Bentley Map RTK data collection

Cliff,

I don't know if my answer will be of any help to you.

We are a large danish surveyor company using Trimble survey equipment and Bentley Map as our standard Cad/Gis platform.
We don't use Bentleys Survey Tool, because we started the Trimble / Bentley Map usage long before Survey tools was added to Bentley map.
As I see it you have two or more hurdles to overcome;
Trimble Access data controller software has a nice way to collect attributes ( = Properties in Bentley map) along with the surveying. As far as I remember these attributes are not included in the Civil-features that Survey tools creates --may be that is not correct any more!
Second Survey tools create Civil-features and not XFM-features which Bentley map works with. Maybe the Gis Export tools will export these features as well -again I have not tried that, since we use our own software creating XFM features.
If not, you will have to promote your Civil-features to XFM features, and I believe, that if you have attributes/properties you have to reenter them.
Hopefully my knowledge is outdated or wrong :-)

Regards,

Erik Wirring
Landinspektørfirmaet LE34
Denmark

Erik - Thanks for the response. Yes we use Trimble field hardware. I was wondering about Bentley Map as a collection tool. Updating GIS type information using Trimble field software isn't a very friendly process. It's all very point driven and the expectation is that these point won't change once they are collected. In other words it's not a very dynamic process with the survey / civil tools.

Cliff, Okay so you want to use Bentley Map as collection software. But then you need at use a laptop in the field.
If your are looking for a intuitive data collection tool for a tablet have a look at Trimble Penmap. It comes in both a windows and a android version and is all graphic. I believe it is able to export data in Esri format.

Erik - I'm almost certain we will be using Esri software to collect the drainage structures. Not sure what type of file that would produce. So the field hardware would consist of a Trimble R8 hooked to a TSC3 somehow piping data out to an Ipad running Esri GIS software....sounds like a three ring circus to me. I was hoping for a Bentley software solution as I'm familiar with the Microstation environment. I think the Esri software is probably great. I just don't know anything about it. And there isn't much in the way of CAD support / compatibility if the client wants a DGN or DWG. The CAD options I have seen the GIS folks produce lacks any sort of attribution. It's bare bones at best.....DXF. So I was hoping to inject Microstation into the workflow.

If the data is field collected using Esri; can Microstation map interface to that Esri data? Is that possible? Will the GIS attributes come over into Map?

Lots of questions.

Cliff,

The ESRI software can produce several file formats. If you want graphics plus attribution, ask them to Export to Shapefile.  Both Bentley Map and MicroStation can open/reference/import Shapefiles.  When you import Shapefiles into Bentley Map, the software will utilize the attributes in standard GIS fashion.   And you're all set to share with your client since the file format is DGN.

The PDF file in this article illustrates those options: Bentley Map V8i menu guide

Cliff,

The ESRI software can produce several file formats. If you want graphics plus attribution, ask them to Export to Shapefile.  Both Bentley Map and MicroStation can open/reference/import Shapefiles.  When you import Shapefiles into Bentley Map, the software will utilize the attributes in standard GIS fashion.   And you're all set to share with your client since the file format is DGN.

The PDF file in this article illustrates those options: Bentley Map V8i menu guide