Summary

PartsAssembly is a fully-functional assembly management utility based on the db4o object database engine. It basically stores a list of parts. The parts are then related together and placed into assemblies. Assemblies can also include other sub-assemblies.

This sort of tool is commonly used to track things like factory assembly records, parts inventories, bill of materials, and production planning. For example, if you know that to assemble an engine, you'll need 20 bolts of size A, and 30 bolts of size B, but to assemble the rest of the car, you'll need 3 or 4 times that number, then you will calculate your inventory requirements differently.

Purpose

This application is meant to demonstrate the simplicity of the db4o database engine. This application makes extensive use of .NET 2.0 Windows Forms, data binding, design-time controls, and db4o. The entire application requires only a handful of custom code. The download below includes the entire source code. You may review the source code in any text editor. Look in the /bin/Debug folder for a set of pre-compiled executables.

Download

You can download the complete source code here.

PartsAssembly requires at least the Microsoft .NET Framework v2.0 to run.
Download it from Microsoft Downloads, or from Windows Update.

To build this project, you will need to use Visual Studio 2005 or Visual C# 2005 Express
Download it for free from Microsoft MSDN.

You will also require db4o version 5.0 or newer. (.NET 2.0 build)

Support

There is no installer. Just extract into a folder, and either run the EXE file in the /bin/Debug folder, or double-click the .sln or .csproj files.

This is not a full application. I will be adding to it as time goes on, but it is not meant for use in an actual factory/assembly line environment. It is missing many of the necessary features which would be required of it. I will not take feature requests. You may make any changes to this code as you wish, as long as it is not for commercial profit. Please send me a copy of any fixes or necessary modifications, so that I may include them in the base code.

I would be glad to answer questions about how the code works. Feel free to contact me with your questions.