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How to ignore Extended attributes while generating Physical model from Conceptual model in PowerDesigner

I am using two types of models, Conceptual and Physical, to design a database in PowerDesigner 16.6.

In the Physical model, I have specific extended attributes on model objects (tables and columns) that are used for export to a third-party system and are maintained only in the Physical model. They do not exist in the Conceptual model because they are not needed there, and it's hard to maintain them in the Conceptual model when using the option "Allow reuse data items."

When I update the existing Physical model from the Conceptual model, PowerDesigner in the "Merge Option" window suggests rewriting the values of extended attributes that do not exist in the Conceptual model but do exist in the Physical model.

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I expected that the native merge mechanism in PowerDesigner would ignore extended attributes that do not exist in the Conceptual model when mapping changes, but that is not the case.

I tried to find any options related to Extended Attributes, but there are no such options in PowerDesigner.

Is there any way to configure PowerDesigner to ignore extended attributes when matching changes between the Conceptual and Physical models, so that it does not suggest rewriting them, or if there are other ways to work around this issue?

Solution

  • When generating with Preserve modifications, you can unselect the Extended Attribute in the Comparison Options:

    Comparison Options dialog

    This will be preserved in the registry just for the CDM to PDM generation, and the attribute will not appeared in the merge dialog for following next PDM generations.

    [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Sybase\PowerDesigner 16\ModelOptions\Tool\Generation\Pdm\TABL]
"NotCmpExtAttributes"="EXTENDEDDEFINITION_1.foo"