topic Re: merge-unmerge, please help in Data Management Questions

merge-unmerge, please help

KatarinaB — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 17:23:24 GMT

Hello,
I have a big problem...I have merged polygons, many of them. This was mistake in my work, so I want to know is there any possibility to unmerge it? To return my old polygons that have disapired...Is there any hope for it?:(
Thank you a lot.

Re: merge-unmerge, please help

RichardFairhurst — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 22:24:53 GMT

Hello,
I have a big problem...I have merged polygons, many of them. This was mistake in my work, so I want to know is there any possibility to unmerge it? To return my old polygons that have disapired...Is there any hope for it?:(
Thank you a lot.

I assume you have saved the edits already, since you could use undo if you were still in the edit session where you did the merge. If you were using SDE and had not committed the child version you were editing you could salvage the original data it it was posted in the unmerged state to a parent version.

If it is a shapefile, personal geodatabase or file geodatabase, you could only salvage your work if you had some sort of back up created by your IT department, which should be occurring if you keep your data on a network drive. I hope that helps.

Re: merge-unmerge, please help

JohnSobetzer — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 14:19:29 GMT

If you are using Windows 8 and file history is enabled maybe you can find an older version. In Windows 7 previous versions might allow the same. I've never used either, yet, and it strikes me it might be difficult to use either with folder type entities like coverages which also have info tables, or file geodatabases. But shapefiles with their limited files in number and sharing the same name, just different extensions, might be more feasible.

Re: merge-unmerge, please help

KatarinaB — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 15:57:58 GMT

Saving old files didn't work, we had some issues with our back up files. I had to work all over again 😕
thank you all for your answers!

Re: merge-unmerge, please help

MelanieSummers — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 20:25:39 GMT

If you merged features that do not share a boundary, you may be able to run the multipart to singlepart tool.

Best,
Melanie S.

Re: merge-unmerge, please help

KatarinaB — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 03:54:18 GMT

unfortunately, they have! thanks anyway!
K.

Re: merge-unmerge, please help

shanyu — Thu, 03 Apr 2014 22:50:04 GMT

If you merged features that do not share a boundary, you may be able to run the multipart to singlepart tool.

Best,
Melanie S.

That is exactly what I want!

Re: merge-unmerge, please help

TimLane — Wed, 18 Dec 2019 18:12:41 GMT

Multipart to single part can be useful, but with my understanding you cannot specify records within a feature layer. I was looking for a solution to this same problem where I had about 5 or 6 records within my "landscaping" layer that I had merged at one point but now realize they should be separate. Multipart to single part would have ran across all of the records when I really only wanted to touch the 5 or 6. What I found to work (in arcpro 2.4.0) is the 'Explode' Tool within the Tools section of your edit tab. You might have to scroll down a few but this worked exactly how I was wanting. I hope this helps any who are still searching this thread.