Importing models in BIMSERVER

[VipulSoniGIS]

After several retries I am facing the same issue that whenever I export the 3d DGN model from Bentley AecoSIM or 3D DWG model from REVIT using the IFC export , the IFC 2x3 model is exported successfully without any errors or warnings in aecosim and revit both.

But after import in BIMSERVER (1.3 and 1.3.2) (through bimviews) the webgl display rendering shows many features missing/absent, like some parts of the roof surface of the building. I checked that BIMSERVER shows errors of entity not found .

27-08-2014 10:42:41 WARN org.ifcopenshell.IfcOpenShellModel - Entity #220173 not found in model 27-08-2014 10:42:41 WARN org.ifcopenshell.IfcOpenShellModel - Entity #225764 not found in model 27-08-2014 10:42:41 WARN org.ifcopenshell.IfcOpenShellModel - Entity #225531 not found in model

I am unable to understand what might be the issue since the export was perfect as per the logs.

Also to further check it, I then used an open source software and split the IFC Model roof surface and imported the roof surface separately still the same issue of incomplete rendering and the errors of Entity not found in model.

Please guide further and help me. Thanks in advance.

In BIMSERVER

IN Desktop based IFC tool

[aothms]

Hi,

It would be very helpful if you'd be able to attach part of the IFC file that is giving problems to this ticket so that we can have a look, or send it models@ifcopenshell.org if you want it to be treated confidentially. Thanks in advance.

Looking at the shape though it might be something that is currently not supported. The amount of vertices for a single shape is limited to 2^16 at this moment. Also, the Entity not found error does not necessarily constitute an actual processing error.

Kind regards, Thomas IfcOpenShell

[VipulSoniGIS]

Hi,

Thanks for the support, I am sending you one example model (mailing to - models@ifcopenshell.org) from the BIM Project so that it will depict the exact issue I am facing.

Please guide further.

Thanks and Regards, Vipul Soni

[aothms]

Hi,

Thank you for your message and detailed information. Your observations are correct, the representation for the IfcBuildingElementProxy with GlobalId "3juJfFRln16eNdUK$wQZ5f" and description "0, mtc_cut2.dgn, Default:580156" fails to process correctly. This error has already been addressed in the library that the BIMserver used for its geometry processing, called IfcOpenShell [https://github.com/opensourceBIM/IfcOpenShell-BIMserver-plugin]. If you tell me your operating system details I can send you a newer build of the library or you can wait for the BIMserver team to switch to a newer version of IfcOpenShell.

Hope that helps,

Kind regards, Thomas IfcOpenShell

[VipulSoniGIS]

Hi,

I have already replied to the email. but I guess its better to update GITHUB Issues forum too.

I will be very happy if you can send me a newer build of the library, The BIMSERVER has been installed on VM environment with Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard , XEON 8 Cores and 12 GB RAM.

Thanks and Regards, Vipul Soni

[VipulSoniGIS]

Hi,

I checked again with the newer IFCOPENSHELL build its the same more or less some features newer were visible. But overall the BIMSERVER is not able to render curved surfaces properly specially surfaces like the above snapshots .

Regards, Vipul Soni

[aothms]

Hi,

The file that has been exchanged over email displays very similarly to all other viewers and does not result into significant geometrical processing errors while using the updated engine. If your full model still has missing geometry please isolate these specific objects and send them to the above email address. Thanks in advance.

Kind regards, Thomas IfcOpenShell

[VipulSoniGIS]

Hi Thomas,

Thank you for your reply.

We usually receive the BIM .DGN Files from the BIM core team, I came up with the idea to set up the BIMSERVER as a intranet web repository to 3D view and as well as share the data among the team.

But the show stopper was that the roof of the main building in model which is curved and has many geometries to depict the curve was never imported correctly, also the other geometries in some places were completely missing.

Then I tried the same with different ways of exporting the BENTLEY DGN to a IFC file but always the same results with BIMSERVER.

Then communicating with you earlier I had cut a small piece of the building in bentley and sent the DGN to you for examination. I had given you guys DGN and as well as IFC for a complete research.

After all these days I noticed that I needed some module like BIMSURFER.org to work for me but it never worked after all the re-tries etc. But the BIMSURFER example.html download worked flawlessly but that needs further customization in javascript for having basic viewing tools also. Customization in Javascript is something that I cant do, its my bad.

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In regards to BIMSERVER what I can now request you guys to please help me out , by teaching me or pointing some tips to - what are the right options or combinations in BIMSERVER _settings for importing an IFC model s_uccessfully and viewing it flawlessly. And also what is the criteria/ options to look for in the IFC export process from a DGN file.

Yesterday, the models I received from BIM Core Team , were not at all importing in BIMSERVER , when I checked properly the errors were from the Failing Model Checker. Then with the help of my colleague we exported the .IFC 2X3 Models into .FBX Files and then again exported them to IFC. After that ignoring the error of Failing Model checker the models were imported in BIMSERVER but now the shading had errors and Table of Content in BIMView showed all the detail features as unknown. Whereas in the desktop products the table of content had all the layers properly listed.

The main disappointing fact for my case was that the IFC Model looked cool in the IFCOpenshell app/SimpleBIM / Bentley etc... but bad/patchy /incompletely imported in BIMSERVER - BIMView, which altogether defeated my purpose. Because of that I was not able to justify the greatness of BIMSERVER product, finally only able to state that it is great in concept only.

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Also I wont be able to share with you the Model files due to the data being in restricted category for public access. What earlier I had sent you was the best I could do.

Overall I feel the IFC Openshell Engine needs a lot of work to improve in 3D display, also the Geometry Server is very slow and takes huge time to process. and BIMSURFER guys need to onetime finalize the viewer and release a stable build with some basic options to view the model.

Thanks and Regards, Vipul Soni

On Tue, Sep 9, 2014 at 2:19 PM, Thomas Krijnen notifications@github.com wrote:

Hi,

The file that has been exchanged over email displays very similarly to all other viewers and does not result into significant geometrical processing errors while using the updated engine. If your full model still has missing geometry please isolate these specific objects and send them to the above email address. Thanks in advance.

Kind regards, Thomas IfcOpenShell

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub https://github.com/opensourceBIM/BIMserver/issues/120#issuecomment-54949997 .

[aothms]

Hi,

Thank you for the time to write this. We are constantly trying to improve our software. Sending us dgn files does not help us, because we do not want to invest money in licenses for proprietary software. Problems with files you cannot disclose with us are impossible for us to diagnose.

A conversion to and from fbx will definitely loose most of the semantics in the model and will turn proper geometric solid models into tesselated meshes. This is not recommended.

If your authoring tool produces invalid IFC files, i.e if they are not accepted on account of the basic syntactic and semantic sanity checks we perform, you should contact the support team of your authoring tool. Note that some viewers do not perform this validation step, giving you the impression that it might be the BIMserver's fault.

Thanks again for your detailed reply.

Kind regards, Thomas IfcOpenShell

[VipulSoniGIS]

Hi,

Good News ! I fixed the issues, which I was facing (I had listed them here above issue #120) with the IFC Models import and display in the BIMSERVER.

First of all a BIG - THANK YOU to the BIMSERVER Team! Thank you for your support.

Just to recall - My issue was , I was getting DGN BIM Models , which upon converting to IFC 2x3 File Format were displaying incorrectly and bad rendering in BIMSERVER BIMView.

As guided by Thomas , I understood that there is some issue in the export process of the IFC 2x3 File or Schema Match. In one of the google searches I got one PowerPoint Slide which said that not all the BIM Commercial software are fully/partially certified by SmartBuilding for IFC Export and Import process. meaning there export of IFC might not be acceptable......

Further it was also specified that currently in the list only Graphisoft Archicad is fully certified product for IFC 2x3 export and import. I used a trial version of the product and also got some help from my friend whose work place has the full licensed product to test the conversion options.

Graphisoft Archicad has a full list of options available to configure and manage IFC Export / Import and also the interface is well documented. The export of IFC from Archicad was done using the General settings of export but after upon import or checkin in BIMSERVER 1.3.2 what I got was a full color rendering and near perfect geometry import. of-course there were still some geometry missing but that needs some more support from the CAD BIM Team guys for schema mapping. But there were no issues at all, I used model checker (pass and fail both) and no error logs in BIMSERVER.

[aothms]

Hi,

That's great to hear. Thank you for your message.

Kind regards, Thomas IfcOpenShell