AppearanceExtractor

Extracts appearance style(s) from the front and/or back side of the geometries.

The output appearance style feature can either be an attributes-only feature or a feature with a raster geometry and attributes, depending on whether the extracted appearance has textures on it or not. It will be output from the Appearance port.

If a geometry does not have any appearances that were extracted from it because the Geometry XQuery did not match any part of it, the feature will be output through the Unmatched port.

If a geometry does not have any appearances that were extracted from it because it had none to extract , the feature will be output through the <Rejected> port, with a rejection code added of MISSING_GEOMETRY_APPEARANCE.

For more information on appearance support in FME, see Appearances.

Configuration

Input Ports

Output Ports

Parameters

Geometry Part Selection

Geometry XQuery

Use this parameter to isolate only a portion of the input geometry.

If no criteria are specified, the action will apply to the entire geometry at all levels.

Selection can be based on structural location, geometry label, type, appearance information, traits, trait storage types, or definition reference. The syntax used is a restricted set of XQuery, where the return clause is fixed.

The basic Geometry XQuery dialog allows you to construct simple selection queries by automatically writing the necessary query based on specified test clauses. Clicking the Switch to Advanced button opens the Advanced Editor, which allows you to type a query free-form, for more expressive queries.

Note Once you switch to Advanced mode, you will have to clear all parameters before you can return to Basic mode.

A hierarchical geometry is represented as nodes of type geometry, with attributes containing information about traits, type, and label for each geometry.

General

Extract Appearance(s) From

This parameter specifies side(s) of the geometry from which appearances should be extracted. They can be extracted from either the front, the back, or both front and back of each specified geometry.

Output Unique Appearances

If Output Unique Appearance is set to Yes, a style is output only once if the appearance is shared by multiple geometries.

If this parameter is set to No, every single usage of an Appearance will output a separate feature, even if there are duplicates.

Keep Input Attributes

If this parameter is set to Yes, all attributes from the input feature will be copied onto the output Appearance features. The feature where the attributes are copied from is the feature which has the geometry from which that Appearance was referenced.

If this parameter is set to No, then no feature-level attributes will be copied onto the output Appearance features.

Keep Input Traits as Attributes

If this parameter is set to No, then no geometry traits will be copied onto the output Appearance features.

If this parameter is set to Yes, all traits from the geometry that referenced the appearance will be copied onto the output Appearance features as attributes. The following attributes will also be placed on the output feature, if appropriate. These values describe in more detail exactly how the Texture was specifically applied to the geometry from which it was referenced.

Attribute Name	Description
fme_geometry_part_label	Geometry Part Label: This is the Geometry Label that was present on the geometry part that referenced the Appearance
fme_appearance_from_front	Appearance From Front: This attribute will be present and have the value yes if the appearance was placed on the front of the geometry part. This attribute will not be present if it was not attached to the front
fme_appearance_from_back	Appearance From Back: This attribute will be present and have the value yes if the appearance was placed on the back of the geometry part. This attribute will not be present if it was not attached to the back.
fme_appearance_texture_gen_info	Appearance Texture Gen Info: Generally speaking, this will hold all the details required to understand how the texture coordinates were generated for the geometry part which referenced this appearance. (Texture coordinates may be viewed as a way of mapping from the x,y,z coordinate space of the geometry to the u,v coordinate space of the Texture.) Specifically, this parameter contains the data necessary to extrapolate the XYZ to UV transformation required to transform data based in ground coordinates into the same coordinate space as the texture came from. The values are comma separated in the following format: X,Y,Z,U1,V1,dU2,dV2,dU3,dV3,a,b,c,d,e,f Where (X,Y,Z) is the first selected representative coordinate, U1,V1 is the texture coordinate at that location, (dU2,dV2) is the difference between the first and second selected representative texture coordinate, and (dU2,dV2) is the difference between the first and third selected representative texture coordinate. The matrix represented by a,b,c,d,e,f allows for the calculation of two parametric values, alpha and beta such that the following expression can be used to map from (X,Y,Z)space -> (U,V) space, or the reverse, if the user wishes to later bring geometries into the same coordinate space as the Raster, or the reverse, in further feature processing. Given a ground coordinate (x,y,z), find (u,v): dX = x-X dY = y-Y dZ = z-Z alpha = adX+bdY+cdZ beta = ddX+edY+fdZ u = alphadU2+betadU3+U1 v = alphadV2+betadV3+V1 For example, one value for this attribute may be: `-0.500576565314848,0.803943350158095,4.94542140836595,-1.11022302462516e-015,1.98164442416027e-015, 1.11022302462516e-016,0.999999999999999,0.999999999999999,1,-6.55663808803325,-6.16047694893307, -4.1725949293875,-0.292710919283411,5.84378207124815,3.53907266079942'

Editing Transformer Parameters

Transformer parameters can be set by directly entering values, using expressions, or referencing other elements in the workspace such as attribute values or user parameters. Various editors and context menus are available to assist. To see what is available, click beside the applicable parameter.

How to Set Parameter Values

Defining Values

There are several ways to define a value for use in a Transformer. The simplest is to simply type in a value or string, which can include functions of various types such as attribute references, math and string functions, and workspace parameters.

Using the Text Editor

The Text Editor provides a convenient way to construct text strings (including regular expressions) from various data sources, such as attributes, parameters, and constants, where the result is used directly inside a parameter.

Text Editor

Using the Arithmetic Editor

The Arithmetic Editor provides a convenient way to construct math expressions from various data sources, such as attributes, parameters, and feature functions, where the result is used directly inside a parameter.

Arithmetic Editor

Conditional Values

Set values depending on one or more test conditions that either pass or fail.

Parameter Condition Definition Dialog

Content

Expressions and strings can include a number of functions, characters, parameters, and more.

When setting values - whether entered directly in a parameter or constructed using one of the editors - strings and expressions containing String, Math, Date/Time or FME Feature Functions will have those functions evaluated. Therefore, the names of these functions (in the form @<function_name>) should not be used as literal string values.

Content Types

String Functions	These functions manipulate and format strings.
Special Characters	A set of control characters is available in the Text Editor.
Math Functions	Math functions are available in both editors.
Date/Time Functions	Date and time functions are available in the Text Editor.
Math Operators	These operators are available in the Arithmetic Editor.
FME Feature Functions	These return primarily feature-specific values.
FME Parameters	FME and workspace-specific parameters may be used.
Creating and Modifying User Parameters	Create your own editable parameters.

Dialog Options - Tables

Table Tools

Transformers with table-style parameters have additional tools for populating and manipulating values.

Row Reordering

Enabled once you have clicked on a row item. Choices include:

Add a row
Remove a row
Move current row up one
Move current row down one
Move current row to top
Move current row to bottom

Cut, Copy, and Paste

Enabled once you have clicked on a row item. Choices include:

Cut a row - delete and copy to clipboard
Copy a row to the clipboard
Paste a row from the clipboard

Cut, copy, and paste may be used within a transformer, or between transformers.

Filter

Start typing a string, and the matrix will only display rows matching those characters. Searches all columns. This only affects the display of attributes within the transformer - it does not alter which attributes are output.

Import

Import populates the table with a set of new attributes read from a dataset. Specific application varies between transformers.

Reset/Refresh

Generally resets the table to its initial state, and may provide additional options to remove invalid entries. Behavior varies between transformers.

Note: Not all tools are available in all transformers.

For more information, see Transformer Parameter Menu Options.

Reference

Processing Behavior	Feature-Based
Feature Holding	No
Dependencies	None
Aliases
History

FME Online Resources

The FME Community and Support Center Knowledge Base have a wealth of information, including active forums with 35,000+ members and thousands of articles.

Search for all results about the AppearanceExtractor on the FME Community.

Examples may contain information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Vancouver, Open Government Licence - British Columbia, and/or Open Government Licence – Canada.