Local group TDS properties

Field Identification

Property Type Meaning
Data Element Separation Enumerated type Specify the method used to separate the data elements within the type. Select one of the following values:
  • Tagged Delimited. This value indicates that all elements within the complex type are identified by a tag, and separated by the value specified in the optional Delimiter property (if specified). You must set the Tag property for all child elements of simple type, and you may set the Delimiter property to a non-empty value. See Global element TDS properties. You must also set the Tag Data Separator or the Length of Tag properties.
  • Tagged Fixed Length. This value indicates that each element is identified by a tag, and the data has a fixed length. There are no delimiters. You must set the Tag property for each of the child elements of this complex type, and each child element must have a Length or Length Reference property assigned to it. You must also set the Tag Data Separator or the Length of Tag properties.
  • Tagged Encoded Length. This value indicates that all elements within the complex type are separated by a tag, and a length field follows each tag. There are no delimiters. The tag can be fixed length, as set by Length of Tag, or variable length delimited by the Tag Data Separator. You must also set Length Of Encoded Length so that the parser knows the size of the length field, and set Extra Chars in Encoded Length to tell the parser how many to subtract from the value in Length Of Encoded Length to get the actual length of data that follows the length field.

    This method provides a more flexible way of handling ACORD AL3 standard messages than Fixed Length AL3, by allowing different parts of the messages to be at different versions of the ACORD AL3 standard.

  • All Elements Delimited. This value indicates that all elements within the complex type are separated by a delimiter. You must set the value in the Delimiter property.
  • Variable Length Elements Delimited. This value indicates that some of the elements within the complex type might be of variable length: if they are, they must be delimited by the value specified in the Delimiter property.
  • Use Data Pattern. This value indicates that the parser determines the elements by matching the data with the regular expression set in the element or type member Data Pattern property. See Message definition file properties.
  • Fixed Length. This value indicates that all elements within the complex type are fixed length. The next data element is accessed by adding the value of the Length property to the offset (see Global element TDS properties). If you set the Data Element Separation property of a complex type to Fixed Length, you must also set the Data Element Separation property of all complex children of this type to Fixed Length. Each child element must have a Length or Length Reference property assigned to it.
  • Fixed Length AL3. This value has a similar meaning to the separation type Fixed Length, but also indicates to the parser that a number of predefined rules with regard to missing optional elements, encoded lengths, and versioning must be applied. If you set the Data Element Separation property of a complex type to Fixed Length AL3, you must also set the Data Element Separation property of all complex children of this type to Fixed Length AL3.
  • Undefined. This value is set automatically if you set the Type Composition property of a complex type to Message, and you cannot change it to any other value.

    Do not set the Type Composition property to Empty, Choice, Unordered Set, Ordered Set, Sequence, or Simple Unordered Set. If you do, you will be unable to check in the type.

Group Indicator String Specify the value of a special character or string that precedes the data belonging to a group or complex type within the bit stream.
Group Terminator String Specify the value of a special character or string that terminates data belonging to a group or a complex type within the bit stream.
Delimiter String Specify the value of a special character or string that specifies the delimiter used between data elements.

This property applies only to the delimited Data Element Separation methods (Tagged Delimited, All Elements Delimited, and Variable Elements Delimited).

Suppress Absent Element Delimiters Enumerated type Use this property to select if you want delimiters to be suppressed for elements that are missing within a message. Select from:
  • End Of Type. Use this option to suppress the delimiter when an element is missing. For example, if the model has been defined to have up to 3 elements and only 2 are present, the last delimiter can be omitted from the message.
  • Never. Use this option to ensure that even if optional elements are not present, all delimiters will be written out. This option should be used when the delimiter used to delimit parent and child objects is the same. For example, if an optional child element is missing, message processing applications could not tell where the child elements in a message ended and the next parent element started if the delimiters are all the same.
Observe Element Length Check box Applicable when Data Element Separation is All Elements Delimited and tells the TDS parser to take any Length property of child elements or attributes into account. The default value depends on the setting of the Messaging Standard property (at the message set level) and Data Element Separation properties.
  • Where Data Element Separation is All Elements Delimited and the Messaging Standard is set to TLOG , this property should be set. For all other messaging standards it should not be set.
  • Where Data Element Separation is Tagged Delimited this property should not be set.
  • Where Data Element Separation is Tagged Fixed Length, Fixed Length, Fixed Length AL3, or Variable Length Elements Delimited this property will be set and is disabled.
  • For all other data element separation methods, this property is not set and is disabled.
Any other combination will generate a task list warning.
Tag Data Separator Button and String Specify the value of a special character or string that separates the Tag from the data. The Tag Data Separator and Length of Tag properties are mutually exclusive.

If you set the property Tag Data Separator, it overrides Length of Tag.

This property applies only to the tagged Data Element Separation methods (Tagged Delimited, Tagged Fixed Length, and Tagged Encoded Length).

Length of Tag Integer Specify the length of a tag value. When the message is parsed, this allows tags to be extracted from the bit stream if the Tag Data Separator property is not set.

The Tag Data Separator and Length of Tag properties are mutually exclusive. If you set the property Tag Data Separator, it overrides this value.

This property applies only to the tagged Data Element Separation methods (Tagged Delimited, Tagged Fixed Length, and Tagged Encoded Length).

Length of Encoded Length Integer Specifies the number of characters (not bytes) after a tag that are used for the length field. Enter a value from 0 to 2147483647.

You must set this property if you have set Data Element Separation property to Tagged Encoded Length; it is not valid otherwise.

The actual number of data characters parsed also depends on the value of the Extra Chars in Encoded Length property.

Extra Chars in Encoded Length Integer (Only valid if the Data Element Separation method is set to Tagged Encoded Length.) Specifies the number of extra characters included in the value found in the length field. (For example, the value in the length might include the size of the length field itself as well as the size of the data field, or it might be the total size of the tag, length, and data fields.)

Enter a value from 0 to 2147483647. The parser subtracts this number from the number found in the length field to get the number of data characters that follow the length field.

You must set this property if you have set Data Element Separation property to Tagged Encoded Length and the actual number of data characters is less than the value found in the length field.

Repeating Element Delimiter String Specify the delimiter that is to be used between repeating elements.

This delimiter is used only when the element repeats and the Data Element Separation of the parent group or complex type is set to All Elements Delimited or Variable Length Elements Delimited.

A default value is provided if the above conditions are true as follows:

  • If the messaging standard is HL7, the mnemonic <HL7_RS> is used.
  • If the messaging standard is not HL7, and the maximum number of repeats is fixed, the delimiter of the parent group or complex type is used.

If none of the above rules are met, a default is not applied.

Length Reference Enumerated type Specify the identifier of a sibling Integer object, the value of which dictates the length of the object in question. The sibling object must be defined before the current object within the message structure.

For information about reordering elements, see Reordering objects.

Data Pattern String Specify the regular expression that is to be used by the parser to identify the data in the message to be assigned to the object. This property is used when the Data Element Separation method has been set to Use Data Pattern in the complex type. See Regular expression syntax for further details.
Related concepts
Physical formats in the MRM domain
TDS format
TDS format: Relationship to the logical model
Related tasks
Working with physical properties
Configuring physical properties
Related reference
Message model object properties
Physical properties for message model objects
Custom Wire Format physical properties for message model objects
XML wire format physical properties for message model objects
Documentation properties for all message set objects
Message model object properties by object