Create CUs for Designer

This topic applies to Designer versions 10.0.2 and earlier.

Designer includes tools in ArcCatalog for the creation of compatible units (CUs) for the Designer geodatabase. The CU tool is an extension to the ArcFM System Favorites Manager such that the interface for creating a CU is the same interface that is used to create system or user favorites.

When a CU that has a one-to-one relationship with a feature or object is added to the design scenario, only one GIS object is created. This is an example of a simple compatible unit. Another example of a simple compatible unit is the case of a non-GIS CU. The addition of a non-GIS CU would not result in the addition of a GIS object. This CU would simply be stored in the design, so that the WMS will be aware of it.

Complex CUs, or macro units, are CUs that have a one-to-many relationship with GIS objects.

Designer supports the definition of both simple and complex CUs through its Favorites Manager tool.

Creating Simple Compatible Units

Defining a new CU is easily done by using the Favorites Manager. As shown in Figure 1, the Create CU tool exists as a context menu option.

Figure 1, ArcFM Favorites Manager

Often the CU will represent an object in the geodatabase, whether it is a symbolized feature (an instance of a feature class) or a non-symbolized object (an instance of an object class). In this case, a target table name and subtype will need to be identified, as illustrated in Figure 2. This step is also required in order to define a favorite.

Figure 2, Selecting a target class for the CU

Other times the CU may be a non-GIS CU, or a CU that does not have spatial information but is significant in the design accounting process. In these cases, the CU will not have a target feature or object class. Even though the non-GIS CU does not have spatial attributes, it needs to be defined in Designer's CU library so it can be added to the design in the GIS environment. Therefore, in the case of a non-GIS CU, the target can be set to <None>.

Once you’ve specified the target class, if one exists, then you’ll be able to set values to fields that the CUs will carry as defining attributes, as shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3, Creating a new CU with defining attributes

When a simple CU is sent to the Attribute Editor in ArcMap, a GIS unit (GU) will be created automatically as a parent for it. The GU will carry the attributes, and the CU stores the WMS information.

Creating Complex Compatible Units

The Favorites Manger allows you to create complex CUs, which are construction units that aggregate several CUs.

In Designer, these complex CUs are actually constructed as GUs that contain multiple CUs. This functionality satisfies two scenarios:

Multiple CUs being associated to one feature
- CUs are aggregated together as one construction unit that can be added to a design in one step. For example, many things are involved when installing an underground conductor. In addition to the actual cable being installed, you might have to consider excavation, health and safety measures, and possibly traffic control - all of which can be represented by CUs. If a set of these peripheral CUs are known for a certain type of facility, then these peripherals could be bundled (in a GU) with the cable’s CU so that the whole aggregation could be placed into the design quickly. This is the popular concept of macro units.
Banked features in a normalized database design
- In some database designs a single feature in the GIS might represent a banked feature, or a feature type that has one or more related objects. Conductors, for example, are likely represented as a single line in GIS but are actually composed of several separate wires. In normalized database designs, this would be modeled as a row in a feature class table representing the entire conductor entity. Related to that feature class row would be one or more conductor unit objects, each representing a separate phase wire in the conductor. In the case of such a bank/unit relationship, a favorite could be defined to create the feature and its related objects.

Multiple CUs, One GIS feature

A new favorite can be created in the Compatible Units section of the Favorites Manager. New CUs can be created underneath the new favorite, or existing ones can be copied and pasted underneath. If you choose to drag and drop a CU into the favorite, it will be moved from its previous location.

Feature CU with Related Object CUs

ArcFM favorite structures can carry either symbolized CUs or non-symbolized CUs. These favorites can be used to add features and any related objects that may need to be created at the same time.

Note the containment structure for this GU. This is actually one GU that contains three child CUs. The transformer feature attributes, in this case, are driven by the GU itself. Alternatively, you could add a transformer CU that would drive the feature’s attributes via the CU-defining fields on the CU. Defining attributes on a CU (if the CU’s work function is Install) will override those found on the favorite itself.

In the Design tab, this favorite would result in a GU that would map to the transformer feature class. This top-level GU would contain three child GUs that would each contain a transformer unit CU.

Adding this GU to the design will create the transformer symbolized feature and three non-symbolized transformer unit records, and relate them if a relationship exists between them. The CUs will specify the transformer units that are to be placed in the field to construct the transformer feature.