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Export shapes

Tekla PowerFab
Modificato: 11 Mar 2025
2025
Tekla PowerFab

Export shapes

Exporting shape information is useful for making shape identification changes while keeping all of the information defined in Tekla PowerFab. You can export either specific shapes or all shapes to the ASCII or XML format.

  1. In the Shape/Grade/Size Maintenance dialog, click the Shape/Grade/Size Maintenance ribbon tab.
  2. On the menu, select Export and the export format.
  3. Depending on the export format, do any of the following:

    If you are exporting to

    Do this
    ASCII format (.txt file)

    1. If you only want to export particular shapes, in the Filter dialog, click the arrow buttons to move the shapes that you want to export to the Included list.

    2. Click OK

    3. In the Save As dialog, browse to the folder where you want to save the file.

      By default, Tekla PowerFab saves the file to the Export folder.

    4. If necessary, change the file name.
    5. Click Save.
    ProNest

    1. In the Save As dialog, browse to the folder where you want to save the file.

      By default, Tekla PowerFab saves the file to the Export folder.

    2. If necessary, change the file name.
    3. Click Save.

    You can see the progress of the export in the Status dialog. After the export has finished, you can close the dialog by clicking OK.
    XML format
    1. In the XML Shapes Export Options dialog, select the checkboxes for the items that you want to include in the export.
    2. Click Export.
    3. If you only want to export particular shapes, in the Select Shapes dialog, click the arrow buttons to move the shapes that you want to export to the Included list.
    4. Click OK.
    5. In the Save As dialog, browse to the folder where you want to save the file.

      By default, Tekla PowerFab saves the file to the Export folder.

    6. If necessary, change the file name.
    7. Click Save.

    You can see the progress of the export in the Status dialog. After the export has finished, you can close the dialog by clicking OK.
    SigmaNest
    1. In the Select Supplier dialog, select the supplier warehouse of the shapes to be exported.
    2. Click OK.

    You can see the progress of the export in the Status dialog. After the export has finished, you can close the dialog by clicking OK.

For the Export To ASCII, Export To ProNest, Export To XML options, the exported shapes are saved to the selected folder, where you can find them and import them to the related software.

For Export to SigmaNest, the shapes are imported directly to SigmaNest through SimTrans.

Example: Changing the shape abbreviation FB to FL by exporting an ASCII .txt file

For example, you could change a material shape abbreviation for FB (flat bar) to FL (also an indicator for flat bar). This change can be made outside of Tekla PowerFab, when you export the shapes into a .txt file. After the change, the .txt file can be imported back to Tekla PowerFab.

To change the shape abbreviation, do the following:
  1. In the Filter dialog, only move the FB shapes to the Included list.
  2. Name and save the file to the desired location.
  3. Browse to find the saved file and open it in Microsoft Notepad.
  4. Open the Edit menu in the upper-left corner of the Microsoft Notepad window.
  5. Click Replace.
  6. In the Find what field, type FB.
  7. In the Replace with field, type FL.
  8. Click Replace All and save the file.
  9. In Tekla PowerFab, click the File tab, and select Import on the File menu.
  10. In the navigation tree of the Import dialog, select Sizes > ASCII.
  11. Click ... to browse for and select the updated file.
  12. Click OK.
  13. Click Import.

    Since the ASCII file only contains the flat bar shapes, you do not need to filter the shapes. Instead, you can leave all shapes in the Included list.

  14. Click OK.

The new shape list is imported to Tekla PowerFab, and the abbreviation of the flat bars changes.

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