Raster to ascii

Question

Hi,
I am trying to convert a raster to ascii in ArcMap 10, but I can only get an output with the .txt file extension - even when I specify .asc
can anyone help?
thanks heaps,
April

OliverBurdekin · Answer

Hi Guys,

I've been trying this out and need to do it pro grammatically as I have a lot of rasters I am iterating through to convert to .asc.  I tried specifying this in the raster to ASCII tool but then I end up with %filename%.asc.TXT  I also tried the suggestion above of using calculate value.  I get this error when I run it:

Executing: CreateEnvLayersFile C:\Users\OJB\Desktop\BurdsGIS\CollabPapers\Mimeticus\WorldClim\asc2 C:\Users\OJB\Desktop\BurdsGIS\CollabPapers\Mimeticus\WorldClim	min_clip NOT_RECURSIVE
Start Time: Thu Dec 06 14:12:56 2012
Executing (Iterate Rasters): IterateRasters C:\Users\OJB\Desktop\BurdsGIS\CollabPapers\Mimeticus\WorldClim	min_clip # # NOT_RECURSIVE
Start Time: Thu Dec 06 14:12:57 2012
Succeeded at Thu Dec 06 14:12:57 2012 (Elapsed Time: 0.00 seconds)
Executing (Raster to ASCII): RasterToASCII C:\Users\OJB\Desktop\BurdsGIS\CollabPapers\Mimeticus\WorldClim	min_clip\clip_tmin_1 C:\Users\OJB\Desktop\BurdsGIS\CollabPapers\Mimeticus\WorldClim\asc2\e_clip_tmin_1.TXT
Start Time: Thu Dec 06 14:12:57 2012
Succeeded at Thu Dec 06 14:12:59 2012 (Elapsed Time: 2.00 seconds)
Executing (Calculate Value): CalculateValue newext("C:\Users\OJB\Desktop\BurdsGIS\CollabPapers\Mimeticus\WorldClim\asc2\e_clip_tmin_1.txt","asc") "def newext(file,ext):
    import os
    newfile =  os.path.splitext(file)[0] + "." + ext
    os.rename(file,newfile)" Variant
Start Time: Thu Dec 06 14:12:59 2012
ERROR 000539: Error running expression: newext("C:\Users\OJB\Desktop\BurdsGIS\CollabPapers\Mimeticus\WorldClim\asc2\e_clip_tmin_1.txt","asc") <type 'exceptions.WindowsError'>: [Error 123] The filename, directory name, or volume label syntax is incorrect
Failed to execute (Calculate Value).
Failed at Thu Dec 06 14:12:59 2012 (Elapsed Time: 0.00 seconds)
Failed to execute (CreateEnvLayersFile).
Failed at Thu Dec 06 14:12:59 2012 (Elapsed Time: 3.00 seconds)

SteveLynch · Answer

April

The default extension in the RasterToASCII GP tool is .txt, however, you can also use .asc

These are the 2 extensions to use. If you create it using the .asc extension then it becomes a supported raster data format, i.e. you can use it in ArcGIS as any other raster dataset (no need to then use ASCIIToRaster).

Please can you share a screenshot of the dialog or are you doing it via scripting.

Thanks
Steve

AprilReside · Answer

Hi all,
Many thanks for the help!  It seems that changing the extension .txt to .asc outside of ArcMap worked fine.  Thanks