# Groups of blocks
**URL:** https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015
**Category:** ParaView Support
**Created:** [July 28, 2025, 11:30am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015 "2025-07-28T11:30:40Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@JMeier](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/JMeier)
#### Post date: [July 28, 2025, 11:30am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015/1 "2025-07-28T11:30:40Z")
Dear Community,
I’m using Paraview to visualize and analyze data from ExodusII-Files. Those ExodusII files consist of a number of blocks. Using “object properties” (see section 4.12.1 in [https://sandialabs.github.io/seacas-docs/exodusII-new.pdf](https://exodusII-new.pdf)) I tried to define groups of objects (e.g. all blocks to be examined in detail, or all blocks representing a special part of my model, etc.).
Now, it seems that Paraview is ignoring those “object properties” in my ExodusII file. To be more precise: I do not find them anywhere in Paraview (but they are present in my ExodusII-file according to netcdf-ncdump.exe).
Now I’d like to ask some questions:
- Does Paraview allow to represent groups of blocks (where one block may be assigned to several groups)?
- Is Paraview really ignoring the ExodusII object properties? Or did I miss something?
- Depending on the answer to the questions above: Ho to use ExodusII object properties to have block groups?
Kind regards,
Jörg
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### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2025, 12:51pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015/2 "2025-08-04T12:51:49Z")
> [@JMeier](#):
>
> Does Paraview allow to represent groups of blocks (where one block may be assigned to several groups)?
I’m afraid no. You can store that information in the form of FieldData with some duplication of information, but it will be your own formalism and ParaView will interpret it just as data.
> Is Paraview really ignoring the ExodusII object properties? Or did I miss something?
Looks like it does, but you will need to share some data if you want us to check
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### Author:  [@JMeier](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/JMeier)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2025, 12:13pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015/3 "2025-08-05T12:13:58Z")
Dear Mr. Westphal,
First of all, thank you very much for your reply and the information. This clears things up.
As kind of a feature request: The option to have groups of blocks in Paraview would be great.
Please find attached an exodus model consisting of an array on blocks. The blocks get activated/deactivated over time and are assigned to two groups: “OddVolumes” and “EvenVolumes” (via eb\_prop2 and eb\_prop3).
[BinaryBlocks.7z](https://discourse.paraview.org/uploads/short-url/v9QlaSooeGe8LjssklhgOtJmKyL.7z) (355.0 KB)
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### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2025, 12:26pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015/4 "2025-08-05T12:26:11Z")
Indeed, these properties do not seem to be read by ParaView as far as I can tell.
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### Author:  [@JMeier](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/JMeier)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2025, 12:27pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015/5 "2025-08-05T12:27:59Z")
Thanks for checking. But due to the fact Paraview is currently not supporting groups, there is also no point in reading them.
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### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2025, 12:30pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/groups-of-blocks/17015/6 "2025-08-05T12:30:00Z")
As I said, they could be read as data and be used in ParaView for coloring, selection and extraction.