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3D Gateway Configuration

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  • Last UpdatedJan 21, 2025
  • 7 minute read

This page describes the default Gateway for 3D Data configurations supplied in the AIM-A pipeline for processing AutoCAD, IFC and Navisworks files and to advise which configuration parameters and mapping configurations can be changed by AIM-A users.

The extractors in the Gateway can read almost all the data in standard 3D DWG/DXF, IFC and NWD files. However, data associated with non-standard objects, such as entities created by proxy extensions to AutoCAD products, IFC files not complying with the 2x3 or 4 schemas, or NWD files not sourced from Autodesk Navisworks versions 2012-2024, may not be readable. Once extracted, tags are identified and graphics hotspotted by transformation Base Mapping configurations. The graphical representation, such as graphical object colors, can also be modified by presentation mapping.

Base Mapping

The ObjectID’s are defined by base mapping processing. See the section on ObjectID Mapping which describes this, and includes replacing values with another attribute, and Transform functions to keep just the part that matches a pattern or adds a prefix or suffix.
Replacing values with a lookup is not supported in the AIM-A pipeline.

Base mapping files also set the ClassID for most objects. This is often replaced by subsequent Registers Gateway processing if the object already exists in AIM-A.

AutoCad 3D

The following file may be used to configure Base Mappings for AutoCAD 3D.

modelfile-ac3d-basemapping.xml

The default mapping in this file sets the ObjectIDs for:

  • the document object representing the input DWG file (which is identified in a condition looking for an attribute named ‘#TYPE# with a value "^manifest$")

  • datasets from attributes attached to blocks and XData, and datasets with a Number attribute

It also removes any objects in XData that have an annotative attribute.

AutoCAD supports the combination of 2D drawing elements within 3D models, such as labels recording the 2D dimensions of the model. These labels can be extracted by the AutoCAD 3D extractor. If the label’s object contains attributes they can be used to set identification for these objects too. Mappings to change the font (for example, Text Mapping as available for Gateway for 2D data configurations) are not supported.

For more information on configuring this file, see Base Mapping Types.

An example mapping:

<MappingTemplate guid="aaaaaaaa-e810-4c17-8978-5a780c02e570" componentVersion="2.12.0.0" sourceProductName="AVEVA™ Gateway for 3D Data" componentName="BaseMapping" creationDate="2024-05-16">

<ObjectMappings regExTimeoutSecs="100">

<!-- Modify Document Object(Manifest) ObjectID -->

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="#TYPE#" pattern="^manifest$"/>

</Conditions>

<ObjectID value="[#MODEL_NAME#]"/>

</Object>

<!-- Remove unnecessary XData coming from annotative attributes -->

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="Application name" pattern="AcadAnnotative"/>

</Conditions>

<Remove/>

</Object>

<!-- Set tag and classify Datasets created from block's attributes -->

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="Handle" pattern=".*block dataset of.*"/>

</Conditions>

<ObjectID value="[handle]"/>

<ClassID value="Equipment"/>

</Object>

<!-- Set tag and classify Datasets created from XData -->

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="Handle" pattern=".*xdata dataset of.*"/>

</Conditions>

<ObjectID value="[handle]"/>

<ClassID value="Equipment"/>

</Object>

<!-- Set tag and classify objects -->

<Object>

<IncludeAssociatedObjectAttributes>

<Association Type pattern="has dataset"/>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="Number"/>

</Conditions>

</IncludeAssociatedObjectAttributes>

<ObjectID value="[associated:Number]"/>

<ClassID value="[associated:Type]"/>

</Object>

</ObjectMappings>

</MappingTemplate>

Industry Foundation Classes (IFC)

IFC files are a form of STEP file that contains numerous associations between objects, many of which are spurious when viewing in AIM-A. It also stores datasets in property sets which are often associated with more than one structural object and therefore needs to be mapped with two base mapping files.

modelfile-ifc-propertysetmapping.xml

The default mapping in this file sets all the ObjectIDs to the GlobalID GUID value, as this is guaranteed to be unique but may not conform to the naming convention of objects imported from other data sources, hence this may need to be modified. It also converts the associations to datasets (that is IFC property sets) to type ‘has dataset’.

For more information on configuring this file, see Base Mapping Types.

An example mapping:

<MappingTemplate componentVersion="2.12.0.0" sourceProductName="AVEVA™ Gateway for 3D Data" componentName="BaseMapping">

<ObjectMappings regExTimeoutSecs="100">

<Object>

<ObjectID value="[GlobalId]">

<Transforms>

<Replace pattern="^\s*$" value="[InternalId]"/>

</Transforms>

</ObjectID>

<ClassID value="[ClassName]"/>

<Associations>

<Association relationship="IfcRelDefinesByProperties">

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="ClassName" pattern="^IFCPROPERTYSET"/>

</Conditions>

<Type value="has dataset"/>

<TargetClassID value="Structure"/>

<TargetID value="[GlobalId]">

<Transforms>

<InsertAfter pattern="^.*$" value="_IFC Dataset"/>

</Transforms>

</TargetID>

</Association>

<Association relationship="IsDefinedBy">

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="ClassName" pattern="^IFCPROPERTYSET"/>

</Conditions>

<Type value="has dataset"/>

<TargetClassID value="Structure"/>

<TargetID value="[GlobalId]">

<Transforms>

<InsertAfter pattern="^.*$" value="_IFC Dataset"/>

</Transforms>

</TargetID>

</Association>

</Associations>

</Object>

</ObjectMappings>

</MappingTemplate>

modelfile-ifc-basemapping.xml

The default mapping in this file sets the ObjectID for the document object (that is, the input IFC file) and cleans up the associations with property sets (where ‘is referenced in’ associations are removed as this makes no sense for a dataset) and structure objects.

For more information on configuring this file, see Base Mapping Types.

An example mapping:

<MappingTemplate guid="aaaaaaaa-1ca1-42d1-b9fe-5d636b816372" componentVersion="2.12.0.0" sourceProductName="AVEVA™ Gateway for 3D Data" componentName="BaseMapping" creationDate="2024-05-16">

<ObjectMappings regExTimeoutSecs="100">

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="#TYPE#" pattern="^manifest$"/>

</Conditions>

<ObjectID value="[#MODEL_NAME#]"/>

<ClassID value="3D Model"/>

</Object>

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="ClassName" pattern="^IFCPROPERTYSET"/>

</Conditions>

<ClassID value="Structure"/>

<Associations>

<Association relationship="is referenced in">

<Remove/>

</Association>

<Association relationship="*">

<Type value="is associated with"/>

</Association>

</Associations>

</Object>

<Object>

<ClassID value="Structure"/>

<Associations>

<Association relationship="has dataset">

<Type value="has dataset"/>

</Association>

<Association relationship="is referenced in">

<Type value="is referenced in"/>

</Association>

<Association relationship="*">

<Type value="is associated with"/>

</Association>

</Associations>

</Object>

</ObjectMappings>

</MappingTemplate>

Navisworks

The following file may be used to configure Base Mappings for NWD files.

modelfile-nav-basemapping.xml

The Autodesk Navisworks product can convert numerous files to the NWD format. Most of these have a consistent set of attributes in terms of their identifiers, with the exception of models imported from IFC files. The default mapping in this file sets the ObjectIDs for:

  • the document object representing the input NWD file (which is identified in a condition looking for an attribute named ‘#TYPE# with a value "^manifest$")

  • all objects derived from an IFC file have their ObjectID’s set to the value of the IFC GUID

  • all other objects have their ObjectID’s set to the value of the Navisworks object’s Persistent ID

For more information on configuring this file, see Base Mapping Types.

An example mapping:

<MappingTemplate guid="aaaaaaaa-c971-4461-baf8-716d0d0a4231" componentVersion="2.12.0.0" sourceProductName="AVEVA™ Gateway for 3D Data" componentName="BaseMapping" creationDate="2024-05-16">

<ObjectMappings regExTimeoutSecs="100">

<!-- Modify Document Object(Manifest) ObjectID -->

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="#TYPE#" pattern="^manifest$"/>

</Conditions>

<ObjectID value="[#MODEL_NAME#]"/>

</Object>

<!-- Example for models created from IFC -->

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="IfcGUID" pattern=".*"/>

</Conditions>

<ObjectID value="[IfcGUID]"/>

<ClassID value="Structure"/>

</Object>

<!-- Example for other models -->

<Object>

<Conditions>

<Attribute name="Item_PersistentId" pattern=".*"/>

</Conditions>

<ObjectID value="[Item_PersistentId]"/>

<ClassID value="Structure"/>

</Object>

</ObjectMappings>

</MappingTemplate>

Presentation Mapping

Presentation configurations can be used to change the material definitions and colors of various objects. The default values do not change materials nor colors, but you may decide to do so via modifications to the following files. Presentation files can also be used to segment the model, but this is not supported in the AIM-A pipeline.

AutoCad 3D

The following file may be used to configure Presentation Mappings for AutoCAD 3D.

modelfile-ac3d-presentationmapping.xml

For more information on configuring this file, see Presentation Mapping.

An example mapping:

<presentation xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" guid="aaaaaaaa-8671-446c-80d5-2fbfc4c0360e" sourceProductName="AVEVA™ Gateway for 3D Data" componentName="TransformerPresentationMapping" componentVersion="2.12.0.0" creationDate="2024-05-16">

<materials> </materials>

<colours> </colours>

<segments> </segments>

</presentation>

Industry Foundation Classes (IFC)

The following file may be used to configure Presentation Mappings for IFC files.

modelfile-ifc-presentationmapping.xml

For more information on configuring this file, see Presentation Mapping.

An example mapping:

<presentation xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" guid="aaaaaaaa-33eb-4393-b495-dc95c24ffb37" sourceProductName="AVEVA™ Gateway for 3D Data" componentName="TransformerPresentationMapping" componentVersion="2.12.0.0" creationDate="2024-05-16">

<materials> </materials>

<colours> </colours>

<segments> </segments>

</presentation>

Navisworks

The following file may be used to configure Presentation Mappings for NWD files.

modelfile-nav-presentationmapping.xml

For more information on configuring this file, see Presentation Mapping.

An example mapping:

<presentation xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" guid="aaaaaaaa-75f0-4d17-bc8b-551ef3fccf78" sourceProductName="AVEVA™ Gateway for 3D Data" componentName="TransformerPresentationMapping" componentVersion="2.12.0.0" creationDate="2024-05-16">

<segments> </segments>

</presentation>

Fixing Input Files

AutoCAD models

  • If the Gateway extraction fails due to non-standard (native) DWG format, try the following:

    • Open the DWG in AutoCAD and if it reports errors, use the Audit function which often cleans up the discrepant/non-standard objects. Resave the DWG before processing again with the Gateway.

  • If the DWG file contains custom/proxy objects they may not be extracted by the Gateway, resulting in missing graphics in the SVG and engineering information for parts represented by these custom/proxy objects. To process DWG files containing custom/proxy objects:

    • Save these drawings/models to the native AutoCAD DWG format. You can use an Object Enabler (program supplied by the creator of the objects), to read (open) these custom objects in AutoCAD. You can also use specific commands of the Object Enabler to convert the proxy objects to native objects before writing out to a new DWG file.

  • Supported versions: DWG and DXF files up to version 2018 (version AC1032), produced by all versions of AutoCAD up to AutoCAD 2024.

IFC models

  • IFC files are plain text files usually generated as an output option in many CAD applications, for example, Autodesk Revit. If the IFC file has been opened in a text editor then it may have been changed, causing its structure to be unreadable. If you still have access to this original model, try resaving it to an IFC 2X3 or IFC 4 file.

  • IFC files are based on the STEP format and so any read errors with specific input objects within the file can sometimes be corrected by text editing the relevant object to ensure its parameters are accurate and comply with the IFC schema. IFC files are usually quite large so only do this if there are only a few errors with specific objects. Deleting objects usually results in a corrupted file as there are many associations between objects.

  • Supported versions: IFC files conforming to schema versions 2X3 or 4.

Navisworks models

  • If an NWD file cannot be read by the Gateway, then if you still have the original file(s) try importing these into Navisworks again and submit the new NWD file.

  • Autodesk have observed that some applications create IFC files with GUIDs that are longer than the standard 22 characters, and when converted to NWD files these long GUIDs are shortened.

  • Supported versions: NWD files sourced from Autodesk Navisworks versions 2012-2024.

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