Esri Geodatabase (File Geodb Raster Dataset) Writer Parameters

Database Connection

Select the File Geodatabase folder.

  • When unchecked (default) and a database already exists, then tables and features are written to the existing database.
  • When checked, any existing database is deleted before writing begins. Checking this option also enables the Template File parameter.
Warning  After a database is deleted, it cannot be recovered – all data is lost.

If a database does not exist when writing begins, a new database is created.

If a template File Geodatabase is specified, the writer will make a copy of the template into the location specified in the Writer Dataset parameter. All operations will be performed on the copy while the original template File Geodatabase remains unchanged.

The parameter is available only when Overwrite Existing Database is enabled.

Note  Since it is doing a complete copy, any data present in the template will also be copied to the destination. To remove unwanted data from tables or feature classes, set Truncate Table to Yes on each feature type. Alternatively, to copy only schema and not data, use ArcGIS to export the schema to an XML Workspace Document, then set the writer to import the resultant schema with the Import XML Workspace Document (Schema Only) parameter (below).

Spatial

Coordinate systems may be extracted from input feature data sources, may come predefined with FME, or may be user-defined. FME allows different output and input coordinate systems, and performs the required coordinate conversions when necessary.

How FME Processes Coordinate Systems in the Workspace

If a coordinate system is specified in both the source format and the workspace, the coordinate system in the workspace is used. The coordinate system specified in the source format is not used, and a warning is logged. If a source coordinate system is not specified in the workspace and the format or system does not store coordinate system information, then the coordinate system is not set for the features that are read.

If a destination coordinate system is set and the feature has been tagged with a coordinate system, then a coordinate system conversion is performed to put the feature into the destination system. This happens right before the feature enters into the writer.

If the destination coordinate system was not set, then the features are written out in their original coordinate system.

If a destination coordinate system is set, but the source coordinate system was not specified in the workspace or stored in the source format, then no conversion is performed. The features are simply tagged with the output system name before being written to the output dataset.

For systems that know their coordinate system, the Coordinate System field will display Read from Source and FME will read the coordinate system from the source dataset. For most other input sources, the field will display Unknown (which simply means that FME will use default values). In most cases, the default value is all you'll need to perform the translation.

You can always choose to override the defaults and choose a new coordinate system. Select More Coordinate Systems from the drop-down menu to open the Coordinate System Gallery.

Changing a Reprojection

To perform a reprojection, FME typically uses the CS-MAP reprojection engine, which includes definitions for thousands of coordinate systems, with a large variety of projections, datums, ellipsoids, and units. However, GIS applications have slightly different algorithms for reprojecting data between different coordinate systems. To ensure that the data FME writes matches exactly to your existing data, you can use the reprojection engine from a different application.

Note  To use this feature, you must have a supported GIS application installed on your system (for example, Esri ArcGIS®).

To change the reprojection engine, Select Workspace Parameters > Spatial > Reprojection Engine. In the example shown, you can select Esri (but the selection here depends on your installed applications):

For more information, see the links below:

Advanced

This parameter determines which version of Geodatabase should be created: 

  • Current (default)
  • 10.0
  • 9.3

This parameter defines the type of compression to use on mosaic dataset overviews.

Values:

  • JPEG
  • JPEG2000 – Available only on rasters with an 8-bit pixel depth and no colormap
  • LZ77 – The only valid compression option for images with a colormap.
  • None

The degree of lossiness caused by the compression. Valid values are integers from 0 (lowest quality) to 100 (highest quality).

This value is ignored when not using one of the JPEG compression types.

Determines the resampling type to be used when generating reduced resolution pyramids on the destination raster dataset.

  • Nearest – Performs nearest-neighbor resampling. This option provides the fastest output but the poorest quality.
  • Bilinear – Performs a bilinear interpolation and determines the new value of a cell based on a weighted distance average of the four nearest input cell centers.
  • Cubic – Performs a cubic convolution. Provides the best quality, but can require more processing time.

Specifies the number of reduced resolution pyramids to build.

More pyramids enable better performance when viewing raster data using FME and Esri products.

This parameter tells the writer whether it should ignore features that would usually cause the translation to fail. This includes features that are topologically incorrect, are not supported by the writer, or conflict with the definition of the table to which it is to be inserted (that is, they are outside of the geometry envelope specified by the feature class). Additionally, the writer will also ignore polygons, donuts, or aggregates of polygons/donuts that cannot be reoriented.

The default setting is No, which means that failed features are not ignored and will cause the translation to fail when encountered.

This parameter sets the number of features to ignore before causing a translation to fail due to a problematic feature. (However, the translation may still fail for other reasons.)

Values: To ignore all failed features: -1; otherwise 0 or a positive integer.

This parameter allows you to store the failed features to an FFS file for later viewing.

This parameter allows you to specify an FME Feature Store (FFS) file to store any failed features.

This file will be created automatically, but will only be created if there is a failed feature.

Note  If the writer encounters a failed feature and writes to this file, and if a file with the same name already exists, the existing file will be overwritten.

This parameter is required when Dump Failed Features to File is set to Yes.

Values: path and filename

If either the path or the filename contains a space, the value must be enclosed in double quotation marks. The filename must end in the extension .ffs.