Improve the performance of model builder feature selection iterator

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01-31-2011 04:18 AM
Status: In Product Plan
Labels (1)
DuncanHornby
MVP Notable Contributor

The Feature Selection Iterator has been a long time coming for model builder and I use it regularly. Whilst it helps simplify models (we don't need to use Python for looping) I have noticed that it's performance can take a hit when there is a large selection.

I run models that crunch large datasets and I often find that ArcGIS simply runs out of memory. A solution to this is to select a subset of my data and crunch in batches. OK it means I have to keep an eye on everything and restart the processing but it gets the job done. If I pre-select a lot of data I notice the Iterator takes much longer to run it's make featurelayer routine.  So as a real work example I have a File Geodatabase point layer with 12,000 points each needs to be processed individually. If I chuck it at my model with no selection it eventually runs out of memory. If I select say 500 points then the iterator's make feature layer step takes about 9 seconds before it moves onto the next model process. If I select say 2000 points (this would not crash ArcGIS) it takes about 45 seconds to make feature layer.

2 Comments
ChrisFox
Thank you for posting the idea. I attempted to replicate the issue described in the second paragraph and was unable to reproduce the behavior. Would it be possible to share more details on this issue or even contact me directly and share your model?
RandalHale
I just hit the same problem processing 300,000 points. [out of memory]