1. What is a library
The library is a place to store your techpack cards along with their associated images, annotations comments, and keywords. You and your organization members can copy cards from these libraries at any time when working on new or existing techpacks.
There are four types of libraries on Techpacker: Sketch library
Materials library
Measurements library
Custom section library
2. How to access libraries
There are two ways to access the card library:
2a. Access the libraries from the side menu:
Step 1: Click on this
icon located on the top-left of your screen to open the drop-down menu.
Step 2: Choose the libraries option.
Step 3: When inside the library page, click on this icon to see the list of all the libraries you have created.
Step 4: Select a library from here.
Further, when previewing your selected library, you can perform these actions:
Library Settings: Once you click on the library settings icon. A window will pop-up (as shown below) so you can update your library information such as your library name, cover image, size range, color combos, and keywords.
Filter cards: You and your team can easily locate a particular card through
filter search.
Options: Select the card(s) and click on the
option menu located on the top navigation bar. Then select an action that you would like to perform from the drop-down menu.
Sort cards: Click on this
sort icon located on top of the library and select a sort option from the drop-down options.
Add new cards: Click on the + Add sketch, + Add material or + Add measurement, and create cards inside their corresponding library.
2b. To access the card library from the Library Shortcut:
Step 1: Inside any of your techpack, click on the icon located on the top navigation bar.
Step 2: Click on this drop-down icon to select a library you wish to view.
3. How to add libraries
There are four types of libraries on Techpacker: The library for default sections : sketches with the icon , materials with the icon
, measurements with
icon, and the custom section library
with the icon.
Information stored in these libraries is visible to all organization members. Everyone can access it, add, edit, remove, or copy cards from there.
Here are two ways to add card libraries:
3a. Adding card library from the side menu:
Step 1: Click on this
icon located on the top-left of your screen to open the drop-down menu.
Step 2: Choose the libraries option.
Step 3: When inside the library page, click on this +Add Library on the top right corner.
Step 4: Name your library and
select the type of section you wish to save as a library. Click on create, this will navigate you inside the newly created library.
3b. Adding card library from the library shortcut:
Step 1: Open a techpack and click on the library icon
located on the top navigation bar.
Step 2: Click on the
option located on the right end.
Step 3: Create a new library.
Step 4: Name your library and
select the type of section you wish to save as a library. Click on create.
4. How to add or delete cards in libraries
4a. How to add cards in a library:
There are three different ways to add cards in any library-
Add through the library shortcut:
Step 1: Open a tech pack and click on the library icon located on the top navigation bar.
Step 2: Click on to pick a library you wish to add cards in. If you don't have one yet, here's how to add a new library.
Step 3: Select card/s from your tech pack and drag them by clicking on the icon and drop them into your library as shown in the gif below.
You can only add cards to their corresponding library type. For eg. You can only add Sketch cards into Sketch libraries and material section cards to material libraries etc.
Add through the library page:
Step 1: To open your Library page Click on this
icon located on the top-left of your screen and
Choose the libraries option.
Step 2: Go to the Libraries option and select open a library where you wish to add cards.
Step 3: Now there are three ways you can add cards in your library here -
Option 1: You can bulk upload your images in a library by simply dragging them in from your computer as shown below. Techpacker will create a card for each file added.
Option 2: You can also add a new card by clicking on the
+ Add sketch, + Add material or + Add measurement, as shown in the screenshot below.
Option 3: Lastly, you can even import your cards from an Excel file. The file has to be in a CSV format with all your table information.
Click here to download a sample CSV file format.
Before creating a library by importing a CSV.
☑ Make sure that your library has no cards and is completely blank.
Step 1: Click on this import from csv icon located on the top-right of your library.
Step 2: Browse and select the .csv file you wish to upload and click open.
You can use this excel template to update your material table data before importing it on Techpacker.
Step 3:This screen will pop-up where you will select the information from your CSV file you wish to include.
- Under Source you will see the names of the columns from your CSV file
- Under Destination, you will select and match the relevant columns where your table data should go.
- For e.g. if in your .csv a column in called CARD TITLE, then in the destination area you should also match it with
CARD TITLE.
- In case you wish to hide a certain column in your library, you can click on this
icon to hide a column as shown above
. Your data will be imported, but just won't be visible. You can always unhide that column late through the column manager.
You can switch any column to color column using the
icon.
Check
the columns you would like to show in your material table.
You can preview the columns and the order of the final table after you have made all the changes.
Click on the "Import CSV" icon to import the table with the final changes made by you.
4b. How to delete cards in a library:
Step 1: Open a techpack and click on the library icon
located on the top navigation bar.
Step 2: Click on
to see the drop-down library panel from the right where you can choose which library you wish to delete cards from and select the cards.
Step 3: Click on the
option located on the right side.
Step 4: Click on edit library.
You will be redirected to a page where you can delete cards in your library.
Step 5: Select the cards you would like to delete
Step 4: Click on the option located on the right side of your screen. Click on the Delete option and you can now delete your selected cards from the library as shown in the gif below.
You can also archive your cards if you want to reuse the cards later.
5. How to edit and delete libraries
5a. How to edit a library:
Step 1: Open a tech pack and click on the library icon
located on the top navigation bar.
Step 2: Click on this
drop-down icon to select a library you wish to edit.
Step 3: Click on the
option located on the right side.
Step 4: Click on the edit library option to make changes to your library.
5b. How to delete a library:
There are two different ways to delete library-
Delete from the library shortcut:
Step 1: Open a tech pack and click on the library icon
located on the top navigation bar.
Step 2: Click on this
drop-down icon to select a library you wish to edit.
Step 3: Click on the
option located on the right side.
Step 4: Click on Delete Library.
Delete from the library page:
Step 1: To open your Library page Click on this
icon located on the top-left of your screen and
Choose the libraries option.
Step 2: Click on this drop-down icon to select a library you wish to delete.
Step 3: Click on the delete icon and the library will be deleted.
6. How to use libraries
Here's when you really experience the awesomeness of the cards library. At any time you can import cards from your card library directly to your techpack and vice-versa. With each card, you can also import its associated description, image, annotations, comments, attachments, and keywords.
Click here to learn in-depth about how to use your newly created libraries.