special Tips and Tricks • Page 20 – General Tips

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Download Materials…… Go to http://www.commscope.com/Visio-Stencils/Visio-Stencils/ Select “Save as” and navigate to C:\Users\yourusername\Documents\My Shapes

All of the required files will extract into My Shapes

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Before you start…… To take advantage of all of the benefits offered with the new Visio methodology, the CommScope Drawing Template must be used. Failure to do so will result in a needlessly difficult and unsatisfactory experience . Some of the benefits of the template are: • • • • • • •

All available CommScope stencils are preloaded Software will alert user to any missing stencils or shapes Automatic BOM report that is exportable to Excel is built in Drawing scale is preset to insure compatibility with shapes from other manufacturers Drawing layer is preset to allow visibility of doors and bezels to be toggled Title Block information is semi-automatically populated Enables Search for shapes by product code

Some shapes use the SYSTIMAX standard Neue Helvetica font. That font will need to be installed in your C:Windows\Fonts directory in order for the shapes to appear correctly. To do so, click this link: http://www.commscope.com/Visio-Fonts/

If Visio is in session during the font install, it will need to be closed and restarted to take effect.

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Updating stencils….. CommScope Drawing Template.vsd contains verification software that launches automatically when the template is opened. The first time that the template is opened, you will be asked to enable macros…. ….the software will then run and if it finds any missing shapes or stencils, you will see a message box. Click “Get Stencils”…

…select the appropriate stencil and drag it into “My Shapes” folder. Then, in Visio, select “More Shapes>Open Stencil” navigate to “My Shapes” and “Open” the appropriate stencil.

Delete all stencils not needed in your design to keep drawing size small and email-able PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL. © 2013 CommScope, Inc

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Working with the Drawing Format….. The drawing format is semi-automated. The “FILENAME” title block will automatically update to reflect the renaming of the template. The “DATE” block must be manually updated by selecting the “COMMSCOPE format” tab at the bottom of the screen and changing it on that sheet. The “DRAWN BY” block may be changed in the same manner or by changing the “Author” on the File>Info page. Changes made either way are global. Page numbers will update automatically as sheets are added. The “Page-2” tab has a landscape oriented version of the format that may alternatively be used. Drawing scale is preset to 1”=10” which is the de facto industry standard for network VISIO shapes. Caution – scale modification will cause unsatisfactory results! The only instance in which drawing scale should be altered is when laying out a floor plan and locating cabinets in top view orientation.

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Working with the Drawing Format….. The template includes both portrait and landscape versions of the drawing format in “A” sheet size but is easily adjustable to metric sizes using Page Setup

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Managing File Size….. • • •

Always drag over a new shape from the stencil – DO NOT COPY/PASTE a shape that is already on the drawing as this will greatly increase your file size with each copy operation. Delete any stencils that are not needed in your drawing Periodically, go to the File>Info page and select the “Reduce File Size” button, check the bottom 3 options and “OK”. This will Remove Hidden Information and drastically cut the file size at the next “Save”. In the example below, the drawing is empty but the size is 2.2 Mb because Visio remembers all of the stencils that were once used in this drawing. Note that after the running the utility, the file size is reduced to 107 Kb!

After Before

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Building a Drawing….. 1. 2.

Save the template with a new descriptive name (e.g. Verizon Data Center 1.vsd) Place an equipment rack: From the stencil named “CommScope Racks and Cabinets ”, select one of the rack shapes, “RKX-45A” for example, drag it onto the drawing, position as desired and drop it in place

Options

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Configure the rack: Right Mouse Button click on the rack to reveal a fly out menu. From that menu, select the Product Code for the desired configuration. This will update the shape data for downstream use (to be explained at a later step). In this manner, a single shape in a stencil may represent many different shapes!

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Building a Drawing….. 3.

Place a Fiber Panel or Shelf: From the stencil named “SYSTIMAX 360 Fiber Shelves and Rail-Mounted Panels”, drag a shape (e.g. 360MP-1U) and hover it over the desired rack unit (“U”) space until red squares appear at the lower left and right hand corners and release it. These red squares are glue points and indicate that the shape has positioned itself correctly.

“Glue Points” Note: Most shapes will display full graphics (as above) as they are being placed but more complex shapes, such as a network cabinet, may display only as a dashed horizontal line with glue points (as below) until placed. This is a limitation of Visio and not a bug.

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Building a Drawing….. 4.

Place a Module or Adapter Panel: From the stencil named “SYSTIMAX 360 MPO Modules”, drag a shape (e.g. 360DM-24LC-XX) and hover it over the center of the cutout in the panel until a red “Glue Point” square appears at the center and release it. Most modules and adapter panels use center points for placement

5.

Configure the Module Performance: Select the module then Right Mouse Button click to reveal a flyout menu and select the desired performance level flavor. Note that the color of the module will toggle appropriately with the selection. Most modules, adapter panels, information outlets and many shelves, panels, cabinets and racks offer similar configurability options so one shape may represent many!

Options

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Building a Drawing….. 6.

Place a Copper Panel: From the stencil named “CommScope Copper Panels and Components”, drag a shape (e.g. M2000-24-1U) and place it as was done with the fiber panel. Many copper panels are offered in both flat and angled versions so special provisions are included to make plug-ins fit properly within the appropriate openings

7.

Place an Information Outlet: From the stencil named “SYSTIMAX Information Outlets” drag over the MGS-600XX shape and hover it over a panel opening until 2 glue points illuminate and release it. Note that the width of the outlet will stretch to fill the opening upon placement. It is highly recommended that the user zoom in closely on the panel before placing outlets to be certain that they snap in correctly!

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Building a Drawing….. a)

Rotate: If required, a shape may be easily rotated with keyboard shortcut Ctrl+R or Ctrl+L. Rotate a subshape (e.g. Info Outlet, Data Module or Data Panel) before snapping it into the rack panel. Once oriented as desired, snap it into place.

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Building a Drawing….. 8.

Configure the Outlet: Select the module then Right Mouse Button click to reveal a flyout menu and select the desired outlet color. Note that the color of the outlet will toggle appropriately with the selection. Not only will the color change but the MID and Product Code data that feeds into the BOM will change appropriately 

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Building a Drawing….. 9.

Run a BOM Report: From the “Review” tab on the toolbar, select Shape Reports>BOM>Run>Visio shape>OK. The report generated is an embedded Excel spreadsheet so it can be exported and manipulated if desired.

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Building a Drawing….. 10. Update the BOM Report: As more shapes are added to the layout, the BOM may be updated simply by selecting the report and right mouse button click>Run Report The report may be placed on any sheet and modified to reflect shapes on all pages in the layout, for shapes only on that sheet or for selected shapes only

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Building a Drawing….. 11. Display Doors and Bezels: Doors and bezels are placed on a layer and made invisible by default. To show them, simply select the “Home” tab on the toolbar>Layers>Layer Properties, check the “Visible” box and “OK”. In most instances, it will be necessary to change the order of the panel/shelf to make the module appear behind the door – this is a limitation of Visio and not a bug.

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Special Tips and Tricks….. •

Search for shapes: All stencils can be searched simultaneously to find a particular shape by entering a product code (or partial product code with an *) in the search bar

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Place Outlets on an Angled Panel: Because Information Outlets use 2 glue points to locate it within a cutout, Visio will allow a small amount of stretching or compression to make it fit so a single outlet size works for both flat and angled panels 

FLAT

ANGLED

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Special Tips and Tricks….. •

Place Fiber Modules on an Angled Panel: In the upper illustration, below, it is obvious that the modules overlap one another on an angled panel. The width difference between the flat and angled openings is too great for Visio to automatically compensate for but if the user wants to cosmetically clean up the drawing, he can use the red drag handles on either end of the shape to manipulate the width and eliminate the overlap. FLAT

Drag handles ANGLED

Overlap

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General Tips….. •

ZOOM is your friend: It is usually simple enough to place panels and shelves onto a rack when fully zoomed out but when it comes time to populate them with adapter panels, modules and particularly information outlets, zoom enhances the usability greatly! This is especially an issue on small laptop sized displays. The glue points (also known as connector points) on the mother shapes can become very dense, making it difficult to get a proper snap. Additionally, those connector points act as tiny blackholes that want to grab shapes and pull them somewhere other than where they should go. This can hang up the program because Visio starts to run many unnecessary calculations. Try to avoid blackholes by not dragging large or complex shapes across one another.

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Before or After?: It is almost always easier to snap adapter panels, modules etc. into panels/shelves before the Bezel layer is made visible but it is possible to do so afterward as well.

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Easy Shape ID: If you hover your cursor over a shape in the stencil, a longer description of that shape will appear. If a shape is already placed on the drawing, hovering your cursor over that shape will also reveal a general description of that item.

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Thank You

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