Introduction

AreaSymboliser™ is the solution to a common question posed by MicroStation^® users who are involved in floor planning or site planning. You need to apply a particular outline or fill colour to multiple areas. The intended use of each area determines the colour to apply.

Suppose you are an architect or planner. You are drawing rooms, using a MicroStation shape or complex shape to represent each room. A room may be assigned a particular purpose, and you want to apply an outline and fill colour to each room according to that purpose. Editing each room manually is a tedious and error-prone chore. The question that results from this process is "How do I resymbolise an area automatically?"

MicroStation CONNECT

AreaSymboliser was designed in the MicroStation V8i era. Its functionality is superseded in MicroStation CONNECT by Display Rules.

You can use display rules to modify an element's appearance. The rules let you test a variable and modify an element's symbology according to the value of that variable. A variable might be something like item data based on a MicroStation CONNECT Item Type.

FlexiTable

Although we'd love you to use AreaSymboliser, we should advise you to look also at FlexiTable™. FlexiTable has a resymbolisation tool. It also provides a host of other functions, including measuring and reporting areas. For example, you can acquire data from area objects, then export to Excel™.

Resymbolisation

You need to resymbolise shapes according to some rule. By resymbolise, we mean to apply new outline and fill colours to an area according to some criteria that you determine. For example, you might be working on a hospital design where a room is assigned to one of several departments: Immunology, Pathology, Laboratory, and Day Procedure. You may also have designations for non-departmental areas, such as Circulation and Reception.

AreaSymboliser works with MicroStation tag data. It looks for objects (shape or complex shape elements) that have been attributed with a tag named purpose. You supply a file of colour and fill definitions that match the possible values of purpose.

When AreaSymboliser starts up it reads its definition file and pops a dialog similar to that shown below. The dialog shows a list of room Purpose and its associated outline colour and fill colour.

When you press the Apply button, AreaSymboliser searches your model for tagged shapes. For each shape that it finds, it matches the value of the purpose with a member of your list. Then, it applies the outline to the shape in the model. Depending on the Fill Mode option, it may also apply the fill colour to the shape. If the Save Changes option is checked, AreaSymboliser updates the shape in your DGN model to make the change permanent.

Legend

Press the Legend button to tell AreaSymboliser to create a legend cell. The legend cell shows the symbology for each purpose, labelled with the purpose and, in parentheses, the number of shapes assigned to that purpose.

How much is AreaSymboliser?

AreaSymboliser is freeware.

License Terms

LA Solutions provides AreaSymboliser software for MicroStation V8 as freeware. We grant you an indefinite license to use the software for any purpose private or commercial. No warranty of fitness for purpose is provided. Use at your own risk.

How to Obtain AreaSymboliser

The simplest way is to use the form below. You will be forwarded to a page where you can download AreaSymboliser.

Click the request AreaSymboliser link, then complete the form. You can then download a ZIP file containing the AreaSymboliser MDL application for MicroStation.