PCEM – Fixing the Parking Lot

PCEM is a program developed by US Cost and used by the NAVFAC to develop costing for projects. I recently was tasked to develop a cost estimate using the program. I’ve used the program without any problems (on a former computer) in the past. Unfortunately I kept getting errors when I tried to add a parking lot to the model on the computer I’m using now. There appeared to be something wrong with the database that it used. After sending an email to US Cost, downloading, uninstalling and reinstalling the program I finally went into the database to see if I could find the error.

I was able to track the error to the cboPipe1SizeList.S19 Variable Assignment. This essentially fills out a list box in the program and it wasn’t providing the correct value for some reason.

The program copies the data needed, for the parking lot, from a file called Sitework 99Eng.PWS which is located at:

C:\Program Files\Success Estimator\Sitework

OR

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Documents\Success Estimator\Settings\Sitework

Opening the file in Success Estimator I was able to do a search and find the Variable assignment. By using the Formulas view I was able to take a look at the expression.

Once in the view I could see the problem. One of the quote marks was mistakenly added as an apostrophe. Making the change fixed the error message.

 

So if you have the pleasure of using PCEM and are having problems, this is one way to fix the issue.