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Why is this code producing an infinite loop

RichardFairhurst

I have tried this code and it is producing an infinite loop that repeatedly prints "0 Records Selected". I know that the query is resulting in 0 records being selected. Why is the value returned from the GetCount_management function that reports as 0 considered be greater than or equal to 1?

import arcpy
import os
from time import strftime


updateFC = r"C:\Users\RFAIRHUR\AppData\Roaming\ESRI\Desktop10.2\ArcCatalog\Trans Connection to SQL Server.sde\GDB_TRANS.TRANS.TRANSPORTATION_MAINT\CENTERLINE"


print "Make Feature Layer: " + strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
arcpy.MakeFeatureLayer_management(updateFC, "CENTERLINE_Layer")
arcpy.SelectLayerByAttribute_management("CENTERLINE_Layer", "NEW_SELECTION", "OBJECTID = -1")
records = arcpy.GetCount_management("CENTERLINE_Layer")
while (records >= 1):
    print str(arcpy.GetCount_management("CENTERLINE_Layer")) + " Records Selected: " + strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
    arcpy.SelectLayerByAttribute_management("CENTERLINE_Layer", "NEW_SELECTION", "OBJECTID = -1")
    records = arcpy.GetCount_management("CENTERLINE_Layer")
print "Finished All Records: " + strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")

This alteration to the code works without producing an infinite loop.

import arcpy
import os
from time import strftime


records = 0
while (records >= 1):
   print str(records) + " Records Selected: " + strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
##    print str(arcpy.GetCount_management("CENTERLINE_Layer")) + " Records Selected: " + strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
##    arcpy.SelectLayerByAttribute_management("CENTERLINE_Layer", "NEW_SELECTION", "OBJECTID = -1")
##    records = arcpy.GetCount_management("CENTERLINE_Layer")
print "Finished All Records: " + strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")

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Accepted answers

AntGiles

arcpy.GetCount_management returns a Result object and you have to cast it as int to check against it:

int(arcpy.GetCount_management("CENTERLINE_Layer").getOutput(0))

All comments

curtvprice

It only lets me mark one [as correct]

Richard Fairhurst‌ I realize this is is adding some meta to the thread -- but you can provide credit to others that add to the content of the thread by marking responses helpful and this will further up-rank the thread in searches. Just a thought!

AntGiles

Thanks Richard

RichardFairhurst

I switched the correct answer to yours, although I would say all of the answers I have seen are correct. It only lets me mark one, but since yours included the code I can paste into my script and was posted first, I switched the answer to yours. (I gave all of them Like points).

RichardFairhurst

Thanks. I had read that many months ago, but forgotten. I did consult the help for Get Count when I wrote the code, but obviously I only glanced through it and overlooked that it was returning an object and not a number.

AntGiles

Richard did this post not answer your question?

curtvprice

Let me amplify a bit because this is an important thread, and a FAQ for arcpy users!

This was a change made with the geoprocessor at 9.3. Before then, tools always returned strings. Now, you get a result object out from tools. This result object can contain one or several results, usually as unicode strings. Most tools have only one result (say, a path or a count) so you can easily get the string representation if you need it using the str() function.

>>> arcpy.GetCount_management("centroid_points.shp")
<Result '231'>
>>> arcpy.GetCount_management("centroid_points.shp").getOutput(0)
u'231'
>>> str(arcpy.GetCount_management("centroid_points.shp"))
'231'

Here's a function that makes getting that count a little easier:

def GetCount(input):
    """GetCount in one step (like 9.2 GetCount tool - except returns int)"""
    return int(arcpy.GetCount(input).GetOutput(0))

ThomasTri

GetCount returns a result object, not an integer count of the number of features selected.

see python - Cast arcpy result as an integer instead (arcpy.GetCount_management) - Geographic Information Systems Stack Exch…

AntGiles

arcpy.GetCount_management returns a Result object and you have to cast it as int to check against it:

int(arcpy.GetCount_management("CENTERLINE_Layer").getOutput(0))

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