System ID for custom line styles

What is the purpose of "System ID":

This property is accessed via the custom line styles:

Element Menu-Line Styles-Edit, then double-click on one of the custom line styles

We learned (the HARD WAY!!!) that somehow this box changed its number to something other than 0. When a number other than 0 is entered, the line style can not be chosen and the program will auto-select the line style to next style which is higher alphabetically that does NOT have a number assigned to "System ID".

So for the Bentley team - what is the purpose of this attribute? if it has no function, please remove it as entering numbers into it causes instability in line style selection.

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  • I have had some discussions internally regarding this setting and the short answer was "don't touch that, ever". The much longer answer from them was :

    The System ID (AKA positive linestyle ID) is a throwback to a specific Intergraph product that was supported in the 90's. It was a database-based product and for reasons at the time it needed to store linestyles by ID rather than name. That's where System IDs came in; they are IDs that could be put on the elements in the Intergraph product database and would remain constant. In contrast, DGN files store linestyles by name and assign a local id that varies per DGN file - i.e. in one file Batten might correspond to -17, in another file it might be -23. These locally assigned IDs are much better of course; it automates management of linestyles so that users only have to use names.

    Regards
    Andrew Bell
    Technical Support
    Bentley Systems

    Answer Verified By: Alex Badaoui 

  • Can I suggest a fix to block out this text box from the line style editor to guarantee that this does not get changed?

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