Maintaining folder structure when translating many files

Scenario:

You have many Esri shapefiles stored in unique folders. The files in these folders are standard/constant names, but the folders are always unique. How do you maintain this folder structure when writing these shape files to a new location? For example, the source shape files are stored like this:

c:\temp\BikePaths_Long BikePaths.shp BikePaths.dbf etc

c:\temp\BikePaths_Medium BikePaths.shp BikePaths.dbf etc

c:\temp\BikePaths_Short BikePaths.shp BikePaths.dbf etc

You want to maintain this folder structure in a Shape to Shape translation.

There are a couple of ways you can do this:



Method 1: use the fme_dataset attribute to do a dataset fanout

Downloads

Workspace as a template

The attached workspace demonstrates how to use the fme_dataset attribute to maintain folder structure. The key is to extract the folder name from the fme_dataset attribute, then use it in a dataset fanout.

See the Fanouts article for more information on dataset fanouts.



Method 2: Use FME in batch mode. The steps below show how to set accomplish this using File|Batch Deploy.

1. Set up a translation from one shapefile to shapefile.
2. Save workspace.
3. Go to Run> Batch Deploy (FME 2015 and higher):
   • Select Source Data Screen - click on "+" button and and select directory that contains all the shape files
   • Set Destination Location Screen - enter destination folder and check both options
   • Destination Data Directory Structure Screen - check "Recreate source directory tree

See Can FME be Used in Batch Mode for further details.