Logical Model to Schema - Order of elements and attributes in the XSD

[Geert Bellekens]

Geert,
So then it's safe to say I could not use the EA Message Composer to customize the XSD further to add text based on some Tagged Values, correct? Do you think that is something that could be accomplished by modifying the EA Message Composer source code, and do you offer that option? Since you didn't mention it as an option, I assume there are no MDG Technologies for something like this.

Yes. The EA Message composer is basically a tool to create a subset of a model, with some added intelligence. Think creating message definitions from a large canonical model.
It it not specifically aimed at XSD models although it does have some features that are specific to the XSD generation mechanism.
You could probably change the code to make it do what you need (or pay me to do it). You would need to evaluate if this would be the right direction given the current focus of the tool.

Also, does the EA Message Composer use the TPos field to set the ordering explicitly? Based on your message I'm not clear as to whether the TPos value is used in the generation of the XSD.

It uses the pos field of the attributes, and the position tag of the source connector ends for associations to play with the sorting.
Not sure about the order of the classes themselves. I don't think tt does anything specific with that, but I would need to check the code to be sure.

Geert

[bholtzman]

Yes. The EA Message composer is basically a tool to create a subset of a model, with some added intelligence. Think creating message definitions from a large canonical model.
It it not specifically aimed at XSD models although it does have some features that are specific to the XSD generation mechanism.
You could probably change the code to make it do what you need (or pay me to do it). You would need to evaluate if this would be the right direction given the current focus of the tool.

Great. That helps define our options. Since it's designed to be used by EA to generate the standard XSD, it sounds like it wouldn't be the best way to go. We need the output XSDs to have some significant customization. Starting from scratch would probably make more sense. Would you agree? Any kind of ballpark range for how much this would cost to develop?

It uses the pos field of the attributes, and the position tag of the source connector ends for associations to play with the sorting.
Not sure about the order of the classes themselves. I don't think tt does anything specific with that, but I would need to check the code to be sure.

Ah, ok so then the Pos field in t_attribute is really the key to the sequence. That would explain why the order appears to be dependent on the chronological sequence of when the attributes were entered. I would assume that EA automatically assigns the new row in t_attribute with the next number in the sequence for that Object_ID.

Thanks again, this is giving me some valuable insights into how EA works!

Bill

[Geert Bellekens]

Great. That helps define our options. Since it's designed to be used by EA to generate the standard XSD, it sounds like it wouldn't be the best way to go. We need the output XSDs to have some significant customization. Starting from scratch would probably make more sense. Would you agree? Any kind of ballpark range for how much this would cost to develop?

Well, I'm not quite sure. It depends on the type of customization you need.
But, I did find that writing a tool to generate a specific style of XSD from a specific style of EA model is surprisingly easy/fast, compared to writing a generic XSD generator for any style of model.
(I recently did a rewrite of the Vienna add-in for a customer to generate XSD's from a UMM/UN-CEFACT model)

Ballpark estimate: something between 7 and 15 days of development.
That is of course still a serious investment, so it might be cheaper to go the post-processing road. Big advantage of the custom development vs the post processing is that you have 100% control and freedom and you are not dependent on the results of the standard XSD generation from EA.

Geert