The difference in TDS and TM schema?

hm_stella

Hello all,

While I have been testing how cartography works in defense mapping, I found the difference in TM.gdb and TDS.gdb schemas.

When I ran the "extract data" step in the workflow manager, all TDS data seemed to be converted and copied into TM.gdb's BM (BaseMap) feature dataset. However, the TDS data were not copied and converted when I ran the Extract Data by JobAOI geoprocessing tool outside of the workflow manager by myself, saying that the TDS feature classes were copied in TM.gdb but not in BM feature dataset as it had to be in the workflow manager.

This was the first time I got curious of why. So, I opened up feature classes in TM and TDS geodatabases respectively. For example, AgriculturePoints feature class in TDS.gdb and in TM.gdb. As expected, some fields that were used to be in TDS schema were no longer shown in TM schema and were newly made in TM schema.

As an example, AgriculturePoints had DMT, TRE, VSP, VSP2, VSP3, ZI013_CSP, ZI013_CSP2, ZI013_CSP3, ZI013_FFP, ZI013_FFP2, and ZI013_FFP3 fields in TDS but not in TM. Also, this feature class got new fields in TM such as ABO_Rotation, CBO_Offset, CBO_OffsetX, CBO_OffsetY, CBO_Rotation, HIERARCHY, and ISVISIBLE.

Here are the questions then.

1. What happens to the fields that are used to be in TDS schema but no longer existing in TM schema? If the fields are missed after converted from TDS to TM, would those fields values be gone and not be used in symbology Arcade queries and definition queries in TM layout?

2. How would the newly added fields like ABO_Rotation and CBO_Offset in TM schema be used? Should the field values be modified by manually or by geoprocessing tools?

If anyone knows some exact answers for the questions, please feel free to make responses 🙂

Thank you!

JohnGrammer1425

The TM geodatabase that is delivered with Defense Mapping product files is a cartographic geodatabase that is based on the the DATA PRODUCT SPECIFICATION (DPS) 1:25,000; 1:50,000 and 1:100,000 Scale Topographic Map (TM) (2021-07-31) Version 1.2. Since the TM geodatabase is based on the DPS specification you will see differences between TDS and TM geodatabase. The example you mention with AgriculturePnt feature class. The TDS geodatabase has more features (eg. Industrial Farm (AL270)). This feature is not portrayed in the DPS. Since it is not symbolized it is not in the TM geodatabase. These features are not loaded into the TM geodatabase as they are not used on the TM map. The TM geodatabase also has extra attributes that are used in the offsetting, thinning, visibility of features in the map. these attributes are populated by tools within the Topographic Production Tools and are used by the layout templates for TM. 

1. What happens to the fields that are used to be in TDS schema but no longer existing in TM schema? If the fields are missed after converted from TDS to TM, would those fields values be gone and not be used in symbology Arcade queries and definition queries in TM layout?

Answer: Features or attributes that are are in the TDS geodatabase but do not exist in the TM geodatabase will not be extracted or loaded into the TM cartographic geodatabase, the feature or attributes will be dropped. Since they are not in the DPS specification the map layouts do not reference them and the features are not symbolized. The layers in the layouts use TM attributes in the arcade expressions to symbolize the data.

2. How would the newly added fields like ABO_Rotation and CBO_Offset in TM schema be used? Should the field values be modified by manually or by geoprocessing tools?

Answer: The added fields to the TM feature classes are for the cartographic refinement tools in the Topographic Production tools Toolbox -> Cartography -> Cartographic Refinement (Apply Building offsets, Calculate Bridge Offsets...). These tools populate the offset information that is used by the layers in the template layout. The layers symbology uses the attribute to rotate, offset, and thin the features.