Item Types Report

Hi Cyril,

Cyril Brezelec said:

I want to integrate in a report the connection of two elements which share a geometric constraint (2D drawing).

I think it's a misunderstanding how Item Types report works.

They are designed to report Item Types data attached to elements (in a "per element way") and also element data, that are available in supported (Item Type / EC) format (like color...). The reports, as far as I know, are not able to work with any other type of data or relations.

Cyril Brezelec said:

To make it simple is it possible to recover an item associated types of element that share a geometric constraint ?

No, because geometric constraints data are not supported.

But I think you can post new Idea. I can imagine a specialized Expression (give me this type of data) can be added. To convert constraints itself to supported format, so they will be available in the report definition, is probably more complicated.

Regards,

  Jan

Hi Jan,

Jan Šlegr said:

I think it's a misunderstanding how Item Types report works.

They are designed to report Item Types data attached to elements (in a "per element way") and also element data, that are available in supported (Item Type / EC) format (like color...). The reports, as far as I know, are not able to work with any other type of data or relations.

- so, we can report data only if element data we want to extract are literally stated in "Expression types and syntax examples" (in Help)?

I have similar problem. My goal is to report cell names in whole model, together with XYZ origin of each cell and item types attached to each cell. As cell origin is not available in Expression, I am thinking of generating two separate reports:

- one with elementID/cell origin

- second with this.GetElement().ElementID and other data stored in Item Type

and then somehow link those data together (Excel?), based on Element ID.

Can you imagine of making it in an easier way?

Jan Šlegr said:

No, because geometric constraints data are not supported.

But I think you can post new Idea. I can imagine a specialized Expression (give me this type of data) can be added. To convert constraints itself to supported format, so they will be available in the report definition, is probably more complicated.

- or the only easier way might be after some enhancements?

Regards,
Wojtek

Hi Jon,

I have found your examples before, but although I am able to put all needed data (Cell data and item type data attached to cells) in one report,  they came in separate rows.

The report utilizes following data:

Cell have attached some additional info stored in Item Type:

And then when you generate a report, cell data and item types data attached to that cell comes into separate row.

I have put Element ID twice (one from Cell data, one from Item Type Expression) to show that this is exactly the same object.

From Ian's post I have understood that's because some limitations of Item Types (Item Type has to "read" some DGN data before - using Expression - to be able to include it in reports properly connected to object).

The goal is to have that data in one row. I need to export origin of each cell with some additional data attached.

Regards

Wojtek

WojtekM said:

when you generate a report, cell data and item types data attached to that cell comes into separate row

Yes, I've come across that problem too! It's possible to solve it using the user interface (UI), but it takes some fiddling.  I have not used it sufficiently to be able to document how to achieve the desired result.  Besides, it's not my product — I think that Bentley Systems should tell us how to solve problems introduced by their poor design.

One of my criticisms of Reports is that (a) the UI is wacky and (b) there is no query language similar to SQL.

You might like to vote for this Idea!

FlexiTable

We're thinking about introducing FlexiTable CONNECT Edition.  Here's an example of FlexiTable used to harvest cell data...

Note: Bentley Systems have recently changed the protocol to attach an image, which is why you see an icon above.  Click the icon to see the image behind.

Hi Wojtek,

WojtekM said:

so, we can report data only if element data we want to extract are literally stated in "Expression types and syntax examples" (in Help

No.

There are two different (but depending) topics: What elements can be harvested (data source) and what can be reported (output data).

As Jon wrote, even when it seems that only "elements with Item Types" can be used as the source data, it's not correct. It's about good enough terminology. My formulation is that you can search for any anything, that is internally available as EC data. Typically they are elements (with or without ItemTypes attached), but can be e.g. model or even file(s). The input data can be further filtered and enhanced by other properties including relationships (again, as long as they can be interpreted by internal mechanism).

What will be reported (output data) is where Expressions can be used. Be aware they are in Technology Preview in U13, so not everything works as expected (especially related to reports). But in general, when there is an information that cannot be reached directly, there is an option to attach ItemType with defined Expression to an element and to report the expression result.

Regards,

  Jan

Hi Wojtek,

WojtekM said:

Can you imagine of making it in an easier way?

Do you mean something like this?

The report contains:

• Cell ID (element id)
• Cell name (empty item in the list is "grouped elements cell")
• X + Y + Z coordinates, split into separate columns
• Properties "Name" and "ID" from Item Type attached to the cell.

The situation can be more complicated depending what properties you want to report and also whether only one item type or more are used.

With regards,

  Jan

For this, you need to use *Add related Items* option during selecting Items.

For e.g. I have created two lines and attached same ItemType to each one of these.

While selecting Items for reporting, I have selected *Include these Items* as *Lines* and *Related Item* as my ItemType (Door) via ElementHasAttachedItem. 

So that, in report definition you can see:

Now, I have selected column as:

So, here Line properties and ItemType properties will be treated as one row. Because, Line class and ItemType properties are *JOINed*.

However, when you select *Include ItemType * as *Lines* and *ItemTypes (Door)*:

Report cannot relate these two distinct EC entity. Hence, each result will be shown as different row:

Hope, this helps.

Thanks,

Mangesh

For this, you need to use *Add related Items* option during selecting Items.

For e.g. I have created two lines and attached same ItemType to each one of these.

While selecting Items for reporting, I have selected *Include these Items* as *Lines* and *Related Item* as my ItemType (Door) via ElementHasAttachedItem. 

So that, in report definition you can see:

Now, I have selected column as:

So, here Line properties and ItemType properties will be treated as one row. Because, Line class and ItemType properties are *JOINed*.

However, when you select *Include ItemType * as *Lines* and *ItemTypes (Door)*:

Report cannot relate these two distinct EC entity. Hence, each result will be shown as different row:

Hope, this helps.

Thanks,

Mangesh