large file without graphics data, how delete nongraphic


Hi,

MicroStation V8i + PowerCivil crash when rendering big graphical object, but a lot of this graphic is probably saved somehow and somewhere... File have now over 200 megabytes, but nothing visible, all levels are unused. Only VBA scan found some nongraphic elements, but can not be deleted. And also I do not know if these few (<100) model elements have 200 megabytes. Although I easly find from what model they come, but still i cant delete them, becuse "model.removeElement ele" throws error -2147218397 (bad modelRef). Is there any way to delete these elements through Microstation,  programming language or any utility?

File contains also few (<50) nonmodel objects, but that is all what i found. And I have no idea if they are deletable or how delete them.

  • Does File|Compress do anything?

    If not, you may want to post the file here to give someone a chance to analyse it.

     
    Regards, Jon Summers
    LA Solutions

  • Hi Petr,

    Unknown said:
    File have now over 200 megabytes, but nothing visible, all levels are unused.

    In my opinion the best solution is to use backup.

    Unknown said:
    Only VBA scan found some nongraphic elements, but can not be deleted.

    VBA is not right tool to access DGN internal structure, because VBA is high-level API, so many details are hidden and also not all DGN and MicroStation features are accessible from VBA.

    Unknown said:
    And also I do not know if these few (<100) model elements have 200 megabytes.

    Probably not, but some data structures (DTM, meshes, interal data structures) can be very large.

    Unknown said:
    s there any way to delete these elements through Microstation,  programming language or any utility?

    I agree with Jon that to compress the design file (with all option switched on) should be the first step.

    As the second, you can try verifydgn utility: key-in is "mdl load verifydgn; verifydgn repair" (or verifydgn repair alternatively) and to check in Message Center details, what is reported. The utility is not very powerful, but it can provide some extra information in the case the file is corrupted.

    To access DGN directly, MDL should be used. But a question is if an expected amount of work is equal to potential benefits.

    In some cases it can be hard to delete some elements, because they can depend on another, which makes the analysis more complex.

    With regards,

     Jan

  • If I have a fresh backup, then I use it. The first thing I tried was to delete what I can and I checked if this have any effect. After each change file are compressed and saved again. I tried to open the damaged file as reference and copy from it what I need, but this is also bad way (copies only graphic). I understand VBA is not the best, but slightly better than user tools and it's something what I know, unlike MDL.

    mdl load verifydgn - no error found

    I attach a file.

    www.uschovna.cz/zasilka/LIPJRX2GFDJL4467-XYT

    PowerCivil for Czech Republic V8i (SS4) 08.11.09.790

  • Hmmm ... plenty of application elements with XAttributes attached inside the file. I guess they are used by PowerCivil to store data about civil model. Not sure, but maybe it's enough to create such huge file.

    I guess (but have not tried it) it's possible to delete them using MDL, but it's quite a challenge ... it's not clear how to distinguish between PowerCivil data and data and settings of other applications. So it requires extra analysis ... time consuming task.

    With regards,

    Jan
  • I took this on as a challenge for a normal user. I tried Compressing, then turning ON All the Compress Options and Compressing, I tried turning on View 3 and got "missing view handler" so was unable to do it, until I deleted the View Group. I Deleted Unused Fonts, Removed Saved View, Tag Data, Removed all Custom Data stored in the file "CUSTOMIZE DELETEALLDATA", Removed 1 Custom Display Style. I did anything I could think of, then did a Verify/Repair and the program found 2292 elements. Did another compress with only minor change in size from 206,265 KB > 206,243 KB. There is still allot of junk that the Compress Options still doesn't get rid of.
    I File Fenced (FF=) to a new file and size went from 206,265 KB to 10 KB
    I did note that the file was originally a V7 file, and had a number of hours it was worked on. It might be good to start with a new seed file or at least the file generated from the File Fence, since there is no way a typical user can get rid of that junk other than using the ancient File Fence! But there should be!
    Jans’ option to search thru the file with MDL is probably the only hope to get rid of the data stored in the file.

    I Hope This Helps Someone Reading This!  (Intergraph>PseudoStation>MicroStation user since 1980's)