topic Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class in ArcGIS Pro Questions

"A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

MichaelMarlatt1 — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 17:07:11 GMT

Hello there,

I'm using Pro ver 3.0 currently. I am having trouble with a point feature class that's not allowing its attribute table to be viewed. When I click on points I can see what I expect to see in the Pop-up window, but when I try to open the attribute table, or look at it in a Catalog window, I get the message "Failed to load data. A column was specified that does not exist." Specified by what? How can I find out what's supposedly missing so I can do something about it?

The feature class in question was created in FME Workbench (I have posted in their forums too) from an excel file. I have found numerous posts that involve using cursors in Python but I am not sure that helps in this case. Has anyone figured out how to troubleshoot this problem?

Thanks,

Mike

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

DavidPike — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 17:26:27 GMT

Do you have OBJECTIDs? Might be struggling to query the data without a primary key. Any potentially reserved SQL or ArcGIS names for the Excel columns? Did the original data participate in a join and didn't come across?

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

RaymondHuang_Sg — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 17:44:49 GMT

Could you share a screenshot of the fieldnames for this feature class?

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

MichaelMarlatt1 — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 17:58:41 GMT

Yes the OBJECTID column is created by the FME software. No reserved words that I recognize in the column names and the source data is not in a join.

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

MichaelMarlatt1 — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 18:03:10 GMT

Attached is what I am able to see in Pro's pop-up window when I click on one of the points in the feature class.

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

DavidPike — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 19:09:32 GMT

'GROUP' sticks out to me

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

MichaelMarlatt1 — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 19:21:09 GMT

That did it! I changed 'Group' to something else and the problem went away. Thank you @DavidPike !

What is it about 'Group' that was causing the problem?

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

DavidPike — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 19:36:54 GMT

Found this for posterity https://support.esri.com/en-us/knowledge-base/faq-what-are-the-reserved-words-for-esris-file-geodatab-000010906

When you open the attribute table it's running a SQL query against the database (FGDB) (I think!). GROUP is a reserved SQL keyword and probably causing a syntax error which there was no explicit error handling for (considering that FME is an unknown variable). Just my musings however.

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

SadieGoodrum — Thu, 29 Jun 2023 12:06:10 GMT

Hello,

I have had this problem before, when you convert the data it creates Multipart input features. This will cause an issue opening the attribute table. you can run a Geoprocessing tool. You use the Muiltpart to Singlepart Geoprocessing tool, this will create a feature class containing Singlepart features. You should be able to open your attribute table after that no problem.

Re: "A column was specified that does not exist"; File GDB point feature class

GISHCR — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 14:34:00 GMT

Had the same issue, I renamed the txt file and it worked (originally was xy 0.5 Well Search)

Guess it doesn't like decimals in titles