Managing characteristics

Characteristics are the measurement points your control plans and captures are built on. The register lives under VoraControl at /control/plan/characteristics. Each characteristic belongs to a part and is linked to one of the operations recorded for that part, so the control plan can lay the points out along the operation sequence.

The two kinds of characteristic

The Type field offers two kinds. Measured value is a numeric characteristic: you give it a tolerance (nominal, lower spec, upper spec and a unit), and captured readings are judged against those limits. Pass / fail is an attribute characteristic: the operator judges it at capture, and a fail is flagged out of spec and feeds Trends and Resolve. Provide at least one spec limit for a measured value; a one-sided limit works as a maximum or minimum.

Creating and editing

Add or edit a characteristic from the register. The form asks for a description, a class (Critical, Major, Minor or Reference), the type, a status (Active or Inactive), the tolerance fields for a measured value, and an optional method and gauge. Methods and gauges are managed under Gauges / Methods; picking them here means Capture shows the inspector exactly how and with what to measure. If a save fails, the error appears inside the form with your input intact. Typed text in a numeric tolerance field is refused with a named error rather than being silently dropped.

Adding several points to one operation

The batch editor works operation-first: pick the operation once, then add a set of characteristics for it in one screen. This is the quickest way to load a full operation, and it uses the same fields and options as the single form.

Archive and restore

A characteristic that is no longer used is archived, not deleted. The register can filter to active, archived or all records, and an archived characteristic can be restored later. Archiving keeps the history intact: captures already recorded against the characteristic stay exactly as they were.