Shortcuts

A shortcut is an object that represents and references a target object.

There are two types of shortcuts:

An Internal shortcut – is a shortcut to an object in a different package in the same model.
An External shortcut – is a shortcut to an object in a different model. The external model may take the form of a library of reusable objects.

With shortcuts you can benefit from:

Reusability: You can create libraries of reusable objects whose properties are inherited by multiple objects in different models. For example, the entity person and its four attributes: Name, Age, Nationality and Address can be used via inheritance links in any model where you have need of a Customer, Employee, etc.
Automatic updates: When the target object changes, the updates cascades automatically to all the shortcuts. Note that both the referencing and target models must be open in the workspace for the changes to be propagated.

In the example below, the Person entity is created in one CDM, and a shortcut to it is created in a second CDM. The Person symbol in the second CDM carries a small arrow in its bottom left corner to indicate that it is a shortcut:

You can create shortcuts for most PowerDesigner objects (including composite objects and other shortcuts). You cannot create shortcuts of diagrams, links, or the following objects:

Module	Object
All	Diagrams, Links
RQM	Traceability link, user allocation
EAM	-
BPM	Decisions, synchronizations
CDM/LDM	Associations, Inheritances
PDM	Privileges
DMM	-
OOM	Decisions, synchronizations, interaction fragments, interaction references, messages
XSM	Internal shortcuts not supported for any object. External shortcuts not supported for imports, includes, redefines, annotations

Note:

You cannot create internal shortcuts to global objects, such as organization units, or business rules, because they always belong to the model and cannot be displaced into a sub-package. However, you can create external shortcuts to these objects. You can reuse data item shortcuts only if they are internal (same namespace). A duplicated data item shortcut has the same characteristics as the original data item shortcut.

Creating a Shortcut
You can create shortcuts to target objects from another package in the current model, or from another model open in the workspace through copy and paste, drag and drop, or from the List of Shortcuts.
Shortcut Properties
To open the property sheet of a shortcut, double-click its Browser entry or diagram symbol. The General tab contains the following properties:
Linking Shortcuts
You can create a link between two shortcuts in the referencing model if the link does not imply a parent/child hierarchy. For example, you cannot create a reference link between two table shortcuts in the PDM, as the reference is an oriented link.
Displaying Shortcuts
Shortcuts are visible in both the Browser and the diagram window.
Generating Shortcuts
You can generate shortcuts through the Target Models page located in the model type Generation Options dialog box.

Parent topic: Shortcuts and Object Replications