Any good reference documents on the reference designator in EDM? We are finding that it is cumbersom to use because all locations must be defined and there is no tie-in (we believe) to Engineering.

How can I learn some more about how it works?

Hi Stephen,
Kind of a very late reply, I guess. Reference designator are supposed to be able to help you specify the breakdown of a certain material usage in one production operation (broken down to several "locations" with quantity assigned to each). This can indeed be very powerful feature if Baan has implemented it comprehensively in their software. As you pointed out, it's not tied to engineering module. Furthermore, it's only loosely tied to the production execution module either (production order processing). If a material is used in final assembly as well as sub assembly, for example, it's impossible to tell from BaanIV's material list the actual breakdown in each (since reference designator doesn't support phantom item, according to on-line manual).
Rgds,
Paul