There are four types of Attribute Sets in Conquest. This section deals with the one for Assets.
Asset Attribute Sets define industry specific; Condition, Dimension and Environment fields (Attributes) and User Fields, to be recorded for various Asset Types. Attribute Sets can vary considerably for different types of Asset but any Attribute Set can be assigned to multiple Assets Types that have the same data requirements but different Financial and Works Management characteristics. An Attribute Set is assigned to one or more Asset Types, each of which is assigned to one or more Assets so, when viewing an Asset, the Attribute and User Fields reflect the Attribute Set definition.
To create a new Asset Attribute Set follow these steps.
Step 1. Open the Attribute Set Editor form by either selecting the Attributes option from the View menu or clicking on the Attributes button on the tool bar. (Refer to the reference section on Attribute Sets for more detail)
Step 2. In the list of Attribute Set types, expand the Assets node to view all the current Attribute Sets. To create a new one, click the Add button and enter a Description
Step 3. In the Attributes form fill in the various labels for the sort of data that needs to be recorded. For example in the dimension section for a road there might be listed ‘Length’, ‘Width’, ‘Area’ and ‘Pavement Depth’. Dimensions can also have a Unit of Measure specified e.g. ‘m’ (meters) for length. Conditions can also be given a weight for the purpose of calculating a weighted average overall condition (e.g. the first condition might be weighted at 4, while the second is at 2, which would mean that the first Condition will be calculated as twice as significant as the second)
Step 4. In addition to the Condition, Dimension and Environment sections there are User Fields; up to 16 text, 8 number, 4 date, 8 check and 8 list fields that can be defined
Things to be aware of:
•An Attribute Set can be assigned to more than one Asset Type. Therefore Asset Types can be broken up to allow for different valuations but still only have one set of attributes for all the Assets of those types
•Integrity of data can be lost, when changing the Asset Type of an Asset, where the new Asset Type does not have the same Attribute Set as the old Asset Type
•User Fields should be defined for the type of Asset data but not for general Asset data. There are global User Fields that can be defined in the Options form. See Conquest Options.