Writing DGN Tags

From fmepedia

Writing tags to MicroStation design files is accomplished through the creation of a series of specific attributes, that tell the writer, which attributes should be taken, to which tag set they should belong, and whether/how the tags should be displayed.

The following screenshot explains the idea:

Our goal is to make a dgn out of two datasources - MapInfo table and Excel spreadsheet, and keep all the attributes as tags. For this purpose we create a list, which contains all the attributes we would like to see in the design file:

igds_tag_names{0} PARCEL_ID
igds_tag_names{1} AREA
igds_tag_names{2} PERIMETER
igds_tag_names{3} Owner
igds_tag_names{4} OwnershipSince

However, we want to keep separately owners' data, and information about parcels. <tag_name>.tagset_name attributes allow us to create more than one tag sets:

PARCEL_ID.tagset_name  ParcelData 
PARCEL_ID.AREA         ParcelData 
PARCEL_ID.PERIMETER    ParcelData 
Owner.tagset_name               OwnerData
OwnershipSince.tagset_name      OwnerData

<tag_name>.tagtype attributes define data type (1 - string, 3- integer, 4 - real):

AREA.tagtype  3

For PARCEL_ID we also create a set of optional attributes, which control whether the tag is displayable and how it is placed relatively to the feature origin:

PARCEL_ID.display       yes
PARCEL_ID.height         5
PARCEL_ID.justification  7

In case <tag_name>.display is set to 'yes', we also have to set the offset attributes, otherwise <tag_name>.display will be set to 'no'.

PARCEL_ID.x_offset  10
PARCEL_ID.y_offset -17

The default location of the tag for a polygon is at the first vertex of the feature. The example workspace shows how to place tags into the center of the feature.

Workspace, data sources and the resulting dgn file

Forgotten how to read Tags with FME?