KB: Troubleshoot SOLIDWORKS CoDesigner panel error - There is no document opened
Created: October 27, 2021 | Updated: March 08, 2024
Altium Designer
Starting in version: 20.1
Up to Current
I get this message in the SOLIDWORKS CoDesigner panel, "There is no document opened or the active document is not linked with PCB design." (for PCBs pushed from Altium using MCAD CoDesigner to SOLIDWORKS) after creating a "SpeedPak" configuration in SOLIDWORKS, which prevents most parts from loading to improve performance.
Solution Details
CoDesigner stores the link to Altium's PCB Project (and some other properties) in the PCB assembly properties in SOLIDWORKS. When SOLIDWORKS creates the SpeedPak, it deletes those properties.The simplest solution for such an unlinked assembly is to pull the board from the Altium Server into a local folder, copy the properties of that healthy temporary PCB Assembly, then paste them to the properties of unlinked assembly.
To avoid this situation in the future, simply add one more configuration together with adding the SpeedPak. That configuration will keep Altium's properties alive.