What's New in Version 12.5 - February 2012

New General Asset and General Survey object types

General Asset and General Survey object types have been added to both Collection and Distribution networks:

• General Asset - the General Asset is a point object that can be used to represent any asset type that is not connected to the water network and not supported by any of the other InfoNet asset objects. See the General Asset Data Fields (Collection) and General Asset Data Fields (Distribution) topics for more information.
• General Survey - the General Survey object is a planned activity to survey or inspect a single asset. The General Survey can be used to store survey data for asset objects that are not associated with any of the other specific InfoNet survey types. The X, Y location and condition data stored in the survey can be used to update asset location and condition information in the network. See General Surveys for further details.

New object types for Collection networks

The following object types have been added to Collection networks:

• Defence Area - the Defence Area object is a polygon object used to represent sea defence structures such as salt marshes, beaches or dunes
• Defence Structure - the Defence Structure object is a line object used to represent features such as embankments, groynes and sea walls. See the Defence Structure Data Fields topic for more information.
• Channel - the Channel object is a link object used to represent an open channel or waterway, whether natural or man made. See the Channel Data Fields topic for more information.
• Cross Section Survey - the Cross Section Survey object is a survey object used to store survey information of a cross section of a channel. Data from cross section surveys can be used in updating InfoWorks ICM networks. See Cross Section Survey Data Fields for further information.
• FOG Inspections - the FOG Inspection object is a survey object used to store survey information of a property in relation to Fats, Oils and Grease (FOG) waste disposal. See FOG Inspection Data Fields for further information.

Enhancements to General Maintenance and General Survey objects

General Maintenance objects can now be associated with many asset types, not just nodes and pipes. Assets are associated via new Asset type and Asset ID fields.

Connectivity of General Surveys has been extended to include: data logger, property, pump station and zone objects, as well as all new asset objects introduced in this version.

See Repairs and General Surveys for more information.

Resources and inventory grids added to incidents

The resource, materials, inventory and approval functionality that existed for surveys and repairs in pervious versions of InfoNet has been added to all Incident objects.

See Resources, Material and Managing Approval Statuses and Levels topics for details.

Flexible method for managing multiple attachments per object

In previous versions of InfoNet, network objects were restricted to a fixed number of image/photo fields.

In this version, it is now possible to include multiple attachments of any document type to all asset, survey, repair, zone and incident type objects.

A new Attachments Editor has been added to the object property sheet, which provides a flexible method of managing attachments. The editor can be used to add, change, view, delete and save attachments. Image fields from previous versions of InfoNet are now also managed via the Attachments Editor.

Image tooltips

Image tooltips display previews of images attached to network objects. Attachments and the Attachments Editor for an object can also be opened via the tooltip.

Image tooltips are turned on by checking the new Image Tooltips option on the Auto Labels and Tooltips page of the GeoPlan Properties and Themes Dialog.

See Customising Tooltips for further information.

Improvement to Scheduled Task update functionality

In previous versions of InfoNet, when updating scheduled tasks, all completed tasks were closed automatically.

In this version, closure of a completed task when updating scheduled tasks has been made optional by the addition of a new Close the task check box on the Custom Scheduling Dialog.

See Custom Scheduling and Scheduled Tasks for further information.

Ability to associate repairs and incidents to pipes using asset ID

This functionality is applicable to Collection Networks only.

In previous versions of InfoNet, it was possible to automatically associate some survey types with pipes by matching the PLR/asset ID field of the survey to the Asset ID field of a pipe.

In this version, the functionality has been extended to allow monitoring surveys, repairs and incidents to be associated to pipes using the same method. In order to implement this tool, a PLR/asset ID field has been added to:

• all Incident objects
• Pipe Repair and General Maintenance objects
• the Pipes editor of Pipe Clean objects

New options have been added to the Selection | Join/Connect menu to allow joining of selected repairs and incidents to pipes.

See the Joining Selected Repairs with Pipes and Joining Selected Incidents with Network Objects topics for details.

Ability to update pipe name groups from pipe asset ID

This functionality is applicable to Collection Networks only.

An improvement has been made to the import of pipe name groups via the Open Data Import Centre.

It is now possible to choose to Update based on asset ID when importing pipe name group data. If a matching pipe asset ID is found, the US node ID, DS node ID and Link suffix values of the pipe name group entry will be automatically populated on import. If a matching asset ID is not found, an error will be displayed in the import log.

See the Open Data Import Centre topic for further information.

Ability to specify alternative report templates location

A new option has been added to the Report Options Dialog to allow an alternative report templates folder location to be specified for use in generating built-in reports. The specified folder may be used to store customised templates to be used instead of the installed default templates.

The template folder location may be specified on a per network or per database basis. See Report Options Dialog for details.

Extension to tool for selecting objects in selected zones

In previous versions of InfoNet it was possible to select objects within a selected zone using the tool from the Selection Toolbar.

In this version, this functionality has been extended to allow objects to be selected within all other polygon object types also: properties, pump stations, storage areas (Collection Networks) and treatment works.

See Selecting Objects in a Polygon for details.

Improvements to Update from CCTV survey functionality

The Ignore Observations option on the Update Network from CCTV Survey Dialog is used to ignore defect codes at a specified distance from a node and is useful for preventing duplicate nodes from being created when updating from surveys multiple times. However, subsequent CCTV surveys may have 'new' defect observations at the same location as existing nodes, representing new connection pipes from new properties.

The update functionality has been updated so that when creating connection pipe stubs using the Ignore Observations option, a stub will be created if a defect within the specified distance has a clock position that creates the connection stub on the side of the pipe that does not already have a nearby connection pipe.

In addition, the Diameter of created connection pipes is now set from CCTV defect data where possible.

See Updating the Network from CCTV Survey Data for further information.

Enhancement to CCTV data import from MSCC XML format

An enhancement has been made to the import of CCTV survey data from MSCC XML format.

New options have been added to the Import MSCC XML Dialog, which allow the survey US Node ID to be used instead of the Start Node ID when generating InfoNet CCTV IDs. This naming method produces survey names that are more closely related to the surveyed pipe's PLR.

See Importing CCTV Survey Data for further information.

Improvement to CCTV data import from Examiner and Sewer .dat files

Options for handling duplicate CCTV records when importing from Examiner and Sewer .dat files have been added to the CCTV Data Import Dialog. Using these options it is now possible to choose not to import duplicate surveys, or to import duplicate surveys as new surveys by incrementing the index part of the survey ID.

Previously, duplicate surveys were always imported by incrementing the index in the survey ID.

See Importing CCTV Survey Data for further information.

Enhancement to drawing of CCTV surveys

Improvements have been made to the drawing of CCTV surveys. The following rules now apply:

• If the associated pipe is found, but the survey direction is not known, the survey is drawn in the middle of the pipe with a length of zero
• If the associated pipe is not found, the survey is drawn at the upstream node with a length of zero
• If the upstream node is not found, the survey is drawn at the downstream node with a length of zero
• If none of the above are found, the survey has no geometry and is not drawn

The location of surveys with zero length can be found by selecting the survey in the grid, right clicking on the GeoPlan and selecting Zoom to selection from the context menu. A symbol can also be added to the CCTV theme to aid with location of zero length surveys: the symbol will be drawn at the survey location drawn according to the rules above.

For more information, see CCTV Surveys.

Display of CCTV scores on long section

New functionality has been implemented to allow CCTV score information to be displayed on the Long Section Window.

Display of score information is controlled by the new Defect chart dropdown on the Long Section Properties Dialog. A trace of either structural or service scores can be displayed.

See Displaying CCTV Defects on the Network Windows for further information.

CCTV Defect Labels

It is now possible to display labels on the GeoPlan for CCTV defects.

• Defects that are currently visible on the GeoPlan can be auto-labelled with their defect code by selecting the new Show defect labels option on the CCTV Defects Page of the GeoPlan Properties Dialog.
• Custom labels can be applied to currently displayed defects by clicking on the defect with the Label tool
• Display custom labels for currently visible defects of selected CCTV surveys by using the new menu option: Selection | Selection operations | Custom label defects for selected CCTV surveys

See Displaying CCTV Defects on the Network Windows and Displaying Labels on the GeoPlan for further information.

Ability to batch import CCTV files extended

In version 11.5, the ability to batch import CCTV data from MSCC XML, BEFDSS XML and SUFRIB SUF formats was introduced.

In this version, this functionality has been extended to allow multiple files to be selected for import from the following formats:

• Examiner .dat
• Sewer .dat
• PACP .mdb
• MACP .mdb

See Importing CCTV Survey Data for further information.

User defined date fields

Five User Date fields have been added to all network object property sheets and grid views.

See Common Data Fields for further information.