Groups Worksheet

In This Topic

On the Groups worksheet you can define named, rule based groups of objects. Groups are a very versatile concept that you can use in many different ways for organizing, editing and validating the model.

The groups worksheet has the following sections

Section	Description
Add Group Categories	In this section you can add new group categories that are used for organizing groups and defining properties that are common to all groups in a category.
Define Groups Based on Property Values	In this section you can define new rule based groups.
Assign Groups to Group Categories	In this section you can map groups to IFC, for example define that your group will be exported to IFC as an IfcZone.
Add Classification Systems	In this section you can add a new classification system into the model

Add Group Categories -section

In this section you can add new Group Categories to the model. Group categories are used for organizing groups and defining properties that are common to all groups in a category.

You can add properties to group categories in the Add Property to Object Class or Group -section of the Model Worksheet by using the key or name of the group category in the Object or Group field.

Field	Value	Description
Group Category Key	Text	The unique key of the group category
Group Category Name	Text	The name of the group category
Parent Group Category	Text	The name of key of the parent group category. You can create a hierarchy of group categories by giving the parent of the group category. The parent group category has to be created before the child group category.

Define Groups Based on Property Values -section

In this section you can define new rule based groups.

When you define a group that already exist the existing group is redefined. The matching for the existing group happens by group name and the comparison is case insensitive. For classification items the operator is starts with, which means that you can use the identification instead of the full name as the group name. For all other groups the operator is Equals. When a existing group is redefined the group category is maintained. For example if you redefine an IFC Zone, then the redefined group is also an IFC Zone.

Field

Value

Description

Group Name

Text

The Group Name is used for uniquely identifying a group.

If the Group Name has the special value [AUTO], then a separate group is created for each unique value of Property. When using [AUTO] you must leave the Value empty. Please note that you cannot use AND/OR rules together with [AUTO].

Backward compatibility
If the first character in the Group Name is a backslash '\' the group is only used in the context of the template and will not show up in Simplebim. The new system is to set the value of Group Type to 'Template Only'

Object Class [+]

Text

The name or key of the Object Class

The special value 'All' sets the value of 'Object Class [+]' to all object classes that have the property you define in 'Property [+]'

Property [+]

Text

The name or key of the property used in the criteria for selecting the objects that belong to the group

Numeric Operator

Choice

The Numeric Operator is used if the Property is a numeric property

Text Operator

Choice

The Text Operator is used if the Property is a text property. You can find more information about the Like -operator here and the Match -operator here.

Case Sensitive

Yes/No

Perform case sensitive comparison?

Value [+]

Mixed

The value used in the rule. The value is converted to the data type of the Property. If you are using measure values, please pay attention to the Template Units.

And/Or

Choice

You can use several rules for one group, e.g. select objects from different Object Classes using different criteria. For this you add new rows below the row with the Group Name and leave Group Name empty on those rows. You can decide if you want to apply And or Or logic.

And	An object must match all rules to be accepted
Or	An object must match at least one of the rules to be accepted

Group Type

Choice

The type of the group

Manual	The rules for the group will be run only once when the template is applied. After this objects can be added and removed to the group manually
Rule Based	The rules for the group are run each time there is a relevant change to the model and the objects in the group are updated accordingly. For example if the rule selects all Walls objects where the Is External property is Yes, then setting the Is External property of a Wall object to Yes any time after the template is applied will automatically include that object in the group.
Container	New in Simplebim 8.0 SR2. The group does not have any objects of its own, but acts as a parent for other groups and collects all the objects from its child groups. When creating Container groups you don't have to specify an Object Class, Property or Operator.
Template Only	The group is used only in the context of the template for example in find and replace operations. The group will not be added to the model in Simplebim.

Parent Group

Text

The name of the parent group for the new group. By assigning a parent group you can create hierarchies of groups

Group Category

Text

The name or key of the group category the new group is assigned to.

Assign Groups to Group Categories -section

In this section you can map groups to IFC and assign Groups to Group Categories, for example define that your group will be exported to IFC as an IfcZone. Simplebim automatically creates Group Categories for all IFC group types, like IfcGroup. IfcSystem or IfcZone. You can in addition create your own group Categories for organizing Group that you use in Simplebim.

By default the groups you define in templates will not be exported to IFC. You must map them to IFC if you want to export them to IFC.

Field	Value	Description
Group Name [+]	Text	The name of the group
Type of IFC Group or Group Category Key or Name	Text	The type of IFC group your group will be mapped to or the name or key of a Group Category

Add Classification Systems -section

In this section you can define hierarchical classification systems that are exported to IFC using dedicated classification resource of IFC.

Unlike in other sections, in this section the first row defines the classification system and the subsequent rows the items of the classification system.

You may define several classification systems in the same section by first defining the first classification system and then adding a new First Row for the second classification system followed by the subsequent rows for that classification system.

First Row

Field	Value	Description
Name	Text	The name of the classification system
Source	Text	The definition source of the classification system, i.e. the organization that has defined the classification system.
Edition	Text	The edition or version of the classification system
Edition Date	Text	The date when the edition was published
Description	Text	The description of the classification system
Location	Text	URL or other reference to the definition of the classification system
Reference Tokens	Text	List of delimiters used for separating the hierarchy levels of the classification system in the item Identification of the classification items

Subsequent Rows

The hierarchy of the classification system is created by indenting the rows for the classification items based on their hierarchy level in the classification system.

For the first level of the classification system the first non empty column is column D, the second non empty column E and the third non empty column F.

For the second level of the classification system the first non empty column is column E, the second non empty column F and the third non empty column G.

Field	Value	Description
First Non Empty	Text	The identification of the classification item within the classification system.
Second Non Empty	Text	The name of the classification item The Comment in this Excel cell will be used as the description of the classification item
Third Non Empty	Text	URL or other reference to the definition of the classification item

Example

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