How do I link between different publications?

The need to link between different publications might occur if you, for example, have separate parts of the business using their own repositories. Then you might need a start model that should link to different publications. In this FAQ we'll go through the steps to create a link between two different publications.

Prerequisites

• You need to use 2c8 Modeling Tool 5.3 or later, and use the new web profile.
• You need to publish models to two different destinations to get an URL to each publication. Everyone that is supposed to view the models needs to have access to the destinations to be able to open the publications in a web browser.

Create document link

To link to another publication, the first thing you need to do is to create a document link that links to the publication you want to link. Start by copying the URL from the publication you want to link. Note that the model you are viewing when copying the URL will be the model showing when clicking the link. The URL ends with a unique ID number that refers to the model you are viewing. 

Create a document link by clicking "Documents" in the left panel and clicking the plus button.

Choose the option "Link document".

Name the document link and paste the URL to the publication you want to link.

Connect the document link to an object

The next step is to connect the document link to the object which you want to use to link to the other publication. Grab the document link in the left panel, drag it onto the modeling area and drop it on the correct object. 

Now the document link is connected to an object.

Settings in the web profile

Now we need to make a couple of settings in the web profile to make it work smoothly. Click "Tools" - "Publish" and edit your web profile. Click the edit button for the model area.

This is where you make settings for what should happen when you click objects in your publication. Here you can filter out a selection of objects that these settings should be applied to, choose if the breakdown icons and information icons should be visible and if you when clicking an object should follow a breakdown or open a document connected to the object.

In this case, we only want to apply these settings to a specific object on our start page. We don't want to display an information symbol for the object, and we want the document link to the other publications to open when clicking the object.

We will start by adding a filter for these settings, where we have filtered out only the object we want to add the settings to. Read more about custom layouts here.

After the filter is created, pick it in the dropdown.

First, turn off the setting for "Show information icon" since we don't want to show the icon that indicates that there is a document link connected to the object. This is only for aesthetic reasons.

Turn on the setting "Follow link when clicking object" and select "Open document". This means that when we click the object the document will be opened. Save the settings.

Save and publish

Save your web profile and publish your material. Now you will have an object on the start page that links to another publication. The other publication is opened immediately when clicking the object.